As soon as my mother moved to New York from Puerto Rico, my father’s father, Don Lorenzo as Mom and Abuela-my grandmother-called him, began regular visits. He offered himself as a surrogate for my absent father. A very short man who dressed in three-piece, brown pin-striped suits, wore silk ties and, on his head, a brown fedora.

When he removed his hat, his head and face seemed big for his body. His skin was pasty white, his brown eyes large and long lashed. He wore his straight silver hair brushed back, showcasing an attractive widow’s peak.

Every Easter Sunday he appeared with a giant basket filled with chocolate and marshmallow rabbits and eggs along with jelly beans in pastel colors. 

For my birthday, he bought me a how to draw book with sketch pad and charcoal. That helped me in art class years later.

Sometimes he arranged day trips to take me to the Bronx Zoo, the Museum of Natural History, Central Park or to meet and spend time with “The Aunts,” his three petite and olive-skinned maiden sisters.

Great Aunt Manuela did not speak. She didn’t acknowledge anything said except with constant snorts and sniffles. As the family cook, she kept everyone thin with chicken parts boiled to death to make broth and later served by themselves. Unsalted, and unseasoned. Nauseating. I asked Great Aunt Rosa why Manuela did not speak, “One day, she just stopped,” she answered.

I saw Great Aunt Consuelo the least because I visited on Sundays, the day she put on her reddest lipstick, wore an old mink stole with a small black, veiled hat placed on her head at a jaunty angle and went to the movies with her boyfriend. Great Aunt Consuelo advised me to never marry. Boyfriends were good, husbands not. Why did I not listen?

Great Aunt Rosa told me to try to do well with French and Spanish in school because the job of United Nation interpreter paid well. Why did I not listen?

Great Aunts Consuelo and Rosa played piano, my grandfather the guitar and they sang. Not professionally, as a family “conjunto” or ensemble.  Don Lorenzo also spoke German and Hebrew, which I thought odd.

Most interestingly, I learned they were not Puerto Rican.

“We’re originally from Venezuela,” Great aunt Rosa told me. “We moved to Puerto Rico before coming here.”

I’m sorry now that I didn’t ask questions. Why did they leave Venezuela? Did they fall on hard times? They were obviously well off enough at one time to all take formal music and language lessons.

 “Abuelo,” as I called him, had a wry sense of humor. Upon hearing me complain that I  was overweight he suggested I drink a lot of water while taking laxatives. “It’ll all come out in the end.” About a couple who had trouble making ends meet, he said, “Tell them to stand back to back.”

Like most other family members, success in love eluded him too. First a relationship with an older woman of cinnamon hair and skin, who already had several children and a personality like porcupine quills. Two boys resulted from that union except the younger one of the two was a question mark. Too dark, too kinky haired compared to my father’s olive skin and silky curls. No matter. Don Lorenzo gave the boy his last name.

My grandfather’s second union, and first formal marriage ended in divorce but produced three sons. Handsome, white and short. Shortness was a point of contention in his life.

A tall man can wear anything and look good,” he told my mother. “A short man has to dress with fine quality and excellent tailoring just to look mediocre.”

If he felt that, it was not how others, including myself, perceived him. His impeccable grooming, good looks, wry wit and good manners gave him an air of importance. Hence always “Don Lorenzo,” never just Lorenzo.

 One snowy day, he arrived for his post as an orderly in St. Luke’s Hospital.  saying he could not catch his breath. He sat, suffered a heart attack and died.

 He was the glue that kept the family informed about the others. After his death, ties with aunts. uncles and cousins vanished.