The Destinies of Many People
HAVANA TIMES – Sometimes you feel like crying, you hold it in, and no one notices your feeling of helplessness. Other times, you can’t hide it, and someone sees you. That last one happened to me with my aunt. She immediately asked: “So, Lien, what’s with all the crying?”
I’m crying, I replied, because I was born miserable, and I thought that if I studied, worked, and did the right things, I’d escape this damned poverty. Life showed me I was wrong. My two master’s degrees in Bioethics and Theology didn’t matter, my bachelor’s in theology didn’t matter, my technical degree in Economics didn’t matter, my millions of hours reading didn’t matter, all the courses I took across the country didn’t matter, all the schools and training spaces I went through (both as a student and a teacher) didn’t matter. None of it mattered… I’m still the same miserable person I was at birth. Now I have soap (sometimes without water, and the soap comes from a cousin in Miami), and during the special period crisis, I only had water hauled from wells blocks away from the house. My sense of fulfillment is on the floor.
“Lien, what you’re feeling isn’t something unique to you,” my aunt told me, not just to comfort me, but to show me a truth that’s lived daily on this island. “Your cousin (her daughter) has a degree in Economics, and right after finishing her two years of social service, she started selling gelatin from home. All the girls she used to tutor now live abroad. One is a dancer, another a bartender, others I don’t even know what they do, but they’re the ones who send food and money from there for celebrations.
Her husband, an electrical engineer, buys discounted items in stores to resell them on social media. That’s how they make a living. But he stays in touch and receives photos from his best university friends who all left for the United States, jumping borders like almost everyone else, and started a company. They tell him how well they’re doing. Imagine how he must feel? Reselling kitchen knives or baby bathtubs.
It’s true, I said. It’s almost all of Cuba in that situation. I had to admit she was right. I was being immature. My case isn’t like that of a castaway with the rest of the crew missing. If anything, we’re millions of castaways trying to figure out how to survive all the time.
I hate the saying ‘misery loves company,’ but it’s true. When you realize you’re not the only one cursed, you find a kind of relief. Something like… well, I’m not alone in this mess. Maybe it’s just a bad time we’ll get through soon, God willing.
I wiped my eyes. And started selecting the books I plan to sell the next day. I didn’t talk about it anymore. In fact, I won’t allow myself to wonder again why everything I did didn’t matter. I’ll learn to reflect on what I’ll do from now on.