The Sum Total of Our Experiences.

"Ay, every generation, every man is part of his past. He cannot escape it, but he may reform the old materials, make something new--"

Rudolfo Anaya (Bless Me, Ultima 247)

Nearing the end of this novel the main character Antonio and his father have a sweet conversation unique to any others in the novel that took place. Antonio was able to reach below the surface level small-talk and hear the emotions and thoughts of his father. 

A frequently quoted phrase says that we are a "sum total of our past experiences," where often we don't realize the potential of what we can make of ourselves. 

In the spring of 1954 an act said to be impossible by physiologists and athletic trainers, Roger Banister broke the four minute mile, something no one had been able to do. Though what happened just shortly after was just as fascinating. In just a years’ time almost 150 others had broken that record. How was this possible?

The old materials, or the thought that many people didn't think it was possible, that the human body couldn't run that fast was almost believed as a fact, but as soon as someone took that old material, or that old way of thinking, and decided to make something new out of it, or decided to think differently about that given situation, reform happened. Changes happened.

We are all part of our past because we lived it, endured it, and made it, but we don’t just make something for nothing. Everything we make is for the future. We run to break records. Antonio, an observer and listener, soaked in life and experiences from his father in this situation and also many other people in other situations throughout the novel, to help him undertake and carry out the final events of this book.

Little did Antonio know, he was preparing himself for the time when he would be without his father and other loved ones. Little do we tap into the capacity we have from stored experiences, old materials; to make them new—to make us new. We possess everything necessary to make any change possible, to reform ourselves, the question is how are we going to make us new?