My Fireflies

"Un question mas" Antonio asks me, waving his pen in my face, as if to dash meaning out of his spanglish mess.

"Yes Antonio?"

"If I get you job, you stay?"

"------------" I paused...."You could get me a job? That would be very generous of you Antonio, you really are too kind...I don't know. I would still have to re-apply for a visa...."

"It's just that, I thought we'd have class together, 3, 4 year more...not only until June...without you, it isn't English."

I thumbed at the pages of the lesson book, I didn't want to look up. "I'm so sorry Antonio, I had to make a very hard decision...I don't like it, but right now, it is not possible for me to stay in Spain....I'm sorry....I hope you understand." I coughed, trying to smother the tightness in my throat that signaled impending tears.

"okay, okay... but I will still ask." he said.

I have 1 month left and what I thought would be a simple departure is already turning out to be a bit more complicated than I thought. The sweet moments, like when I give class to Antonio, my 50 year old doctor who says everything is 'chupa'o' (easy) and snaps his imaginary suspenders, are so few and far between that they float by like early summer fireflies, pulsating yellow light in the darkness that is my life here, as the forerunners of more bright spots, but as I remember from my childhood, the lights go out when you try and trap them in a jar. The trick is to let them pass by in their temporal beauty, to fixate on them and capture them is to extinguish them.

Which is why I had to cry a little and tell Antonio I wouldn't be coming back. He is a bright spot I have to let go, even though it is so tempting to chase after the joyful times and say I'll stay, when I know that it will just get dark again when the lights go out....