I was born on Mexican Independence Day, Mexico’s Fourth of July, but for over half a century now, other than an annual “Happy Mexican Independence Day!” from my good friends, Hung, Corinne, and Kate, I have never combined the two celebrations—until yesterday when Jody and I drove to Downtown Los Angeles to spend the afternoon on Olvera Street.
Olvera Street is special. To share straight from its website, “Olvera Street, known as ‘the birthplace of Los Angeles,’ is a Mexican Marketplace that recreates a romantic ‘Old Los Angeles’ with a block-long narrow, tree-shaded, brick-lined market with old structures, painted stalls, street vendors, cafes, restaurants, and gift shops.” If that sounds lovely, the reality is even better, and it struck me as a terrific place to celebrate my birthday and Mexican Independence Day.
On the sixteenth day of September in 1810, Father Miguel Hidalgo y Costillo spoke to his little parish church in central Mexico and urged them to fight for independence from Spain, which led to his execution a year later and over a decade of fighting, but ultimately, an independent Mexico. And yesterday, 213 years after his initial “Cry of Dolores,” beautiful families gathered together, children danced in festive costumes, and Mexican flags flew proudly in the City of Angels.
It was not our first time to visit Olvera Street, but it was our first since returning for Part Two of our California adventure, and during yesterday’s visit I recalled that familiar and wonderfully unsettling sensation of feeling like a tourist in your own homeland. I have come to relish that feeling.
Now, given my personal appearance, I rarely look around any place and get the feeling that I fit in exactly. On certain dramatic occasions, like wandering through an Indian bazaar high in the Himalayas or briskly walking down a side street in Nairobi, the gawks and smiles of locals showed how apparent this was to everyone, but I feel out of place in all sorts of locations, like the cosmetics aisle of any department store, or to be honest, Bass Pro Shops.
But as I said, in a certain way, I now find that feeling almost intoxicating.
Independence absolutely has a dark side, including the colonizing mindset that views your independent self as God’s gift to unfortunate people not like you, but I felt independent in a good way walking through Olvera Street on Saturday—independent in the sense that I am not contained by familiarity, at least not anymore.
I’m not sure that I’m making sense, so let me try it this way: I felt both humbled and alive on Olvera Street yesterday, humbled and alive with the fascination of this beautifully diverse planet on which we live, and the realization that the differences all around me are better embraced than critiqued, and that in that sense—the sense of the heart—“my” people can be “all” people.
I hope that you enjoyed your Mexican Independence Day, too!
Jewelry. A spa package. Something for the house. A lovely dinner. One might have guessed such an answer to my innocent question: What do you want for your birthday? But my wife said: Trapeze School. That was her immediate response. Like it wasn’t crazy at all.
Today is my wife’s birthday, and the specific number is none of your business (or, apparently, mine!). Jody’s parents both worked as tax preparers back in 19-whenever when she made her grand entrance on April 14—talk about demanding attention from the very start! She deserves a lot of attention. Jody is, hands down, the most impressive person that I know.
George Washington’s 285th birthday is two days away, my how the time flies, but today marks the federal holiday in his honor. Close to half of these United States extends the holiday to all presidents, but I live in one of the many states that sticks with the federal designation of “Washington’s Birthday” in honor of the man known as the father of this country.
Starting to Look Up 