I tried to be more present instead of documenting some of my favorite moments from 2023. I’ve witnessed some heart-wrenching scenes since starting this career in 2020, and last year wasn’t an exception, so I’m grateful for the family and friends that shared in moments of reunion, much needed joy, laughter, and genuine conversations when I needed it most throughout a bittersweet year. Sometimes seeing pictures again of news events dims the lighter moments I get to see in a year. Looking back at the pictures I made in 2023, one of my maternal grandfather “papa” and the portrait of my paternal grandmother “mama Bebita” we used in memorabilia at her funeral service are the most meaningful to me. 

My grandfather pauses while surrounded by family members during his early 80th birthday celebration in his daughter’s Plant City home on Saturday, Nov. 25, 2023.

My grandmother poses for a portrait sitting in a rocking chair on the balcony of her home in Santo Domingo on Thursday, May 18, 2023.

Last year I was able to connect with trailblazers on both sides of my family— women who were the first to leave the familiarity of their motherland Dominican Republic to the United States in search for a better quality of life, economic opportunities for themselves and their loved ones. Their stories inspire me during a time when many of us in this country are being impacted by one too many crises.

It was a blessing to reconnect with mama Bebita, who was 93, before she passed a few months later. She didn’t follow many of her children who had left the island, instead she would visit her family in the States from time to time, but she and my grandfather lived in the home they built in DR, where my father grew up with nine siblings. “Nadie me saca de mi tierra” my father told me his dad said. I didn’t get to know her as much as I would have liked to due to life’s circumstances, but I learned more of her story during our recent visit. Then later heard stories from so many relatives who knew and loved her as we gathered to honor her memory. She was a treasure, and left an everlasting legacy of love. 

Growing up papa was my closest constant father figure. I admired the grand adventures he shared with me. He rerouted a path from priesthood to marry my grandmother, they moved to Puerto Rico where he worked at a printing plant, returned to DR to run his own presses, and eventually went on to direct a television station where he and my parents hosted talk and entertainment shows, respectively. He shared stories of how he got to meet and  interview politicians, celebrities, religious leaders and travel the world in this role. It was my eldest grandkid, little language and tech translator privilege to transfer cursive handwritten contacts he carried around in a leather bound tiny phone book to his new flip phone — Sammy Sosa was the name I remember being impressed by most in his collection of numbers because I recognized the player from the baseball games we watched together with my grandmother when I practically lived with them as my parents worked odd hours outside their professions to make a living for our young family in South Florida, and my mother managed to take English classes too. 

Papa gave me my earliest gig as a preteen production assistant to pay my mom back for the Nokia games I purchased and deleted after playing, learning afterwards that the cost would show up on her phone bill regardless. I got to press keys on a board inside a production van and graphics showed up like magic on the monitors during a mass broadcasted in Spanish that he helped produce after leaving life in DR behind to join his kids in the States. Running that religious broadcast was his last job before retiring.

This past year I turned 30, papa turned 80, he and my grandmother reached 56 years of marriage. Although he’s still with us, we really saw the lights go out for him in 2023 as living with Lewy Body Dementia has taken a toll on his coherence and memory. 

As I look forward to whatever 2024 may bring for me, for us I’ve thought a lot about how we’re only here for a relatively short time.  A time unfairly and inhumanely cut too short for too many. Though mama Bebita lived a long life, she didn’t get to experience a lot of the things I take for granted sometimes, but she was aware of what mattered most to her. And like papa even after living a storied life you may not remember most of it. Being intentional with what I make of my life’s work is more present on my mind than ever before, and I’m lucky to have the support of really great people I’ve met so far along this journey, especially at times when I haven’t been my biggest fan. 

I write this in an effort to express myself more in the spaces I take up this year. Sometimes I think I’m funnier than I am sappy in case you’re wondering what else I might write about here. Also, I might link a song at the end of these because that’s how my brain works too. Y aqui tambien se escribe en non-English and Spanglish so stay listos. 

Cheers to a new year of appreciating the little things, connecting more through the difficult times and taking care of one another better. 

Thanks for looking at what I see,

Ivelliam

Whoa, just learned this classic below turned 30 last year too…Que special 🥹