A very special birthday...

I confess to being far too fond of the History Channel and sitting home with the flu makes the T.V. all the more my friend. All week the History Channel has reminded me that Feb. 6th would be the 100th birthday of Ronald Regan. This is something that I would just as soon not give a second thought to, but for the lives of two important people that so shaped who I am today. My father, Pedro Grimaldo and my great aunt Amanda Villanueva Hernandez, both of who passed away some years ago and also shared Feb. 6th as their birthday.

Amanda and her sister Timotea, along with my grandmother Isabel were my caretakers throughout my childhood while my parents worked. However poor we were, I certainly didn't know it. I had every thing I ever wanted just for the asking - fresh pealed fruit, Mexican pastries, tortillas (corn and flour) made daily. Amanda was the youngest of three and in some ways, possibly the strongest. I always knew that in a jam, even in trouble with my parents, I could count on her to save me and stand between me and anything bad. As I grew older I realized that she was not especially nice to others, maybe even unyielding and sometimes mean. When my grandmother married into the family Amanda was jealous of her older brother and made things difficult for them but as I learned of this, I realized that I knew why. For Amanda it was all about loyalty and no one would stand between her and whomever she loved. I thank God that my grandmother Isabel was perhaps stronger still than Amanda because that left me with a legacy of strong, powerfully loyal women to guide my life. I can't imagine a more firm foundation.

My father would be 70 this year and I miss him very much. He was fun and often silly when he was with family. Now I try to be silly enough for my nephews and nieces so that they will know a little of Grandpa Pete.

As a kid, I always wished dad were home more. He had directed a United Methodist Community Center and at one point a large community action agency in south Texas. As I grew older I spent more time with dad at his job and saw what he was doing and why it mattered so much to him. Once I was on my own, he would occasionally try to rope me into one initiative or another or to get my help with a grant proposal he was preparing. He saw things in me that I didn't see in myself.

Dad was shaped powerfully by his grandfather and he made sure that I had the same experience with my grandparents. I can never thank him enough for this. He wanted me to learn from my mom's dad (also named Pedro)about hard work and protecting family at all costs. My father's parents were divorced and he was raised by his aunt and uncle Guadalupe and Jose Angel Hernandez, a Presbyterian minister. Dad was always somewhat undisciplined but he wanted me to learn from his parents what he lacked and so my sister and I spent more time that we might have chosen for ourselves, with our grandparents in Austin. On the other hand, I am still a Presbyterian and although it has been years since I was ordained to serve as an elder, I still try to honor my vows and serve God as best I can.

Service to others, loyalty, strength in the face of poverty and difficulties, love, honor and respect are among the things that I learned from my father, Pedro Grimaldo and my aunt, Amanda Villanueva Hernandez. May God bless them both.