Last night, my family’s entertainment came in the form of guessing the sex of the newest baby. The new mommy and daddy are about 3 weeks from finding out, so now is the time for the shenanigans.
They were lovingly introduced to both, sitting on a utensil AND having a string and a nail dangled over mommas growing little baby bump. All, while the great-grandparents to-be were on FaceTime barking orders, and trying to direct all of us. We laughed a lot, which in turn caused some frustration from the elders who were taking this, all too seriously. We, on the other hand, CLEARLY had no idea what we’re doing.
My Alabama born and raised son-in-law was at a loss… as he should be.
I haven’t laughed that hard in a long time.
In Miami, I was saturated with the old school Cuban traditions: From the obligatory trip to, “Canastilla Cubana” or another baby store that had A LOT of ruffles, to countless, unsolicited opinions about my physical appearance, all of this, were par-for-the-course. Fast forward to 2022 and I’m the abuela. So, I need to introduce all of this Cuban hocus pocus to the next generation, and frankly, I should’ve paid more attention, because I have NO clue what I’m doing.
I remember my mother and grandmother feeding me all kinds of things that were “good for the baby”, but I can’t bring myself to prepare and cook liver; so, chances are that future generations will never know the unique pleasure of eating, “igado”. NOR… will I be introducing the diabetic coma known as leche condensada (condensed milk) with malta, to produce more breast milk.
All of these silly things got me thinking. What else will the next generations miss out on because I simply forgot to take notes? Oh, my people are a supersticious bunch.
Enjoy your history people! We definitely enjoyed mine last night.