Andre Bronzoni

2011-03-22T18:41:00.001-07:00

Every day on this blog I am going to write about someone I know,

either a person I’ve just met whose life has a contemporary interest,

or a friend who has taught me something about myself or life around

me. Two years ago I published I Am Everyone I Meet which focused on

the spontaneity of encountering strangers and recognizing our common

attributes.

I met Andre Bronzoni on the elevator of the Barrington Plaza in

Brentwood, California. He was riding up with his pretty, dark haired

girlfriend to her apartment with a view.

“Are you Brazilian?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said, his English good. “I am a student at UCLA.” His

accent was rhythmic, unlike our staccato American speech. He spoke

easily.

“I’m looking for a tutor to teach me Portuguese,” I said immediately.

“Will you teach me?”

“Yes,” he said. “We must talk about it. Give me your phone number.”

He said, “your phone,” as if the two words were a melodious long

word—“yourphone”—which is exotic to American ears.

I gave it to him, not expecting to hear from him. But I did. He

called, a few days later, and we agreed to meet. From our first class,

I began to listen to his Portuguese closely, watching his lips move

differently from mine, because of where he grew up. I had never

thought that our lips move differently because of where we live in the

world, but they do. It’s true of people everywhere—Arabia, Russia,

China, Chile. Their lips and mouths make little movements that only

they do effortlessly. Once you think of it, it’s obvious. Imagine

someone from Scotland speaking Japanese and moving his mouth as he

does when he speaks Scottish.

There were several sounds I felt at once I would never learn—the “sao”

which must not be pronounced as ‘ow” and the rolling “r’s” which use

the tip of the tongue. I think American tongues like to lie flat when

we speak.

I had no idea how our learning a language would throw both him and me

into a literary intimacy. It is like translating a poem from one

language to another and getting insight both into the native language

and into the language you are learning. I began to learn about English

because of how he spoke, and about Portuguese because of how

falteringly yet with improvement, I spoke. And we became aware of our

personalities and our cultural differences.

He is a young dynamo, already having mastered being a chef in Brazil

and Miami, as well as finishing a B.A. in the U.S. and doing further

studies in marketing at UCLA. He cares about his future—thinking about

and building its security carries him along like a steam. He has a

certain joy of living that matches his good looks, but that can be

shadowed by his fear of insecurity.

I am 47 years older than he, but more comfortable with being

insecure. He wants and needs a good job to propel him into success. I

have a measured success that allows me to judge how he is appraising

his own future.

Everything about him is intelligent, even his slouchy dress and

unkempt hair. I embarrassed him once by telling him that he had

dandruff, which he denied but got rid of. He is philosophical,

energetic and like a wide-open eye ready to take in the world.

Not only am I learning Portuguese from him, I am reminded every visit

how serious and delightful being young is. He knows as little of his

future as I know of mine. In a few years I will have changed vastly,

age accelerating after 70, and he will mature but have many years to

live.

He makes me feel optimism because of who he is. Does every young

person in the world have his spirit and his shocking future that can

not be shaped yet? Probably, somewhere deep inside them. But he is the

embodiment of the individuality of youth, and I am that of old age.

He worries about his future. I believe in it. There is no doubt that

a far more dramatic and satisfying world than he imagines has already

gripped him. The fingers of my life are loosening and will, before too

long, start to let me go. I will find out about something even more

important than living.

But to participate in this world with a stranger and not a stranger,

with another person whose life force I can feel as he speaks

Portuguese so beautifully, is a gift of the moment.

James P. White