Forget me not

In Sunday's New York Times, an article on Alzheimer's took a look at the prevalence of the disease among Hispanics. It said that although it's not necessarily because of physiological reasons, Hispanics tend to be diagnosed with the disease more than other ethnic groups. The experts cited in the story claim the fact that most elderly Hispanics are displaced from their homeland and have experienced cultural and financial hardship as reasons for this anomaly.

For me, this is such a sad fact. My grandparents are Cuban exiles who have been in the United States since the Cuban Revolution. Although the financial hardship piece doesn't really apply to them, the cultural adjustment is truly staggering. To this day, my grandfather, a doctor who practiced in the U.S. for 40+ years, can't speak about Cuba without a forlorn look on his face. He has often said he wishes he could just forget it all. He also says when he first moved here, he tried so hard to forget the language, where he came from and his culture, just to fit in. I know these are hardly scientific reasons for being diagnosed with Alzheimer's but you can't deny the coincidence.

It got me thinking about an entirely different issue. Whenever people claim immigrants should "just learn English already" or "become American otherwise, go home" I pray they consider this: not only are some immigrants wishing and trying to forget what they went through in their native country, but, in some cases, those memories are being ripped away by a debilitating disease.

My grandparents, Dr. and Mrs. Francisco Macias, and my siblings, last Easter.