Actually a better title for this essay would be; "Bienvenidos, Doug So Long, Mónica"

Officers Club - Fort Belvoir, Virginia

May24, 1997

DaddyO HotRod                                        Gives Monroney Away!

It is May 24, 1997 and today I will have to give my Darling Monica away. That is what society calls it, you give your daughters away when they marry, and society also holds that it is the father who does it. I knew it would hurt. Aye, it is going to hurt. How will I do it; what will I say? This task is going to break the cockles of my heart or at least the strings to it, as did the two previous occasions when I gave away Dolóres Lumína and Cecília Tañya.

Here is what I said:

"Mónica Emília Chacón, you are now Mónica Emília Chacón de Glenn. You were named Mónica after your great-grandfather Mónico Durán on your mother's side, and Emília after your grandmother Emília Martínez de Chacón on your father's side. You were born in a Clinic named Hogar de la Madre, in Miraflóres, a ritzy suburb of Lima, Peru while we, your parents were on assignment with the Peace Corps. Until you completed your eighteenth birthday you had dual citizenship and could have opted to become a Peruvian citizen or an American. By your silence you opted to become an American. You have the most adorned birth certificate I had ever seen, and you now have it, it is yours to keep. And for you Doug, there is no secret to understanding this sweet, darling daughter of mine, she is yours to make your wife. We welcome you and yours to our family and to our way of life."

One Family Now

The Chacons                         With Glenns

"Doug, as you know, and you have encouraged me, I am working on my memoirs, entitled MY NINE LIVES + and I have about 25 chapters completed. It is a continuing project and I will no doubt be working on it when the last goodbye does come. I do have a copy for you of what is available now which contains enough for you to know who we are."

"In effect we are the product of a unique melting pot, perhaps the most integrated yet identifiable group, on the face of the earth. American Hispanics are descendants of Visgoeths, Jews, Moors, Spanish, Arabs, Piautes, Aztecs, and more. We range all the way from pale pink blue-eyed blondes on your mother's family to brown-eyed bronze browns on your father's side. We can trace our genes on at least one family tree to the legendary Major Rafaél Chacón, Commander of Northern Troops at the Battle of Valvérde during the Civil War, to Governor Don Fernando Chacón of New Mexico (1794 to 1804), to El Marqués de la Peñuela Admirante Don José Chacón Medína Salazár y Villaseñor, a native of Seville, who served as Governor of New Mexico from 1707 until 1712 and is recognized as one of the founders of Albuquerque."

Till Death Do Us Part!

"So here Mónica, here is your famous Peruvian birth certificate. Here Doug, here is my daughter Mónica Emília; we also call her Moniquíta, Moniquéta, Móna, Moni, and Monroney. Make her your wife and may God Bless you both. We, your parents and your new found family, wish you only the best."

Hot Rod DaddyO

Read On! Enjoy!