alejandra cadena

Hector Rolando Flores Guerrero, an American citizen living in Mexico, is not only my maternal grandfather but also my role model. He is a small business owner in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas Mexico. for more than 40 years. Heis the most hardworking person I know. He essentially worked his whole life. After being a CPA for 13 years in Laredo, TX, he opened “Exclusiva Rolando” his small local business that sells fine gentlemen clothing. He has always been the head of the house hold running his business and his home. While growing up, I always thought my grandfather was just like El Catrin from la loteria, a Mexican lottery game. He dressed in only finest clothing and wanted only the best for his family. His shoes only were more than $300 custom Italian shoes. He was the true image of a gentleman in all forms possible. He always treated everyone with respect and especially raised his children in a very strict manner. It was only a matter of time until his age would get the best of him. Now at the age of 89, he is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. He has trouble remembering short term memory. He will often forget where he is, who people are, and what he is doing. However, despite his disease, he still is an extremely hard worker and remembers most of his long term memory. After so many years of taking care of all business aspects of his store, he can no longer perform those tasks. Now, my grandmother is the one taking over the store, the bills, driving, essentially everything, and it's taking a toll on her too. My grandmother at the age of 87 is extremely challenging to start new and learn all these new tasks. She herself has memory issues of her own. After all the years of hard work and success, they are alone and taken advantage of. All the successes they saved over the years have been taken from them from employees or customers that see any easy way to scam an elderly couple. It is now very evident that my grandparents need help. They can no longer work let alone run a store for themselves. We are slowly trying to figure things out whether or not it is worth keeping the store open. These are images of what is going on during the transition to bring my grandparents over to the United States and immigrate my grandmother, so we can watch over them carefully.

-Ale