You remember that time when something funny or something bizarre happened to you? And your best friend told the story better than yourself? Like it happened to them? You stare at them in wonder and laugh because they own it, they own that story!
Pito had such a friend. William, or as my dad used to call him, by his full name,”William Lara Cintron”! They met in the D.R. as teens, and when Pito arrived to NY in 1962, it was William who welcomed him, found him a room to rent in the same boarding house that he lived in, on Amsterdam and W. 83rd Street on the Upper West Side. In just over a week William also helped him get his first job at the factory in Brooklyn, where he worked.
William was a national poet laureate for the D.R. and in their youth, he and Pito composed and recited poems together – it was their greatest joy to outdo each other. This sense of competition carried over to other aspects of their lives. They both studied upholstery craft and opened shops that also sold plastic and slip covers and sold furniture on credit plans. They both married twice had children and would go out a couple of times a month together. They shared work, helped each other out during bad times and celebrated good times. Their children became friends, friendships that endure up to this day. William was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s a few years ago. It’s about mid-to-late stage now. He may forget what he ate or even where he lives, but he always remembers Pito and their grand friendship. And he loved to tell stories about my dad repeatedly.
Whenever they would visit towards the end of Pito’s life, they would reminice. Pito would sit on the plastic-covered couch with his friend and talk softly to him. William would stare straight ahead in his own world. One time we were all sat around the living room. Our conversations had the ebb and flow to them of familial things. Suddenly, William turned to me and says,
“Rose, did you know that your dad killed a bull?”
I know this story but I let him tell it anyway. (it was a donkey, not a bull)
“Si! this bull kicked him and threw him against the cactus lining on the road and he got stung all over!”
“Really?” (I say trying to looking interested in a story I had heard before.)
“Si, and you know what he did?”
“Tell me.” (this is the best part)
“The next week he tied a bottle rocket to the bull’s tail and lit it up – that thing landed on the road with all four hoofs in the air, haha!”
Pito turned to me and added:
“Yeah, Papa gave me such a licking that I was bed-ridden for a week!”
William chuckled to himself and then went back to staring straight ahead.
As we waited for a taxi to take us back home, I asked my dad if he ever regretted what he did.
“Claro que no – that bull had it coming!”
And just like that, the legend grew by William’s storytelling. It was no longer a poor hapless, ungraceful donkey but an enraged, indignant bull that narrowed its eyes on my father, the innocent by the side of the road. William never forgot that story, nor did he change the way he told it. He made it his own. And my dad was one to let greatness have its day.
William recently celebrated his 80th birthday surrounded by lots of family and love. My father would have loved to have been there, heck, I would loved to have been there. No doubt, Pito would have spun that well-told yarn about how after painting the town red and black, William would precariously drive them both home, crossing the George Washington Bridge with just his index finger on the steering wheel of the car. Barely making it home alive only to laugh it off the next day. Well, talk about taking the bull by the horns!
Somewhere in Between 