First Reflection—Her Hands
When I was still a boy—no more than nine, almost ten—my grandmother made a promise. A boat, she said. Together, we’d build one, big enough to carry us across the great sea, and one day, we’d sail it to find my parents, who were caught in the endless, bureaucratic tide of papers in Portugal. The ocean, she told me, was vast and unkind, with rocks hidden deep beneath the water, waiting for the careless. “We must be vigilant,” she warned, her voice as soft as the wind over the waves. “If we pray enough, often enough, we will be carried. Our boat will glide like a stone skipping on water.” She’d sing about the monsters hidden deep below, of a world that seemed both ancient and alive in her eyes. But she insisted that prayer would be our salvation—God would guide us safely on our voyage.