Alexandra and Brenda
Comadres – Seeing Each Other Through to the Future
By Alexandra M. Landeros
I’ve known Brenda since 2003. We first met when I was married to my first husband. He and I had gone to see music performance at a local restaurant, and Brenda was there with her husband. Brenda and I exchanged a few words at the time, just small talk, and throughout the months that followed, we’d see each other here and there at music shows and gatherings.
About a year later, when I was splitting up with my husband, she confided to me that she had known we weren’t right for each other…that when she had met me that first time, she had a feeling about me and where I was headed in the future.
Ever since then, Brenda and I have always had that uncanny way of knowing things about each other. Knowing when the other was happy or sad, angry or just goofing around. Brenda isn’t a Latina, but she is one in spirit. She is determined, fierce, loyal, loving, and you never leave her house without getting fed. She taught me how to eat slices of avocado with cayenne pepper (when making guacamole was too much of a chore), and how to make Mexican rice the natural way, without using Knorr broth powder.
Brenda was there for me when I went through that difficult divorce – giving me the confidence to make a decision that was right for me, even when other people didn’t agree with me. With her funny Honda quasi-pickup truck, she helped me move all kinds of furniture into the house I purchased on my very own.
She also made me understand when I made wrong decisions after the divorce. She supported me when I was heading the right direction, but she was quick to point out when I wasn’t. When I dated the wrong guys. Or wore the wrong thing.
She taught me to embrace my body, wear fun clothes, and be adventurous with my hairstyles. We camped out at music festivals with wild friends, ate fast food cheeseburgers with her sons, and hung out in her living room gossiping about everything and nothing.
I was there for her when she and her husband went through the difficult process of adopting an orphaned child, and then about five years later when she went through her own divorce. I remember seeing her one afternoon walking down South Congress with her husband in 2006, and I had that same feeling about her that she had about me in 2003. I knew Brenda was destined for a different future – a happier one.
Now we are both remarried to wonderful men, whom we feel strongly about having made the decision to commit to them for the rest of our lives. Brenda has sold the house where I spent so many memorable evenings, and she moved away to Hondo, Texas, with her new husband. We don’t see each other very much anymore. But she is always just a Facebook message or phone call away, and I know I can still count on her any time, whether I’m having the worst day of my life, or the best day of my life.
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