Uncle Charlie

A Letter to My Father

I’ve been thinking about Uncle Charlie.

The smell of albondigas filling his apartment in Los Feliz. His Thanksgiving feasts in West Hollywood. His annoying pet birds.

Seriously, why the damn birds?

Then I remembered the little café across the street from his apartment on Los Feliz Blvd. The waitresses would fawn all over him. One—I think her name was Teri—went so far as to tell him she thought he was beautiful. He was, but it was the first time I ever saw women swoon.

I remember asking him after breakfast if he found women attractive, and he admitted that he did sometimes. He said he loved dark-skinned Black women. When I was in Senegal last year, I thought a lot about Uncle Charlie. It’s entirely possible that Senegal has the most beautiful people in the world.

You two didn’t always get along. You never really explained why to me. But then, you weren’t the talker. And yet, you always trusted him with me. You knew he loved me as if I were his own. More than that, you knew he could reach me…