I've spoken of my mother and my stepfather. My mother didn't remarry, it was a common law marriage. My stepfather really became my father because he took me in before I could walk and raised me and my sister, Rosa, who is two years older than I am. If I tripped over my real father out in the streets right now, I wouldn't know who he is.
Evidently, my real father was kind of busy on the side. One summer when I worked picking blueberries, I talked with the guy who was on the opposite line for a week and a half, two weeks--we talked like we'd known each other for years. One day, the conversation was about where we're from--we knew a lot of people in common. I said "You must know my mother," told him her name, and said "Listen, today, when we're done and the bus drops us off, why don't you stop over the house?" No problem. End of the day came, the bus dropped us off, we walked home, I opened the door and I started to say to my mom, "I want you to meet this friend of mine." Mom stopped. She looked at the guy. "Ramon, where have you been?" I said, "What's going on here?" She said "That's your brother!" I said "My brother?" Here I had met my brother in the blueberry fields, not knowing about my father and his other friend. I found out that I had two other sisters I had never met. They were living in New York; we made contact and I saw my sisters for the first time when we were all adults.
