I didnāt really like my name growing up.Ā Iām Puerto Rican so I have 4 names.Ā Ā Three are after my dad. Luis Roberto Torres. No junior. Iām the second son. And then, Machuca from my mom.Ā Luis Roberto Torres Machuca is my birth name.Ā Learning how to write it in kindergarten was hell!Ā My parents shouldāve named me something strong, commanding, atypical for us.Ā How about ADRIAN?Ā Isnāt that the perfect name for a curious, sweet boy like myself?Ā
They named me Luis, which means famous warrior/someone who is glorious in battle according to my dadās mother. Ā That part of my name I like a little.Ā Pero.Ā LUIS. IN PUERTO RICO??Ā You know how many Luisā youād find in a 2nd grade class of 30 students? Six.Ā So I wasnāt just Luis- I needed a second identifier.Ā Again, ROBERTO, IN PUERTO RICO? Adrian would have sufficed. So I was always LUIS TORRES.Ā LOUIS-TOURESS for the gringos.Ā Blah. Basic. Common.Ā Am I that? Is that what you read in these words? I donāt think so honey!Ā Ā
Thank god Iām gifted and cute, though not always aware of it, especially when the teenage years hit.Ā Which, I know, theyāre hard for everybody but more so for me because of my plot heavy existence.
So with nowhere else to go, I listened to the mother who had abandoned me a decade prior and moved to the suburbs of Pennsylvania.Ā I lasted a year.Ā Iāll tell you more about it when I turn this draft into a chapter of my book.Ā Ā
For now, please allow me to share with ya the identity crisis I had when I moved back to Puerto Rico in 2006.Ā I had fully embraced the hood gringo aesthetic- white tshirts over michael jordan baseball jersey, Rocawear jeans and Timz.Ā Ā
My brain was on shuffle between Spanish and English- making me annoying to everybody on the island and rightfully so! Nobody wants to deal with that person who spent 11 months away and returns back with a terrible accent, and no, this is not a reference to Madonnaās British era!Ā Ā
It was easier than I anticipated adjusting back.Ā I was so happy to be LUIS and not LU-IS anymore.Ā I needed to make up some classes I lost, and others I failed, geometry, so I had an odd schedule and spent most of my time in the, uh, disadvantaged group.Ā Ā
We love everybody and understand that school isnāt for all. With that said, one of the advantages of being in a classroom with folks who donāt care about academic pursuits, is that you develop thick skin or else because most of the time is spent bickering, taunting, bullying (the teachers) and arguing or de-escalating an argument.Ā I wasnāt involve in many scuffles.Ā My classmates respected me, granted, they needed me to pass them the answers to every exam, but also because Iām a bully, and a great one, cuz you canāt bully me back!
Iāve always had the wit of my alcoholic maternal grandmother, the rage of displacementĀ marinating every thought that I will ever have, and the sense of humor of a paraplegic father who loves to say things like, āIām going for a run after work,ā to mean a nap.Ā Ā Calling me names, addressing me as a faggot, or being the group doormat never took because I didnāt react to itā¦ in high school!
I used to, uh, release vitriol and ancestral hatred in elementary school, when kids would call me MACHUCA.Ā Ā
The man who named my mother is Carlos Machuca.Ā He is known in the island because he is a successful coach of baseball players.Ā The heyday of Puerto Ricans in the MLB throughout the 90s?Ā His impact.Ā The one in my life is similar to the one his daughter imprinted in me:Ā abandonment.Ā
My abuela had paid him $250 for me and my brother to join his weekend baseball clinics for teenagers.Ā $250 each, by the way.Ā We were excited!Ā For the first time, our family meant something other than neglect and mental illness.Ā But he never picked us up.Ā Ā
So, really, what could possibly hurt more than my motherās original sin?
I canāt stop thinking that high school has an expiration date and then I have to start all over again and really make college happen cuz I have no backup plan.Ā Itās success or else.Ā I want to be a lawyer, I tell the school counselor! But I donāt. I donāt know what I want. I canāt strategically plan for the future when my past is what itās been and my present is abandonment, poverty, mental illness, cancer!Ā
So I take it out by bullying the bullies who prey on closeted students and the annoying jesus freaks who always point out that my dad, Don Luis Torres, is a good man of God and Iā¦ am not! And they were right.Ā His name doesnāt fit me.Ā His name doesnāt identify me.Ā Luckily, I was about to be anointedĀ by Puerto Rican King Daddy Yankee.
During the second semester of senior year, when Iām fully immersed in graduation and prom planning, getting good grades, and being the coolest LUIS in all the school despite stiff competition. Thereās 10 Luisā total, and then we get another one.Ā In my classroom!Ā
And get this, he was also a Torres so our home class teacher decided to go by our maiden names. He would be called LUIS COLON and I becameā¦ Luis MACHUCA and as soon as he said it, the entire classroom, in unison, began chanting MACHUCANDO *bass* MACHUCANDO.Ā
Allow me to explain,
As I returned back home, Daddy Yankee released Machucando, a summer hit about settling animalistic sexual tension through dancing aka Machucando.Ā The song is a bop, we stan, and it took a different meaning to me that day.Ā
MACHUCA is not a word used often in conversation, let alone as a last name in Puerto Rican Spanish. Itās a verb.Ā It means toĀ smash.Ā As the action in aĀ wooden mortar to crush spices, enemies, the terrors of my life.Ā
My classmates chanting MACHUCANDO didnāt register to me as taunting, maybe because I wasnāt paying attention thus confused as to why I had been called MACHUCA in the first place?Ā I still donāt know. But the rest of this harmonized chorus called for one action and one action only:
I get on top of my chair buckle my knees and thrust my hips to the chanting, MACHUCANDO adolescent fears away; ready for whatās next as the strong, commanding, assertive lion, Luis Machuca.
Fave so far