I , named Jimena. The Mortal Tribute

Thoughts swirled in my mind as I pondered how to celebrate today, April 23rd, World Book Day, with all of you. And it occurred to me that nothing could be more fitting than sharing a snippet from "Yo, llamada Jimena" ("I, called Jimena"), specifically from "The Mortal Tribute" (book 3), which is currently undergoing revision. This excerpt belongs to its first part, "The Return."

IV

There are moments in life one doesn't know how to confront, and there are situations that, no matter how much time passes, still cause pain if remembered. Allowing those somber moments to pass through us, letting them depart without wreaking the havoc they once did, is a virtue; to refrain from shedding tears as they pierce through us is a miracle. There are moments in life that etch themselves forever within you; nobody can aid you with them. You silence them, yet not speaking of them doesn't mean they don't haunt your mind each day. (...). She endeavored to cushion the physical discomfort it caused her by summoning forth countless images and beautiful moments they had shared. Yet sometimes, nothing could quell that dull ache that remained unaltered in her mind year after year.

Driving offered a pleasant sensation of physical progress but also provided a distraction from thoughts that often, in Jimena's case, looped back to the past, weaving disjointed narratives of other journeys, tender moments, her mother, her childhood, the scent of apples, the wind on her face, rain in her hair, memories, flashes, like lightning bolts that completely abstracted her mind, causing her to lose track of time. Moments, so many, countless moments, all parading through her mind as she continued to drive automatically.

Anna fell asleep quickly, and Jimena found solace in the fact that they were drawing closer with each passing mile; in the haze of her thoughts, she was already there. Not in the present; as the journey progressed, her mind regressed, drifting further into the past.

How grateful she was that the child slept! It allowed her to cry, to let tears flow freely down her cheeks. She cried for everything and for nothing. It was difficult to explain those emotions that surged between joy and sadness, walking that fine line was where she always found herself now.

She could no longer say, as she did when she slept embraced by Antonio in her youth, "I am completely happy." She had uttered those words many times in the dead of night in Néstor's arms, but she could never say them again, and she knew it. When life shows you darkness, you understand how illusory all emotions are—fleeting, fragile as butterfly wings, as enduring as sighs. She settled for being serene, knowing full well that we were all just passing through each other's lives, savoring every second with her son and granddaughters from that firm conviction.

Ironically, whenever someone insisted that we come into this world to be happy, Jimena would smile. "Happiness"—a word as overused as it was unreal, as exploited in marketing as by the gurus of mind power... as absurd to Jimena as the other extreme, the religions that strive to console you for the misfortunes you endure by promising paradise after death. No, Jimena didn't believe we come into this world to suffer, that this is the world of sin and pain, and that only after death will we find paradise if we've been "good."

In reality—Jimena thought—nothing mattered, and precisely that made living interesting. She had long ago promised herself not to try to control anything, just to adapt to the waves of life without complaining. So she offered no resistance; with each passing day, she understood her mother more and more, simply existing, accompanying, and not questioning anything.

She journeyed inward, and almost always her stops were in the past, not the future. The present was merely passing through. In the past, she knew clearly where she had paused, why she had done so. She had woven the "novel" of her experiences and constructed the whys and wherefores; in hindsight, everything was "fitting," and she could make sense of it.

That was enough for her. As a child, she always felt curious about that sensation conveyed by elderly people that this present world wasn't for them. They regarded it with taciturnity and detachment, trivializing everything, as if looking away. Now, she recognized herself doing the same.

"I've been going blind, losing my hearing, and all other senses," her mother had once told her, "but I see, hear, and understand better than ever."