A Looming Change of Continental Dimensions

In which Teófilo dwells on his and his bride's arrival to South Dakota

Here we go!

The geographical shift we undertook at age 20 astonishes me today but it didn’t back then. We went from the tropics, at 18 degrees of latitude north of the equator, to 44 degrees north. We've lived on an Island that is 100 miles long by 35 miles wide but now we had a continent to reckon with. We had to start thinking in miles, not kilometers, of hot summers and bitter winters, not of steady warm temperatures year-round.

Then, there was also the language challenge. I'd developed a better English fluency already though very accented, but Mercie hadn't yet. She depended a lot on me at first as she developed her own fluency. She did so in large part by watching I Love Lucy and other late 50's, and then 60's sitcoms. One day I caught her belly-laughing at an I Love Lucy episode. Watching her laugh pleased me, as humor is one of the most difficult things to learn from a language and a culture.

We faced every challenge in stride. We had it good when compared to the prior generations of Puerto Ricans who had migrated north. Other than the language challenge, our culture shock wasn't too bad. The South Dakotan people we would come to meet were warm, friendly, and very amiable.

More on that later.

Arrival and First days

Fig 1. Great Circles distances from San Juan to Rapid City: 3,184 Statute Miles

We traveled from San Juan to Miami, and then on to Houston, and then to Denver. In Miami we had a bad encounter with a Hare Krishna man. He placed a book on my hands without my asking, then pulling it away brusquely when I refused to bite. Next time - I told myself - I will run after him, ask for the book again, and fling it to the ground. But I was, and in many ways remain, a man of slow emotional reactions. That's good in a way.

Fig. 2. Hare Krishna folks doing their thing, somewhere. Photo by Martin Krchnacek on Unsplash

In Denver we caught a turboprop commuter plane en route to Rapid City. In light of my previous experiences in 1972 I became agitated and concerned. Yet the flight was smooth and uneventful. That killed the fear forever.

We arrived at Rapid City in the evening. The temperature was in the low 60’s, a temperature we seldom experienced in Puerto Rico. It was breezy too, and drizzling, which added a chill to the air. “Windchill factor” was another term we were unfamiliar with. We would come to know it very well, soon enough.

After retrieving our meager luggage, we called Ellsworth's transportation squadron. They send the base taxi to retrieve us and take us to the Pine Tree Inn, the base's hotel. We'd expected to stay in for as long as could before finding housing off-base. But an annual bombing squadron weapons loading competition was about to start. That meant we had to vacate the room in about two days, and we had nowhere to go. Thank God, and goodhearted Staff Sargeant whose name I've forgotten took us into his home on base. He acted as a "sponsor" and took me around to find our first vehicle and first home. God bless you wherever you are.

That's also when I purchased the first vehicle we've ever owned: a used 1980, white and blue, two-door, manual transmission, Ford Fairmont Futura. Something like the picture below.

Fig. 3. Ford Fairmont two door sedan (Source).

By every measure the car was a clunker. It lacked air conditioner, but its heater worked well. Its windshield wiper fluid container was busted. It had corrosion marks on several places. Moreover, we had to learn to drive anew using the manual transmission. It was not made to navigate the Dakotan winter, but we made it to.

The good thing about the vehicle was that, compared to today's models, it was a "dumb" vehicle. No computers, no fancy radios, no huge electronic panel. That meant I could work on it and I did, until we got rid of it in 1991.

We moved into a large mobile home in a place called Western Mobile Park in Box Elder, a town adjoining the base. The Park consisted of a grouping of mobile homes owned by Adolph and Violet Denke (may they RIP). They became our first landlords ever. The Park looked like this:

Fig. 4. View of Western Mobile Park, Box Elder, South Dakota (Source).

The units included furniture and a full-size bed with a lumpy mattress. They were sparse, Spartan even, but they were home, our first ever home.

We were together, ready to start our lives. We were ecstatic. Thus, we went.

Bonus Video