I Remember

Loot and lascivious

Grandma Pia Birth 13 kids.
My uncle's names are: Mario, Amado, Bimbo(RIP), Enrique(RIP my dad) Abel, Alex, Juan, Andres(RIP), Ricardo, and my aunt's names are: Mirta, Belkis, and Mercedez. Plus several still born. Plus five additional ones on their dad's side, I don't know them though.
It is important to know your family members you don't want to marry your cousin or for any of your children or grandchildren to marry a cousin either. So I'm glad for the ones that I do know. Hoping I meet everyone one if they stop having babies.
From October to February I seen daddy a handful of times. Panama got invaded by USA on December 20th 1989. The whole city was upside down, we were out there looting the city, people was breaking into plazas, malls, supermarkets, shoe stores, restaurants, electronic stores, it was wild. We ate good for a long long time, Best Christmas and New year Ever!! It took a while to restore order back into the city, with all the looting, burning and killing that went on the armed forces held a city wide mandatory curfew. They had to, they warned that if anybody was caught anywhere after 9pm they were going to shoot to kill. We aren't no fools, we hung out outside the house, threw house parties with barbeques, and music. We made it work in our neighborhoods. The invasion was a sad thing thought, people died in the midst of the USA 's attempt to bring down Noriega and the corruption in the government. They blew up all the headquarters and the police stations and anything with any type of military in it. Most of these bases where located near neighborhoods that went up in flames and thousands of innocent blood was shed. The entire ghetto was gone and all the adjacent hoods. It was a great thing to rid us of the bad condemned buildings, but people died in the process, for a while you could smell the dead bodies as they decomposed and the burnt skin from the ones who burnt to death and wasn't found. Body parts etc, it was sad.
On that particular night we were painting the house. It was December so the houses get painted before Christmas, It is customary to do so.
Leo was on top of a ladder painting away as the breaking news hit the airs. He climbed down that ladder and turned up the TV. Every body got quiet. All we heard them said was: " All military personnel please report to your local base immediately, failure to do so will result in automatic termination and possible encarceration. The country Is under attack....repeat...."
Leo looked at all of us and immediately went and took a shower, uniformed up, and hugged and kiss everybody, Leo was scared for the first time. He had tears in his eyes, he kissed and hugged grandma, turned around and told Leonel to make sure he finish painting the house and to look after grandma. No body liked Leo but we all loved him some how, it was sad. Grandma asked him to come back in one piece, he didn't reply. Leo knew his stuff, after days of being gone he came back. Leo had a contract with the Devil he wasn't going no where.
After the holidays passed Summer vacation started in Panama, we all went to the river and Lord and behold, we seen my sister and daddy. I was so happy to see them, my sister seemed different more quiet and distant. Daddy was just daddy. She came to us and we got in the water and proceeded to have fun. I kept on asking her where daddy go, she shrugged and said I don't know. A while passed and then here he come walking from the bushes. We could smell him before we could see him. He was smoking marihuana and snorting cocaine. Of course he would embarrass us. He was "Quique" as they called him, unruly and nonchalant. But he was also human and our dad, like it or not. We stayed there for a long while, he tried to hang but grew bored, he was never a dad so being around His kid's was unknown to him. He didn't know how to act. We demanded too much of what he wanted. You see, kids automatically jump into kids roles, They find out you are dad or mom and their spirits are so thirsty and voided for that character in their lives, that they forget the sin forgive and just love unconditionally. They make the mistake of assuming the grown up will do the exact same and when it doesn't happened they end up broken hearted and confused, often blaming themselves for not being who that parent wanted TWICE. We think hey I'm your long lost kid, I'm sure you have been missing this role. Nope, Negative!! it's not the same, especially if you abandoned your role voluntarily or never even assumed it. Big difference.
Anyhow, my sister left and I felt sad because I had missed her terribly, but I was glad that she got away from Leo...
One day I went to visit grandma, every body was there except daddy and my sister. Every one asked but no one knew. My sister Jackelyn had let a huge elephant in the room prior to my arrival. Once I got there it was a big elephant in the room. Some people were angry others where shocked, others in denial. Jacky was said to act weird at times, she had a history of suicidal attempts, etc. So the unbelievers used that fact against her. Others knew it was true. She told me that daddy was raping my sister daily. She said it was sick, horrible and she couldn't believe it. She said she had gone and ask to stay with them once, because she wanted to live with daddy also, she said she was even jealous that he would only take my sister Mirta with him when we all needed him. She owned that much, he finally agreed she said and brought her along. My sister had told him what was going on at home with Leo touching her and stuff, he got all mad, went to my grandma's job, threatening to kill Leo if he ever touch her etc, made a big dramatic scene and said he was taking her with him, this is how and why she ended up with him. Jacky didn't know that much, all she knew and thought was, that it wasn't fair to her. So she went and stayed with them. She said it came time for bed and her and Mirta was sharing a bed, but as soon as daddy come in, he would ask Mirta to change beds. Jacky's feelings were hurt by it, she felt left out of the love, until she heard my sister crying one night and him moaning barking orders at my sister. She decided to peek in through the curtains that's when she saw him pull his gun out on my sister. She burst out crying and took off running from that house all the way up the hill towards grandma's house. She told every soul she could, daddy said she was lying that she was jealous and crazy. I knew it was the truth, I was furious, why would you take your child from being molested to pure Hell???!!!
Who knows!!! Sad case....
He got killed shortly after that. My sister never came back home. It was a disaster.