take my chances every chance i get

before i was old enough to drive, my grandmother Tallu and i were alone at Jekyll and needed to go off the island for something on the mainland, about a 20 minute drive into town. we climbed into the beach car—an old, standard Subaru and left. after we crossed the bridge and got on the causeway, i realized my grandmother didn’t really know how to drive stick. she fidgeted around with the gears and clutch and we made a jerking mess on the road. i asked her if she knew what she was doing, my eyes wide in disbelief, and she said more or less and so we made our choppy way into town, with starts, stops, tons of mistakes and lots of laughter. the whole trip was fueled by my grandmother’s huge appetite for life and her scrappy voracity for going for what she wants in a big way. i just held my breath and cheered her on.

my friend and colleague Jairo gives me dap every time i do good with my Spanish. he took me to visit his brother Gadiel a couple weeks ago, who is the Nicaraguan ambassador to Uruguay. we passed an afternoon together, playing songs on the guitar and drinking beers on his patio. it felt comfortable and i began asking them questions about their work, and about Nicaraguan politics—difficult to understand in any language. in turn, they asked me about why i moved to Nicaragua, my politics, my faith and what i believe in—difficult to explain in my own native language. i was scrappy with my Spanish and made a million mistakes the whole way through. they were both so patient, each of them celebrating my smallest improvements. at the end of the afternoon, Gadiel kissed me on the cheek and said to his brother over my shoulder, “Esa muchacha, ella es una luchadora.” Jairo and i climbed into his pickup to leave and before shifting gears, he gave me some major dap.

last week, my colleague Marcelino asked me to join him and eight other men we work with for a meeting to discuss how we might celebrate the fifteen mothers in our office for La Dia de las Madres, which was this past weekend. we gathered in Jairo’s office for the meeting, and Marcelino asked us for possible themes. everyone was quiet for a while, and finally i mentioned one possible theme, mostly to break the silence. i was going slow with my Spanish and Marcelino stood up in the middle of my idea and started talking to another colleague. i looked up at him and said no hombre, you asked us for ideas and this is my idea and i know my Spanish is not perfect, but please listen to me because this is important and i am trying so hard. all of the other men laughed and made noises and one of them leaned back and did that thing guys do with their fingers by waving their hands in the air and snapping their fingers when something good or funny happens. Jairo reached out across the gathered group to give me dap; Marcelino sat back down, humbled, smiling.

i love when that insatiable enthusiasm for getting where we want to go shows itself—loving, ready, wanting, expectant. we can rarely get there as gracefully as we wish to, but i like when we try anyway. we held the Mother’s Day service last Friday, which was, by the way, totally fueled by my idea for a theme. in the middle of it, i had the opportunity to mention my own strong mother and two grandmothers by name—all three of them luchadoras in tough and tender ways. my Spanish was slow, stubborn and full of errors, just like my grandmother driving that car she only almost knew how to drive. but i let my want for going out fuel my going out; i was so scrappy, i was so bad, and it was so, so good.