At what times in your life were you the happiest, and why?

I assume this question means other than the day I married Miriam, the dates my children Humberto, Pablo and Daniel were born and the dates my grandchildren Laura Humberto And Carly were born as well, for these undoubtedly were all extremely happy, monumental dates of my life.

It is no accomplishment, for I inherited it from my father, but I am blessed with great optimism and persistence; that likely makes me look more favorable at circumstances that would be the case otherwise .

Other than the obvious foregoing marriage and birth dates it is difficult to select the happiest, for there were many. My childhood was full of happy moments, but of course, some impacted me more than others and hence I remember them vividly still at age 80.

One such date is the first memory I have; when two years old and having already learned the alphabet, I made a pest of myself when my parents, Tío Manolo and others were sitting in the porch on rattan rocking chairs from La Selecta, Manolo was reading the newspaper and I interrupted all by pointing out and identifying letters on the newspaper, but not two or three, it seems I did it for a long time, interrupting everyone else.

From my house at Calle 25 Num 1107 between 6 and 8, Vedado, Habana, there was another house to our immediate right, then a corner house and after that house and turning the corner into Calle 6, was the house of Tía María, my father's oldest sister, married to Emilio Villamil, an accountant already retired, who read constantly, when I was a child. He had graduated from Saint Joseph College in Louisiana, his family had lived in Key West, who spoke English fluently, as well as Latin, was Tertiary of the Dominicans, and for all purposes and effect was the only grandfather I enjoyed; taught me many things, including Latin, was subscribed to National Geographic and showed me the beautiful pictures of the magazine and talked to me about the places they showed. The only real grandfather I had, Manuel Porto Porto, on my mother's side, did not have patience with children.

This long explanation of Tía María and "Mimi's" house's location in relation to mine was to explain that since very small I was able to go there by myself, not a long distance and did not have to cross any street.

One very happy moment I remember was on Epiphany, when The Three Kings brought my first pedal car, (on Jan 6 which was when we got the presents) and I pedaled to Tía María's.

My first cousins there were Emilio, José Luis (Pepe), Elena (my godmother), Cira and Rodolfo, all of them much older than I. Emilito had already become a physician and moved to Pinar del Río, but Pepe and Elena were like a second set of parents to me.

Pepe was a lawyer and successful at it, Elena was his secretary and as a small child I often went with her to their law office. Later on Pepe also studied journalism and succeeded in a big way at that as well. He wrote for a political satire weekly newspaper of great circulation called Zig Zag, created a character named Sindulfo Vinagreta y Unga de Vaca that I used on my Spanish mailing lists.

Cira was a pharmacist, had her own small pharmacy; Rodolfo graduated from the Cuban Military Academy at Managua, Province of Havana.

Another vivid memory as a small child was when Pepe took me to ride a train for the first time. It was a line from Havana's Train Terminal to the Hershey Sugar Mill, elsewhere in the Havana Province. We not only rode in it, but he took me to walk around it, touched the cow guard, it really impressed me with the size of the locomotive from up-close, I was able to touch it.

Another couple of thing I must mention about Pepe is the he wrote a detailed biography of my first few years, which typed version I brought with me and still have, later had it printed and bound with hard covers, which my sister brought me when she came, but I gave that bound copy to my cousin Ada, his daughter, no idea where it is now that Ada died. The other thing is that when I was eight or ten years old, he had a friend who was chief of the National Driver's License department, when they were little booklets, like a savings account bank booklet, and he got me a valid driver's license, with my picture, number and everything; sorry to say I left it in Cuba.

My first dog, named Linda, was a Maltese ( small to medium size with a wooly coat) and every time she heard me tell my mother that I was going to Tía María's house, she came running from under a bed or wherever she was to go with me; no leash of course, she just stayed close and very happy, seeking treats, it was her second home too.

During my entire youth I spent much time at the house where my father was born, in Pinar del Río. The house was mostly empty, with an old black man named Felipe (that had been a slave) as caretaker, although at times Emilito lived there. It was a big house, with elevated concrete floor and red tile roof, made of Jiquí wood (something like Ash, practically indestructible) with 8X8 beams. Untill I was ten or so it did not have electricity, water came from a regular well, pulled by buckets into a wooden large recipient mounted on wheels and pulled by oxen.

I made friends with the children of Andrés Maragoto, whom's older brother was married to my aunt Eulalia (Llalla). Manolito Maragoto was about my age, never wore shoes, had feet with skin tougher than regular leather, with him I learned much about farm life. When we went to Llalla's farm,larger but away from the city, and spent time with my cousin Neno who managed it, learned much more, appreciated the different instincts of a person raised in a farm as opposed to me. They had eyes accustomed to look far away while I was accustomed to look near; they were instinctively aware of their surroundings, alert to dangers not perceived by me. Neno had lots of pigs that lived lose in the woods, but he periodically went and called them throwing corn around him; once in a while, he jumped a male, knocked it down, pulled his knife, castrated it, pulled a little bottle of "creolina" some of which he poured over its scrotum to avoid infection and let it go. One of those pigs, with very little grease, properly roasted on a hole in the ground over guava branches and covered with banana leaves, was the best meat that you could ever want.

Later on, when I was a teenager in high school, Emilito and Pepe had a project in which I helped. Pepe would quit at noon on Fridays, picked me up and we went to Pinar; there we stayed at the house where my father was born, which was practically in the city, we ate anything Felipe cooked for us, including river eels, wrote, edited, typeset, printed and distributed a weekly newspaper called La Codorniz (The Quail), then returned to Havana on Sunday afternoons.

Another great memory is going with my father to his factory on Saturday mornings, when he worked half day, was payday and after quitting time my father, Manolo Sánchez and others went to the corner bodega, of a man named Benigno, and played cubilete (Cuban dice) for a glass of beer, (it was served by the glass, or about half a bottle, instead of a bottle, so it remained cold) and "saladitos" or tapas, usually very good.

Remember also eating chocolate sundaes and banana splits at the Sevilla-Biltmore Hotel at Avenida del Prado, whose general manager was Bertín Pérez, the father of my classmate Roberto Pérez.

When it was obvious that the government was taking over every business without compensation, we had a dilemma. My parents and I had tourist visas for the U.S. that lasted four years with unlimited visits, but if you applied for a resident visa (green card) they automatically voided the tourist visa on your passport. Miriam's mother had a close friend who worked at the United States Embassy; she got me an appointment with a Consul, to whom I explained our problem. He was very nice, keep in mind that I was only 18 then and my parents did not participate, my father never missed work, which would have been suspicious. The Consul told me about everything I needed, I went to different places to get all the requirements, then all of us went for physical exams and for the photos, and when we had it all, went for the interview and he issued the resident visas.

So it was that on 13 October 1960, after my father came home for lunch as usual, we dressed up, as people did then to travel, got the suitcases my father had made of rattan that I still have, since luggage had disappeared from the stores in Havana, we boarded a Pan American flight and left Havana for the last time, bound for Miami. Miriam and her mother came two days later.

My father-in-law Alfredo was a pharmacist who had studied in this country, after he came in December he was hired by Norfolk General Hospital and so Miriam and her parents moved to Virginia. Things in Miami were tough, work scarce, I applied for a scholarship to the University of Miami, but was too na ve, gave them the very average grade report I had brought, which I should not have done, and was turned down.

At the beginning of the summer of 1961 the built the Berlin Wall, which turned into what was called The Berlin Crisis and resulted in increased Selective Service draft activity. After consulting Tío Manolo, i volunteered for the Army in July 1961, went to Fort Benning, Georgia for induction, to Fort Jackson, South Carolina for basic training. It was tough, although I could read and write English well and in the initial battery of tests I had qualified for Officer Candidate School, I could not understand the spoken word, (much less with heavy southern accents or black slang) nor speak intelligibly. Although as routine the sergeants took turned riding us hard, there also most have been some discrimination involved, for all I heard of OCS was a sergeant that asked me: You don't want to go to OCS, do you? There was a blond, young second lieutenant who was sure I was playing dumb when I did not understand him, so he yelled, making him even harder to understand. It was not until much later, at the VA, that I found out the discrimination had began in the Miami recruiting station, where they did the initial paperwork and tests, and listed me as having finished the 9th grade, instead of the first year of Electrical Engineering at the University of Havana, which was the case, it should have been 13 instead of 9.

During the vacation after Basic Training, Miriam and I got married on 3 October 1961 at Portsmouth, Virginia, and went on a weekend honeymoon to a hotel in Virginia Beach in a borrowed 1959 Edsel owned by Charlie, Mariana's husband.

My next duty station was the Engineering School at Fort Belvoir in Alexandria, Virginia, next to D.C. I had not asked anyone's permission to get married, as I should have done, but still my First Sergeant was very nice to me and gave me a three-day pass every weekend I was there, so I took a Greyhound bus to Portsmouth on Fridays and returned on Sundays. When I finished towards the end of January 1962, five of us from that course were ordered to Bad Kreuznach, Germany, via Fort Dix, New Jersey, to board a MSTS ship in New York. We landed at Bremerhaven and Private Prokop was waiting for us with a ton truck, it was 2 February 1962.

Nothing but friendly people there. Worked at Support Point 753, a Third Echelon radio and radar repair shop, first under CWO Johnston, then CWO Ulrich and finally under Lt. Vento. My First Sergeant, named Gratz, whose sister Kitty was one of the stars in Gunsmoke, was very helpful. John Slagle showed me around town. There was a dependent ban since the Berlin Crisis, but without asking permission, I went to American Express and bought a one-way TWA ticket from New York to Frankfurt on payments for March 18th, and sent it to Miriam. She got her paperwork and vaccines at the Norfolk Naval Station, went to Philadelphia to meet her cousin Nestor, who accompanied her to the airport in New York. Miriam was pregnant since December, told Nestor, who in turn told the stewardess to take special care of her.

I was waiting in Frankfurt's airport, every passenger came out except Miriam. Then an MP came to get me. Up until then, a Cuban passport was as good as a U.S. one, accepted everywhere in Europe without need of a visa, but that had just changed in Germany. To complicate matters, the passport had expired, unbeknownst by all. The Germans where worried about Miriam having the child as a ward of their government if I left her, they wanted TWA to return her to New York; they refused, said they had not been notified of the visa requirement. At the end, they let her come in, with the condition of reporting to the local police station each week,to report that she was married to me and would have the child in the military hospital. Miriam had shipped her clothing by sea and it had not arrived by the time it got warmer; she had only winter clothing and high heel shoes, she was laboriously walking uphill to our rented room one day, when she decided to go into the chapel, which was empty, knelt down and began crying. The priest was in the loft and came quickly to console her.

I must say we were still occupying Germany at that time, although the Status of Forces changed before September. There was a stamp, to be put only on U.S. passports, whereby the U.S. Occupying forces authorized the person to enter the Federal Republic of Germany and West Berlin, signed by the Commanding General of US Forces in Europe.

Miriam explained all that to the priest, he drove her home and asked for her passport. A couple of days later, he called us and invited us to dinner at the Officer's Club, where he returned the Cuban passport with the authorization stamp. He had a private plane, had flown to Frankfurt, to the I.B. Farben building, where the headquarters were, wearing his full-colonel uniform, approached the sergeant who put the stamp with the passport open, (an open passport looks like any other, he said) and got it. That was the end of Miriam having to go to the German police station each week.

The rest of the time in Germany went very well, we travelled as much as we could, with a camping tent, gas stove and canned food after two years I was an E5 doing the job of an E7, Battalion Supply Sergeant of the Signal Battalion of the 8th Infantry Division, my Battalion Commander, Major Harris, a survivor of the Bataan Death March of April 1942, took a liking to me, advised me to stay in the Army, offered to send me to OCS, it was rewarding working for him in the best job in the Army, where GIs of all ranks always came around asking for favors, batteries, smoke granades, .45 ammo, etc.

After extending my active duty six months to complete the three-year tour in Europe and thus qualify for moving back our household goods and dependent travel, we returned to New York from Bremerhaven with a stop at South Hampton where we went ashore and rode in the first seat of the upper deck of a doubledecker red bus, then the ship left England and the second day in the Atlantic we hit bad weather; after that instead of three sittings at the dining room one sitting was half empty. We had a comfortable cabin where Bert rode the duffel bag while it slided lengthwise from side to side of the cabin and Pablo mostly slept. Miriam helped the crew by caring for children of other couples that were seasick, later on each evening, when things quieted down, the mostly Dominican crew cooked for themselves and offered Miriam of their food, which she enjoyed much.

Arriving at New York we found that there was a strike by stevedore and they would not unload the new VW we had shipped, so we rented a car, went to Virginia, later on took a train to Miami.

Miriam was pregnant again and in September Daniel was born. Life had its up and downs but we lived there for many years. In 1973 I graduated from The American College of Bryn Mawr Pennsylvania, which had a deal with University of Miami where classes were held; I earned the professional designation of CLU.

In 1976 we sold the house that my parents had given us, at 464 E 10 Street Hialeah, FL 33010 and bought a house Carlos Su rez built for us at 11520 SW 98th Court, Miami, FL 33176, on which we closed in a hurry when Carlos told us that the company he worked for was about to go bankrupt.

Later, in 1998, we bought the apartment 912 at Arlen Beach condominium, 5701 Collins Avenue, Miami Beach, FL 33140. First we went only on weekends, later on we moved there and sold the Kendall house. The first few years at the condo were very enjoyable, right on the beach, made good friends,drinks served by Roberto Junco, played Cuban dice, both cubilete and , also poker, a good restaurant that spoiled Laura, very nice until 2005, when Pablo died.

Pablo died on November 2005. In December we went to San Diego when Carly was born. Bert and family had moved to Fort White around that time, so in 2006 we decided to move to Fort White too. Bought a house there, moved in 2007.

We had enjoyed excellent health insurance in Miami and had many good friends who were physicians; also had great luck always with all the doctors who treated us. My uveitis began when I was 28, in 1970 and the ophthalmologist Rafael Hern ndez referred me to the then beginning Bascom Palmer Eye Institute, where I was treated by Dr. Mary Lou Lewis during about 25 years; she became a good friend. She and Dr. Norton, the director would sit down and discuss with me new courses of action, trying to rule out possible causes, the risks involved, etc.

After moving to 2624 SW Newark Drive, Fort White, FL 32038 in February 2007, we could not find satisfactory health insurance; someone at church suggested we try the VA, so we went to the hospital at Lake City, where they found me in the computer right away, enrolled me and referred me to Judy Hayes, the Visual Impaired Services Team (VIST) Coordinator, who was very nice and promptly sent David Johnson, Blind Rehab Outpatient Specialist (BROS) to my house to evaluate me. When he saw how I handled Job Access With Speech (JAWS), the preferred screen reader, he convince me to apply to the VA to be a vendor, so they could contract me and pay me to teach other blind veterans in Northern Florida and Southern Georgia. I enjoyed that very much, Miriam drove me to their homes, from Valdosta to Tallahassee to Jacksonville to south of Ocala, went shopping or read while I tought. We helped many people.

After I went to the VA Hospital at Gainesville by ambulance on 30 November 2020 with Covid and almost died a few times, after a tracheotomy and being put several times on the Ventilator, Miriam and Stacy's daily calls thanks to the hospital's chaplains, being visited by Peter (Dr. Peter Pelletier, retired Air Force colonel and a friend from church), were very happy moments at a time when I felt really lonely; The first visit by Miriam and later by Bert while I was recovering from the tracheotomy at Select Rehab were also; later being sent to UF Rehab when I could not even sit up at the side of the bed but thanks to Josh soon could walk again, and finally coming home with Miriam on 4 March 2021. That was one of the happiest days of my life.

Likewise, the quick daily improvements with Home Rehab by physical therapist Ryan, the visits by Bert, laura and Betico, being able to again work on my computer, about which I had my doubts, not knowing if my brain would get back all the way to normal, instead of being befuddled as before, were all very happy days.

When on 3 October 2021 we celebrated my 60 years of marriage to Miriam and having transcurred actually 64 years since we met, was certainly one of the happiest days of my life.

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