Part 3: El Ingeniero con Alma de Poeta
Paraguaná
Upon to returning to Venezuela, my father led a series of projects for companies such as Meneven, Pequiven, and Bariven before securing the role of Senior Manager of Materials for a major refinery construction with Maraven. Our pride in Venezuela at the time was evident even in the letters used to construct our company names.
The project, titled PARC for Proyecto de Adecuación de la Refinería Cardón, established a major refinery within short distance of my mother’s hometown in the Paraguaná peninsula. The project was monumental in creating jobs for the region and received international press for its technological innovation and design. It also formally introduced my parents to each another following the death of Dinorah almost four years earlier.
Prior to entering the oil industry, my mother tried to escape Paraguaná by becoming a flight attendant for VIASA, Venezuelan International Airways, yet the height restrictions imposed on job candidates kept my tiny mother from applying. In turn, she studied economics at the urging of my grandfather and oversaw the financial operations of various oil projects, including PARC.
She excelled in a field of men driven by excellence and riches alike, softening her towards my father when she discovered a kind, intelligent soul capable of steadily guiding a room of brash personalities. Following two failed marriages with difficult men, my father’s relaxed brilliance and self-awareness drew her in.
My grandfather discouraged their courtship, suspecting they may become incompatible based on previous professional collaborations with my father, yet daughters often act in the contrary to their father’s wishes. The seventeen year difference separating my parents drew criticism from friends and colleagues, yet my mother simply sought a loving man with whom to share a child with.
After a few months of dating, relentless morning sickness announced my arrival, and my parents married seven months into their relationship. My mother wore a teal dress with translucent beads draping her torso and styled her red hair in the shape of a mollusk shell. My father accompanied his navy blue suit with a similarly colored tie, accentuated by yellow and brown lines that brought out the walnut tones of his rectangular eyeglasses.
I was born later that year on the day my mother turned 39, becoming the unifying factor that kept my parents together longer than either desired.
