While I was moving around London last week in the tube (subway, for the rest of us), all I kept thinking about was “minding the gap”. It was not just the gap between the train and the platform at some of the stations which I was thinking of, but all those gaps that exist between us and other people, countries, ideologies, etcetera.

For example, there is a gap between my son and me. After a year living in London, he is now a different person from the teenage boy who left home to live abroad by himself. There is a gap now that will help him become a better citizen of the world, as opposed to those youngsters who haven’t had the opportunity to travel or live abroad.

There is a gap between my generation and my children’s, just as I realize how different (and difficult) it was in my adolescence to move around, communicate and insert you in a somewhat closed society. Now, people become part of a multicultural and flat world where the Internet and social networks keep you in touch with friends and family, no matter where you are. Mobility has never been so great!

This was my second visit to Emilio in London in less than a year, just because I probably mind the gap too much, a gap created by his physical absence that feels wider and wider as days passed by. Even if I can get in touch with him through web calls via Skype, or cell phone and e-mail, I needed to kiss and hug him.

So I wonder: How could my mother make it through the year I spent in Italy in the mid 70’s? We spoke only twice by phone in 12 months! And she didn’t have the opportunity to visit me, probably because plane tickets were unaffordable to most people. This is certainly a wider gap than the one I am now experiencing with my children’s generation. I wrote letters to all my friends in Mexico, my mom and my dear yaya (my grandmother), and I had to wait almost a month to get a response. This is now unthinkable to the kids that were born with cheap telephone calls and instant messaging.

So these and other gaps plagued my brain while listening to the endless loop in the tube: mind the gap. There are so many gaps to mind about for those that don’t have as many opportunities to become citizens of the world…and among them the vast majority of Mexicans. This is a real gap that we all have to mind about.

Monicami | Jun.30.2008 | Familiy business |