Fifty-seven is my Mom’s lucky number.
“Mira, look!” She would say as she points to a license plate that ends with fifty-seven.
Tears would crowd her eyes as she would see that our airline gate is fifty-seven. “She is watching over us during this flight, we will be safe,” she would say.
Fifty-seven is the year my mom was born. She thinks it’s a way her mom, my grandma, talks to us. My grandma (whom we call Mamamama), passed away three months after I was born. I never got to meet her, but from the way my mom talks about her, I know that she was an amazing woman.
My mom explains how everyone in their small town in Peru knew Mamamama. She was an iconic woman in the community who touched many with her compassionate drive to serve others, leaving a major impact on the town and its people. I can tell that she was my mom’s biggest role model and best friend, and it’s crazy how I never got to meet someone who shaped the person who has shaped me.
Even though I was always attentive to stories, photos and any other recollections my mom stored about my Mamamama, as a young teen, I wasn’t really convinced that my Mamamama was somehow present through a number.
“Okay mom,” my brother Ernie and I would remark, “sure sure, that’s Mamamama”. “It’s just a coincidence,” we would say, as my mom was freaking out, “No, no, she’s talking to us! I’m telling you, she’s saying she’s watching over us”.
My angsty, annoyed with the world, early-teenage self just thought this idea was a little crazy. I knew my Mamamama was looking over us, but there was no way a number could somehow be her manifestation into our lives, sending us a message through the number’s simple debut.
My close-minded, pessimistic self at the time was also unwilling to truly engage with my Peruvian roots. My predominantly white town and privileged life made me think that there wasn’t a need to be connected with that part of myself. I didn’t want to appear different in any way. I wasn’t secure with my identity or how I wanted to be seen by the world, so I resorted to the comfort of presenting myself just like everyone else. Distinction was a scary thing to me, as it is for most young teens; but I was particularly insecure about having any minor aspect for people to misjudge me off of.
Because of this mindset, I was embarrassed by my rather different family and their beliefs. With my mom being from Peru and my dad studying Spanish in college, these practices included my parents often speaking in Spanish, excessive and overwhelming acts of love and affection, the necessity to have family dinners every night, Peruvian food and remedies my mom insisted we tried and other minor yet seemingly major distinct customs that none of my friends practiced in their homes. I wanted no part in this divergence from my peers. I denied my Peruvian heritage and pushed away that part of myself—of my identity.
So, when my Mom would whip out her camera and start snapping pictures in awe of seeing the number fifty-seven, I wouldn’t let myself see the number’s significance. I saw my mom’s emotional reactions as another one of her dramatic Latina responses to a standard event. “Mom it’s just a number, there’s nothing to freak out about,” I would say harshly, terrified of making a scene and standing out in the slightest bit.
Then, as age does to one, I matured! Although it was just the slightest bit, anything was progress from my mad-at-the-world teenage stage. Part of this maturity involved an exploration into my identity and figuring out who I am in this world.
A microcosm of this large investigation was my college decision process and figuring out where would be the best fit for me. After visiting for Notre Dame’s accepted students weekend, I was enlightened by their discussion of a similar topic in the Philosophy class I was able to sit in on. The professor brought up the very questions I was beginning to ponder: What can I offer to this world? Why was I lucky enough to be born into such a privileged life with such an amazing family? What can I do with such gifts? What is my purpose?
This conversation really resonated with me and gave me a bit of perspective outside of the suburban bubble I had lived in my whole life, which I knew I needed to explore deeper. But I still had my array of doubts and worries if Notre Dame was really the best fit for me.
And sure enough, as my mom recalls: “We were deciding to see whether or not you were going to Notre Dame and trying to see what you were thinking at the end of the Accepted Students Weekend. We got dinner at Legends and were talking about what your thoughts were on deciding which school to go to, and how you felt about Notre Dame. I turn and there on the wall is a jersey with the number 57! 57! I thought, ‘Mamamama is telling you to come here!’”
As she recalls this story to me now, I personally don’t have a recollection of the instance, showing my lingering short-sightedness and identity search at the time. However, it is so clear now that this was my Mamamama pointing me in the right direction.
As I began at Notre Dame and took my first set of classes that delved into these questions about my existence, I—very slowly—began to become more secure with the identity I want to share with the world.
I am Peruvian, and it is something I shouldn’t be ashamed of. My roots are within me and a part of me; I wouldn’t be me without them. The unique customs of my family are also what have shaped me into the big-hearted, (almost) bilingual, family-oriented, foodie I am today.
I also now realize that my mom wasn’t that crazy about her idea of the significance of fifty-seven. As she firmly believes today, “that is the way I communicate with her. She has been my guidance for all these years.” And now, I recognize fifty-seven as a way for my Mamamama to guide me.
My open-mindedness, acceptance and drive to explore this part of my identity have brought about such an ability for her to communicate with me. Now, as I see the number on license plates, page numbers, math problems, door numbers—you name it—I think of her and what she is trying to tell me.
I think about how none of this, none of my family, none of me would exist without my Mamamama. I think about how she is telling me that I am where I am supposed to be, and that everything will take its form with time. I think about her calm character that my mom always described, and how she always brought a sense of peace and clarity into my mom’s life. I try to extract a piece of that sense for myself.
And as I share this with my Mom, she rejoices, “Finally you see it!” She begins to share stories about her recent fifty-seven encounters.
“Every time I am on my way to the store and I am thinking about you guys, there is a fifty-seven on the license plate reminding me my kids are okay.”
“When Ernie was abroad in Madrid and it was our last day before we left him for the semester, my cousin was bringing us out to dinner on our final night, I asked him where we were eating and he said ‘Puerto Fifty-Seven!’ I knew that was a message that Ernie would be all right.”
“I was going to visit my friend Toulouse, France and was a little nervous because I wasn’t really sure where I was going, and I looked at my plane ticket and the gate was fifty-seven. I knew I was going to be safe”.
These signs are so clear to me now, as they have always been for my Mom. There is no longer a detachment inside of me from my Mamamama and the Peruvian culture she brings into my identity; she is always going to be a part of me just how my Latina roots are always going to be a part of me.
I accept fifty-seven, and I accept myself; I welcome fifty-seven, and I welcome all of my varying facets; I am grateful for fifty-seven, and I am grateful for the heritage that makes up my existence; and I know I am safe under her watch, her eternal love and through her lasting legacy on my life.
So as I am sitting here in Duncan Student Center, stressed about writing this piece and the busy weeks I have coming up, overthinking why I wasted so much time yesterday and growing anxious, I hear a voice from Modern Market yell:
“57, your order is ready!”