Where I'm From

I am from the eternal spring, where we cook with sunlight and say "please" and "thank you". My house in the eternal spring welcomes you with a bouquet of potpourri and my mother's voice. She always seems to be shouting, but that's just because she's so full of radiant energy, like the sun. She is in the bougainvilleas outside, and in the tabachín, but my grandmother is in the lemon tree and my dad and Papay are on their way out to the patio to have a drink from the library that smells like books, an old desk, and cologne. I don't think they'll ever stop talking about Mexico. I hear their voices when I drink lemonade, or when I make quesadillas, or in the huevos tibios, rancheros, revueltos, a la mexicana. I smell potpourri again when a friend or a neighbor visits, or when I visit them and discover a large clay sun adorning their wall. Even though the movie theater is now a showroom for European cars and the old plaza is now an upscale shopping center, where I'm from can't be paved over because, you see, where I'm from is not a place, but the eternal spring that lives in bougainvilleas, quesadillas, old books, and cologne.