Hailing from New York City, as many Smithies do, Lola and I crossing paths would have been unimaginable a decade ago. We have plenty in common: immigrant families, a love of college radio, a hate of disorganization, even an Irish high school history teacher who coached golf. What are the odds of that? Also, we are both are horrendous at math.

They are a writer (another similarity)– a poet, to be precise. “Reality is literal enough,” she tells me, so when writing, they seek to be immersed into fantasia, where a man can be a pear tree blossom and something holier than life. This imagination has to come from somewhere, not nostalgic Disney channel shows or glam boy bands, but books. Or perhaps, just the idea of books, because when I ask, she cannot give me a solid favorite. I shouldn’t ask a mother to pick a favorite child. Maybe bell hooks? James Baldwin? Even Zora Neale Hurston? Or whatever graces their hands next.

Some of the imagination must stem from their upbringing, as most things about us do. Lola had strict parents (yet another coincidence), hence why Disney was not a part of their childhood. We talk about our parents, how they hand down not only their genes but their tastes, peculiarities, and quirks. Often, we miss these tendencies, at least until they unravels in our futures. Small miracles, like realizing we are so similar to our parents, and trying to love them for their kinship to us, are what Lola tries to capture in their writing. They didn’t tell me this, but showing is better than telling. I am allowed the honor of reading their work, surgical in its preciseness, haunting as it stares me down. I don’t need to be told.

One thing that failed to be passed down was the language. We both are from Spanish-speaking families, but they never caught the tongue for it. Lola has tried, cried, and bled for it, but nothing sticks. English stuck; it is plastic and velvet and weightless in their hands. But Spanish slips through their fingers, even after years of study. It is such an easy and common want– learning another language– but its impossibility is especially acute for them. Not knowing their mother tongue is aggravating, embarrassing, desesperante, and there is nothing they can do. Nothing but make use of what she is gifted with instead.