Jorge Carrizal

To know Jorge was to understand what selflessness means: self-sacrifice. I remember time and again Jorge giving his last bit of food to someone in need. The personification of giving the shirt off your back. Whatever you needed from Jorge, it was in your hands with out asking. Time, energy, devotion to his children, his daughters and son were everything and more. When you called Jorge’s house, the sound of a baby could be heard laughing in his arms. His pride of family is what it means to be an El Pasoan, his wealth of El Paso culture, the small details of our lives and the extension of grandmothers. Jorge was a walking cultural authority of time costume wear, the special herbs in a dish. Jorge could take anything; a scrap of colored tissue became a cathedral of flowers. An old flat of cardboard became a painted Mona Lisa, hours and hours toward the right color the perfect passage of magenta into rose mauve.

Though senators sang his praises the cooing voice of a grandchild well satisfied, her cry of “I am loved and in the hands of an angel and He’s my grandpa”, were his most treasured sounds.

Jorge always ate last. A jar of his homemade chili went to the bed ridden woman across the alley, a pot of beans was to feed as many friends as it could hold and the last was for someone who would never forget him.

The sound of guitar, his friend Cesar or Ricardo, a Cito drum and Jorge’s foot would be set against the setting El Paso sun a flame with corrido or flamenco dance.

He paints this day among the adobe walls of Saint Eli, his chickens, canaries and cockatiels, all a crescendo of passion inspiring extending from grandfather, father, brother, friend, teacher, to knew hands what it means to define the meaning of civic duty, of making someone feel loved and in the midst of a new angel.

In the refracted rainbow light of golden halos I hear his laugh, his smile, and with Saint Frances, Our lady of Guadalupe with our own friend Jorge he looks us over with delight and says, “A job well I have done”.

I thank his grandmothers, his father, his mother, his sisters, his brothers, his son, his daughters, and his many grandchildren for letting us share their great treasure.

And we were and still are rich because of it. I know those supreme on high have a special place for Jorge to rain down in pure light high up from a heart that knows no bounds.

Goodbye our friend and hello to all that you may touch, for we know they receive you well.

David Fleet.