When she opened the door she could smell the aroma of the fresh baked pastries filled with bananas and sweet cream that she had left in the window earlier to cool. Empanadas as they were called in her native Central American Spanish tongue. As a child in El Salvador, Empanadas were a favorite with mermelada. That is to say jelly or jam and served with hot tea. Putting a kettle on the fire the old woman smiled as she thought of her home in El Salvador, although she hadn't been there since her teenage years.
She could still remember running through the court yard playing with the other children her age in the heat of the noon sun at San Miguel. It seemed she could still hear the sound of the flutes, scrapers, and guitars as the musicians played daily, simply for the joy of it and not for money.
“Nobody does anything for sheer joy anymore,” she said. “As a result, the wealth they seek so hard after is repelled from them while they grow older and more miserable. If only more people understood that the joy of displaying the gifts inside of themselves would attract wealth, the world would be a much happier place.” She was referring to a quote from an old book one of the elders had given to her on her way to school at San Miguel in El Salvador many years ago.
It was a ragged little book with both covers torn off so she never knew the name of the book, but the elder had cautioned her saying, “No matter the outward appearance of this book, keep it close and refer to it in times of despair and it will shine a light so that you can see your path clearly.”
She read the book often over her 80+ years and remembered it to say that, “A gift opens the way for the giver and ushers him into the presence of the great.” In all of her years the book had never steered her wrong so she figured that if the book said it, it must be true.
After she'd finished her meal she retired to her favorite reclining chair for a nap. The old woman smiled to herself as she thought of how the young seaman had noticed she was leaving the dock early that day. She didn't think that anyone ever noticed her there at all.
“The cares of life are such that many people miss the beauty of the journey for worry of the final destination,” she said to herself. “Maybe my love was standing right next to me somewhere one day, but because of the cares of life he didn't even know it.”
Her thoughts turned to the Old Seaman she had met and she wondered where his travels would take him this time.
“Maybe a short stop in EL Salvador and her childhood home of San Miguel,” she thought excitedly! Either way she was happy for him.
“ At least he got to see the world instead of wasting his life away sitting down at the dock staring out into the distance, watching the ships from whither they came hence and back out again.”
“He seemed to have no concern for love at all, quaint old man,” she thought. “...Maybe I should have been more like him,” she said to herself. “Love is the conquest of fools, enjoyed only temporarily if ever at all.”
In her heart of hearts she didn't really believe that, but over the years it had helped her to cope with the pain of never having found her love so she reminded herself of the saying from time to time. It was now getting late so she laid her head back, snuggled into her favorite reclining chair under a beautiful hand woven tapestry and drifted off into sleep. The old woman soon began to dream and saw herself aboard a ship that was bound for Italy, a place that she'd once had opportunity to go.