My mother Hermelinda is an extraordinary woman that never gives up. My mother has tough me that education is very important, if someone wants to succeed the better, solid, and safe way to be successful is with a professional career. Also my mother is a strong religious person, she has tough me that to God loves me and with him I can do anything. I see my mother as a loving and caring person, she always took care of me and my family as a whole, she is a very strong character and she always encourage me to do my best in everything.
My father Raymundo is a unique and loving father; he is always available to listen and gives the best advice of his knowledge. He is a very wise person and he always is discovering new ways to make anything better. He is very creative and he can use anything to build anything and make it better and functional.
Both of my parents are from two different small towns in the North of Mexico and because of the limited resources neither of them had the opportunity to study further. My father only studied until 3rd grade because that was the highest grade you could do in his very small town. My mother studied until middle school but even though they did not have the opportunity to persuade their education, I admire them for planting in us the seed to always encourage to persuade better education and how they embrace that learning is always fun and anyone can do it all you need is “willing to” do it!
One of the best memories from my childhood is when we got to go outdoors, it was frequent and we went to different places, nothing fancy all the we had it was nature, the sky was the roof and the grass of the land was our bed. We used to go to family or friend’s ranches close to river, I always played that I was an explorer and I wanted to discover treasures, I has a stick and I used to climb the hills and made holes with the stick looking for hidden treasures and if I was lucky I could find a rock and I create my own story about it, sometimes those hills were my slides and I used to slide down from the top of the on a recycle cardboard. Oh, but the animals, I love to played with the goats, trying to ride them, running with them, milking the cows, riding the horses, feeding the chickens and the pigs. Ah and the best was the river, splashing with water, going and collecting rocks, making big bridges with the rocks or making mud paddles. Collecting pecans when they were available or cutting cactus to eat, or corn or pumpkins depending on the season and don’t forget making “leche quemada” (caramel from the milk) mmm! Yummy, yummy, and in every single activity my parents always encourage learning, counting, adding cows, taking away goats, dividing the milk in between all of us, and making me the creative thinker, what if the chicken gets out during the night and the coyote is around? Many cognitive experiences, hundreds of physical activities, wonderful social-emotional interaction with all family members and friends and always the opportunity to talk and even write with a stick on the land or with the rocks creating letters or with the sticks breaking them in pieces to create houses, animals, fences, people, I was able to create my own word with my imagination. And the stories, at the end of the day all gather around the fire listening to the stories, some times scary stories but I love them, I still remember those wonderful days!
My Math teacher from middle school, Forencio Rendon Guajardo, simple words come to my mind when I think about my appreciable teacher: wisdom, respect, love, kindness, patience, lots of patience, amazing person, admirable for everything he is and he does. I remember those three years that he tough me Math, he always greet us walking into class in a very special way with a smile, he knew every single one of his students, not only by name or last name as they use to called us, but always he had a way to knew us, and he make us feel special, he demonstrated interest in everyone, and he had this special way to acknowledge you and always want it to make sure that you understand, and if not he find a way to explained it, he gave us the trust and the feeling that it was ok to make questions, and made the room environment with his kindness a place you want it to be at.
“El Profe Rendon” (The Teacher Rendon) is for me a role model, he always was very professional, he always walk in very well dress, he always greet every single person on his way and always give you a smile. He care about me with simple things as sit down right, your back should be straight, you want a straight back as the years pass around, he always encourage me to further my education, he make me feel special by giving me the time to explain me what I need it, and the best of all, not only those three years that I was his student but after that, until now, if I walk by and he sees me he knows who am I, he smiles, he stops and asked questions about me my life, my family, and he not only remember myself, he remember so many students that pass through the years in his classroom, he devoted 38 years in our middle school, he was one of the founder of our school and now he has been retired probably since 7 o 8 years ago. He is also an author of over nine books and he was appointed by ICOCULT advisor emeritus
I do not get to see him frequently since he lives in my small town at Sabinas, Coahuila, Mexico but when I get to see him s a truly pleasure!
“Je,Je, Je, How are you doing, what are you up to now? How things are going?” is his greeting with a smile and his eyes looking straight at yours that acknowledge that make you feel truly special!
My sister, Argelia Raquel Perez Parra is a computer engineer and who is currently a professor at a local high school in my home town. Argelia used to take care of me when was little, she used to be my tutor when the years pass by and she reviewed my homework every single day and was a little hard and strong, sometimes she asked me to correct my homework for example if I had ten math problems she said “something is wrong you need to correct it” and I asked “which one, and where, what I did wrong?” and she answer “ look at them and reviewed them and you will find the answer” It was hard but I learned, I practice a lot, let put it this way J .I have many memories full of fun but I think the best ones were every single night I had story time, I used to go to the living room and pull one of the twenty books from an encyclopedia that we had and I got to pick my own fairytale story, also I learned if I went to the last book the number twenty I could see at the very back the index, and I could find the name of the story and the page number and the book number that I need it. That was amazing and she thought me that! At the beginning she used to read me the stories, then I was learning to read and she invite me to read them too with her and eventually I could read on my own but she was there with me. She always guided me and she is always there for me. I learned from her the appreciation of the books, and how the books can tell you stories and make your imagination wonder, also books can tell you true stories like history and moreover books can show you new things and how to make thing and how things are made. I love books, I love children’s literature and I do love my best early childhood memories around books, wondering, discovering, imagining and crating in my own mind.
