from lola’s story, copyright © 2017 by the estate
of alex tizon, as first published in the atlantic
(june 2017), theatlantic.com.newspaper articles I’d written. She
couldn’t read back then, but she’d
kept them anyway.Doods pulled up to a small concrete
house amid the rice fields. Before I
even got out of the car, people started
coming outside.
“This way,” a soft voice said. Follow-
ing close behind were about 20 peo-
ple. Once we were all inside, they sat
down on chairs and benches arranged
along the walls. I remained standing.
People glanced at me expectantly.
A woman in a housedress sauntered
in with a smile. Ebia, Lola’s niece. This
was her house. She gave me a hug and
said, “Where is Lola?”
I handed my tote bag to her. She
sat on a wooden bench and pulled
out the box. She set it on her lap and
rested her forehead on top of it. Her
shoulders began to heave, and then
she was wailing—a deep, mournful,
animal howl. I hadn’t expected this
kind of grief.
Before I could comfort Ebia, a
woman walked in from the kitchen
and wrapped her arms around her. The
next thing I knew, the room erupted
with sound. Everyone was crying. I was
so fascinated that I barely noticed the
tears running down my own face.
Ebia sniffled and said it was time
to eat. Everybody started filing into
the kitchen, puffy-eyed but suddenly
lighter and ready to tell stories. I
glanced at the empty tote bag on thebench, and I knew it was right to bring
Lola back to the place where she’d
been born.Alex Tizon died unexpectedly in his
sleep, of natural causes, at age 57, on
the same day in March 2017 that the
Atlantic decided to publish his story
on its cover. Tizon never got the news.
Although he had won a Pulitzer Prize
for his work at the Seattle Times, his
wife, Melissa Tizon, called this “his
ultimate story.”When Lola came to live with the author’s
family, he urged her to relax and enjoy life.rd.com 99courtesy melissa tizon
First Person