So I have another sister. Her name is Loluca and she has been in my life since she came on a student exchange to spend some time with my family when we were 16. As these things go, I didn’t do a very good job staying in touch with her, but my father was very dedicated to her and to keeping her and her family in his life. I wasn’t as conscientious, and I had a lot going on back then. My father never lost touch over the past 24 years, and spent many holidays in Europe with Loluca’s family. I never did. I heard about Loluca’s achievements from my father – her PhD, her jobs in various countries as an important scientist, her marriage, and, most recently, the birth of her son Diego. My father was at her wedding, and he had a photo of his Spanish grandson on his mantle. After my father died, it came as a huge surprise to me that I wanted to go to Spain and see Loluca and finally meet her parents. We had already planned our home exchange and would be in Scandinavia and Holland, but I decided to arrange the trip to Spain during our vacation. Out of the blue, I emailed Loluca and asked if she would like to get together. She was extremely gracious, giving up her home for us, and driving us all over Madrid with our huge backpacks. On our last night in Madrid, we to dinner at her parents’ home, the first time I had ever met them. It was a huge honor for me, and I was really emotional about it. Her mother doesn’t speak English, but we managed to talk in depth about my father and how he was very important to their whole family. Initially I was relieved to know that the relationship hadn’t all been in my father’s head, as others had been, especially toward the end of his life.
These were people who had a history with my father, years of caring about each other in a way that came much later in life for my father and me. I was instantly comfortable with these loving people whom my father adored, and I immediately understood why. Despite the cultural differences, and sometimes the language differences, my father had found true camaraderie with this family. Their home looked like my father’s home, filled with antiques of the same era and the same blue collectable china plates on the buffet. The dining room table was set with their Sunday best, as my father would say, just as he used to do for important guests. We had drinks on the huge balcony of their beautiful home and they offered us olives, cheese, and thinly sliced, buttery Spanish ham. I really knew I was home again when they served us exactly what my father would have made for dinner – homemade gazpacho soup (Mariano’s specialty), a tender roast of beef, sliced thin (Lola’s specialty), chicken breast for me, salad greens, and roasted vegetables. They even had the ice cream for dessert. You always have a home in Spain, Loluca’s mother whispered to me, in Spanish, as we hugged goodbye. You, too…I mean, thank you, and so do you, I said in my poor Spanish. But it didn’t matter that I made some mistakes with my grammar – we’re family, after all.
Barcelona’s cable car (think Disney’s Sky Ride, not San Francisco). However, the best part of the trip for me was when Jon decided to finally do something for himself and treat himself to a few new outfits, Spanish style. Jon is so utilitarian and practical that he rarely spends money on himself, and even though he’s been wearing the same 3 shirts for the past 4 months, he’s reluctant to upgrade. He doesn’t even like those 3 shirts. 
