Meant to be--Alyssa

 

One of my favorite genres of movies are romance movies. Some of my, and I’m sure a bunch of other peoples, favorites are The Notebook, The Vow, and Remember Me. However, my Granny’s love story is my favorite of all of them. Their story started in Mexico in 1953 with my Granny, in her early twenties, on vacation with her friend Jane. Back then, my Granny said they didn’t have direct flights to Mexico, they had to land in Guadalajara first and catch a flight from there to Mexico. My Granny and Jane got off the plane and went to get their luggage to get on the plane to Mexico, and while they were waiting that’s when she saw my great grandpa Joe. He also happened to be going to Mexico to go visit his mom who was sick with cancer. Joe went up to them and started talking to them in Spanish, which my Granny was not very good at speaking, but Jane was. Out of embarrassment she didn’t want to talk to him so she stood off to the side. He asked Jane where they were staying and originally they had planned to stay with Jane’s family, but they changed their mind and decided to stay one night at a hotel, which is what they told Joe as well. They went their separate ways and got to the hotel, and they found out when they got there it was $50 a night which isn’t a lot now, but back then my Granny said that was way more than they wanted to spend, but they did anyways. As they were settling in they got a call in their room from Joe, who called the hotel to find them. He invited them to this dance he was going to later that night with his friend and they had planned to go, but it started raining so they ended up just staying in. The next day they went to Jane’s family’s house and some of her cousins were going to a nightclub around there so they decided to go with them. When they got there, my Granny saw a very familiar looking man. Joe happened to be there with his friend and he immediately spotted her. Of course my Granny was in shock because what were the odds? She thought she would never see him again after they didn’t go out dancing the night before, but there he was. He approached her and asked her to dance. The funny thing is, my Granny said she wasn’t really interested at first even though her friend Jane was, however he was definitely interested in her. After that night she said that was it, they went to the movies and dinner the next day and he showed her around Mexico. They were married within less than a year, I guess when you know, you know. As if that wasn’t enough he and her also happened to go to the same dance hall Downtown all the time, but they never ran into each other there. They ran into each other in Mexico, when the whole time they were even closer than they thought. If that’s not meant to be I don't know what is. They had a happy marriage and had 4 kids, 3 girls and 1 boy, one of them obviously was my nana. The summer of 1996 was when my great grandpa Joe passed away from a heart attack. I never got the chance to meet him, but my mom knows I would have loved him and I know I would’ve too. She said he was such a happy, kind, and talented man. He was an amazing artist and even painted murals in City Terrace. Some of them are still there today and they’re beautiful. It’s crazy to think that if they hadn’t gone out with Jane’s cousins they never would’ve met, but they did because I firmly believe they were meant to be, and although they couldn’t spend the rest of their lives together my Granny’s love for him never faded. She’s 92 now, she never moved on and she still continues to tell their love story and plenty of other stories about him all the time. This story is the reason I will forever believe if it’s meant to be, it’ll be.