REFLECTIONS: A Chance Encounter with the Past
by TERESITA BACANI-OROPILLA, MD work.
He was known as the Navy veteran who had gone through three theatres of war – WWII, the Korean and the Vietnam conflicts. He maintained a power facility for a children’ s home for the next 23 years after that, before retiring from
At 99 years of age, he sauntered into the activity room of the assisted living facility where he now lives, looking for a technician to fix the TV in his room. It had gone on the blink.
In the interim, a fascinating conversation occurred between two elderly co-residents about names. Although he did not have Castilian features, he did have a Spanish-sounding family name. How come?
In this chaotic situation, a man from Andalusia, a European, evidently was in charge of an area that included this devastated town. Told of the dilemma of children without family names, he gave them his name,“ Romero.”
In the nearly 180 years that have passed, one wonders how many kept and propagated this name, shared by this kind man from another continent.
This present one, Mr. Romero, wishes that this generation remember some of the roots and history of their founders and honor them by their deeds.
Do we wonder about our names and our own roots? Do we pass them on as parts of us? Somewhere in the past, they must have done something good, or we would not be here!
Dr. Bacani-Oropilla is a retired pediatrician and psychiatrist.
He explains: in the Mexican-American War in the years 1846- 1848, discordant border troops alternately raided each others’ towns to maintain ownership of the same. On the border of the now New Mexico, a vicious raid killed most of the adults, leaving orphaned children. A brother and sister about six years of age were among other parentless children who knew their first names but not their parents’ family names.
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