Quinn Flores’s Family Journal
Though I sometimes wonder what it would have been like to have received more nurturing and consistent warmth from my mom, by this point in my life, I have no regrets. When I reflect on every major decision I’ve made, from my educational degree to my career, from choosing a life partner to how we raise our son, I can see how it stems, in one way or another, from that complicated and complex relationship I had with my mom.
By the time I was a teen, I’d accepted the parentified role I had with my mom, and this was because I had three other loving adults at home whom I could rely on to be my parents. We all worked together to take care of and support my mom, and there was still plenty left over for me to get the care and support I needed, too.
Many evenings, my mom would be performing until late at night, so that left my grandmas, Dad, and me to create our own cozy, peaceful home environment.
I remember so many nights when the grandmas and Dad would gather in my room.
We’d drink tea and coffee, grab a late snack, and just talk.
It’s possible that those are some of my happiest memories growing up.
Mom and Dad, in spite of it all, stayed crazy about each other.
I remember sometimes coming home from football practice, before my mom had left for the concert hall, hearing them giggling from their room.
I learned a lot about love from them, from Dad, especially, who somehow, no matter how often my mom might lash out at him, would always find a way to forgive, would always turn back towards her.
Once, I asked him why he remained close, why he didn’t put up boundaries, like I had.
The warmth is stronger than the hurt was all he said in reply.
I remember that Grandma Nicki was doing a series of landscape paintings back then. As she got older, her painting really took off, and she was getting critical acclaim from shows and art reviewers.
I used to love to watch her paint while I did my homework. The smell of the oils and turpenoid was part of the draw, but most of all, I loved the way that she would open up with me about her thoughts when she was painting. And she always listened to me, too.
I had plenty to talk about. I’d started high school.
I went to a new, non-traditional school that had just opened up. The principal was my mom’s old principal, Principal Abe, who had accepted this position because the school was founded on her pedagogical theories.
“You’re not neurodivergent,” Principal Abe said to me during my office visit on my first day of school.
“No,” I replied. “But there’s neurodivergence in my family. My mom is Magdalena Flores.”
“I know that,” replied Principal Abe. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter. It was just a statement of record. We need NTs here, too.”
“Of course you’re most welcome,” said my homeroom teacher. “Like Principal Abe says, we value inclusion, and that means including neurotypicals, too, right?”
I felt giddy. It seemed, as a neurotypical, that I’d be in the minority here, and for some reason, that delighted me. I think that was when I began seriously considering exploring neurodivergent-neurotypical dynamics as a research project. I knew it was something I wouldn’t do alone, though, but as part of a team, and, sitting in the principal’s office, I had a swift flash-forward of diverse researchers working together to explore new aspects of communication and collaboration.
There are moments in youth when possibilities stretch out, and enthusiasm rushes in to close the distance between the present and the future. That’s what high school felt like for me.
Of course, I’m not sure my classmates felt that way about school.
In second period, though, the level of engagement started to pick up. We were asked to write about a learning experience. I wrote about mixing paints, and how that learning experience drew from years of watching Grandma Nicki at the palette, along with her own care in showing me how to blend and arrange the oils, and all the hours of my own experimentation. Most of us got lost in the writing, and I recall that it was so quiet that we could hear our pencils scratch in the notebooks over the rhythm of the ticking of the clock.
And that was when I met Dimitri.
I’d always heard how my mom met Dad on her first day at school. She’d even teased me that morning. “Watch out you don’t come home from school with your future husband!”
“Don’t worry!” I replied. “I’m too young!”
But it still planted a seed.
So when I felt a spark with him, I laughed to myself. Wouldn’t that be something!
I sat next to him between classes, and we talked.
“What did you write about?” I asked.
“Fantasy football,” he answered. “Ever play?”
“Eh, not really my thing?”
“There’s more to it than you might think,” he replied. And then he launched into a long explanation of forming teams, scoring, getting an edge, as well as all the various skills, strategies, and logical thinking it develops.
I liked him. He had a funny style, all his own, and he spoke with confidence and enthusiasm.
I remember that after he left, while we still had a few minutes before the next class, I took out my notebook and wrote about a poem about open doors. The first day of high school, for me, had been a gesture from the future: work hard, hold the faith, look for possibility, it all awaits.
Cathy Tea's SimLit Anthology 