I remember about a place that changed in a matter of 3 years, and I cannot remember how it was before the new changes. The place I am talking about is in Carretera a EL Salvador, in Condado Concepción, where you find Wal-Mart, and Pradera Concepción. I know this place changed because I remember one afternoon when I was 5 or 6 years old and I was with my mom and my brother going to my grandparent´s house. We were in a white one cabin pick-up and it gave a special odor that, when I think about it, gives a special detail to the moment´s reminiscence. The smell was the motor´s odor with a little bit of gasoline, but it was nice, it wasn´t that strong. You could see the sky and it wasn´t magnificently blue, it had huge bluish gray clouds which seemed like they were made with cotton. I could also see some orange and pinkish thin but long clouds. I also saw the top of the tall trees that were at the side of the road, some of those trees are still in the road. I have the impression of an old photograph of a beautiful landscape in my memory made from this moment, it is a nice reminiscence. I remember the conversation we were having. I had asked my mother what was in that place before they had built Hiper Paiz, what in now a day is Wal-Mart. She told me that it was all grass with cows all over the place, but I couldn´t remember it.
Since that day every single time I try to remember that place I get frustrated, it really annoys me, and it makes me mad because I try really hard to remember just a small piece of the whole place and I just can´t! Fortunately I can remember another place, and how it was before it changed. That place, well it is another road, means a lot to me, because it is the road you have to take in order to get where my grandparents, uncles, aunts and cousins from my dad´s family side live.
This road is in Honduras, I am not sure but it might be 40 minutes or an hour and a half from the border line with Guatemala. I haven´t gone to Honduras in more than 8 years, but going there was absolutely an exciting trip. Right after the border when you were already in Honduras, the first thing you saw was that you were in the top of a mountain, and it was full of machines that were used to take out minerals from the soil. The rode wasn´t of concrete, it was an off road, and after you had driven those 40 minutes, half an hour you reached a small town with a restaurant at the top of another mountain. At the top of it when you were in the restaurant what you saw were just trees, really green and tall trees that saturated beautifully all the reaching capability of the eye sight. After we had lunch at that restaurant we got back in the car and my dad would drive until we reached my grandparent´s house in La Esperanza, Intibucá.
The next time I went to Honduras was approximately a year and a half since the last time. I don´t remember why but my uncle went and met with us at that restaurant. It was funny and weird because we were, again, in a pick-up and my father sat in the back part of it, and in the other hand my uncle, mom, brother and I were inside. We weren´t even 2 miles away from that small town and we reached a stair between the concrete road and the one made of soil. My uncle told us that the road was absolutely new. I was impressed almost in shock because having to go in a road made of soil was part of the adventure, and it was scary sometimes, especially when we drove near a cliff. At the same time I enjoyed the new road. It was the last time I went to Honduras and I had the best view I ever had of the way to my grandparents. What I saw from my window frame was a dark pavement road, with the perfect yellow lines in the middle, it had no oil spots or rubber marks from wheels. It was a perfect view, I felt like if I was navigating in a river at the middle of a forest, because the trees hadn´t changed. it was a dark and deep green color the trees had, and you couldn´t see into the woods. What had changed was just the road, but at least for me it was more than just a road it really meant something. It made me appreciate and realize how beautiful that place was, and the best part is that instead of the road in Carretera a El Salvador, is that I do remember this one. I felt a great peace while my uncle drove the pick-up in all the curves of the road. At the end I finish up having two memory portraits of a road landscape, and in both of them I confronted completely different feelings. Also, both remind me how life changes and goes on, and it will not wait for any of us if we ever need to stop; we have to keep on living because the opportunity in life of living something new and making a memory will keep advancing as if you were watching a movie, the thing is that you won’t be able to stop it and rewind it.
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