Have some kids. New York City, maybe. Find an apartment that is full of people who are foreign to this place, like yourself, and judge them and accost them regularly, so that early on your kids learn the importance of self-hate. Kiss your wife on the teeth and take her sledding. Find a tree surrounded by pavement and watch as it changes with the seasons. Fruit born from nothing, dropped for nothing, rotting on the sidewalk, uneaten. Notice the suede underbelly of the tree’s leaves. Your grandfather holding a frog on its back. Stroking it gently, the soft white underbelly for good luck. For more rain. “They do not mind,” he says, smiling, handing you the frog.

Eat store-bought cake on Thursdays, since that is the day of the week your mother used to surprise you and your two older brothers with the paçavure that she would bring home; and store-bought cake is the closest thing to paçavure that you can find here; and it is cold—so cold—and the cake tastes nothing like paçavure, unless you close your eyes and you focus only on the texture of it, when the cake is old and on its way out.

Eat week-old cake and struggle to remember the place that you came from. Lean against the tree with the fruit that is now collecting in the gutters. Think about all that you have left behind, and all that you have found.

Have some kids. Three boys. New York City, maybe. Find an apartment that is full of people who are foreign to this place, like yourself, and judge them and accost them regularly; and on Thursdays bring them food that your wife has prepared so that someday your kids learn the importance of texture.