Jose Luis Lopez
Autobiography
I, Jose Luis Lopez Resendiz, was born in Mexico City, Estado de Mexico on Sunday, April 18, 1973. My father is Lino Lopez Camacho and my mother is Catalina Resendiz Lopez. I am the middle child with four sisters, two older and two younger than me; Consuelo is the oldest, then Hortencia, then me, then Arceli, and then Diana. I was a very quiet and shy child when around strangers but at home I would run around with a lot of energy. I often fell and hurt myself or broke things in the house. I grew up with Consuelo, Hortencia, and Arceli. Diana was born much later when I was about 17 years old. I love my sisters but I would often fight or didn’t get along too well with Hortencia. Consuelo would take care of us a lot when our parents were not at home, since she was the oldest.
My favorite sport since I was very little is soccer. When I was eight years old I joined a soccer team. I could play very well. I was known for making a lot of goals. I was very well liked on the team because of this. I really enjoyed feeling loved by my team mates. The sad part was that my family never came to watch me play in any of my soccer games. My parents were usually busy at work or at home.
Both of my parents worked in factories. My parents had to work a lot ever since they were small children. They were not able to get much education. My dad was only able to go to school to the 5th grade and my mom to the 3rd grade. Back in my parents’ days the children had to quit school in order to help their parents with the farm work. I think because of this, my parents were not able to teach me very much, education wise, at home.
As for my education, I was on my own. I tried to do my best. When I started in school I was very good but then it got harder for me and my grades were not too good. I failed the 4th grade and had to do it again. I was very sad about this and paid more careful attention to my education from then on. My last year of school was 9th grade. In this time period, my father gotten laid off from his factory job and he opened his own tortilla making business. Unfortunately, in Mexico, not everyone has an equal opportunity to go to high school. You have to apply and get accepted. I was not accepted but I took some computer courses for a year and a half, that I had to pay for. It was a private school. I also started to work with my dad in the tortilla business before I finished the computer course.
My parents, when I was 17 years old, separated. My mom moved out of the house and my dad started to drink a lot. All of us children stayed at home with Dad. Three months after I started to help my dad with the tortilla business, he decided to moved to the United States, to New York City. He went alone and left us all in Mexico. My mother moved back into the house. I started to work the tortilla business on my own after my dad left. It was not a business I enjoyed. It was a lot of hard labor and long hours. At first, my sisters would help me but later on it was just me running the business alone. I stopped taking the computer courses because it was difficult to run the business and go to school.
I grew up being skinny and people would always tell me so. I decided to try to build more muscle and try to bulk up in my early twenties. I started going to the gym after I would close the tortilla business for that day. I had to really motivate myself to go to the gym because I would be so tired from the long day at work but I would always feel better after going to the gym. This helped me build up my self confidence and self worth. People started to notice me in a different way. I also enjoyed listening and dancing to music, going to movies and parties with my friends. Even though the tortilla business was making good money, I knew it was not what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. After eight years of running the tortilla business, I decided to sell it. I wanted to learn something different. I wanted a change in my life.
I considered school and even took some classes such as English. I wanted to start a school supply store but I wanted it to be in another state in Mexico. I never got a chance to do this because I spoke to my sister, Araceli, who had moved to the United States three years before, about wanting the changes in my life. She wanted me to visit her. I wanted to go too but not to just visit. I thought that moving to the United States would be the best way to make some changes in my life. Everything would be different for me and I could get a clean start with my life. I started to work on getting my Visa and passport so that I could go to the U.S. It was very difficult but finally I was able to get to the United States. Of course, my sisters and mom were very sad to let me go but they understood that I needed this change. I moved in with my sister, Araceli and her new family in El Monte, California.
Araceli was already married to her husband, Marco, and had her first daughter, Samantha, who was already two years old. I wasted no time and started working at a local King Taco only weeks after arriving. I also started taking English classes with Araceli at a nearby Elementary School that taught English to adults. After working at King Taco for almost a year, I got another opportunity to work somewhere else. This job offer was at a company called, Chemtex Print, which was in Rancho Dominguez, to work in the Lab to match colors for fabric printing and to do chemical quality. I thought this would be a good opportunity to learn something different. Even though it would be farther to drive to and I would need to quit King Taco, I decided to take the job.
As business at Chemtex got busier and I started to work 12 hours a day, which was good money, but I had to stop going to the English class. After working at Chemtex Print for four years, an unfortunate event occurred. The owner died in an slip and fall accident at his home. This caught the company in shock and business since has greatly decreased. But for me at this time in my life, I had met a girl that worked at Chemtex. Her name was Rachel. She only spoke English and I still spoke mostly Spanish. I wanted to talk to her but since we both did not speak the same language I started to take English class again. Until one day, we were both at the water fountain and I spoke to her in English. She was surprised to hear me speak so well. We later set up a date to go dancing. That was our first date.
We dated from then on until we got married. We got married in Las Vegas on Saturday, January 5, 2008. Since I started to date Rachel I really have improved with my English because I use it everyday to talk to her. As I wanted, my life has greatly changed since moving to the United States. I am very happy and comfortable with my new family, my wife, Rachel, and my step-son, Ian, who is now 12 years old. I still work at Chemtex Print even though Rachel does not. I’ve been working there for six years now. I still want a better job such as owning my own business someday. I am taking culinary classes as well as an English class. I would like to someday be an American citizen and own my own restaurant.
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