The noise increased when Progreso X presented on «Innovation in Communication.» Initially, it wasn’t a journey through time but getting lost in it. Yes, a journey to the past to celebrate those who communicate the present and, additionally, a conference with a vision towards the future. I know I might be exaggerating, but the structure of the analytical process in my brain was collapsing while trying to connect all the train cars in this activity. Fortunately, the noise diminished. I understood that, although we have our feet firmly on the ground of the present, we cannot look towards the future without first climbing the steps of the past. That is the value of our history.
I decided to board the train and embark on my personal journey through time.
I went to the past and noticed that my story occupies a significant place on this train. Fortunately, the freight cars have an appropriate length. Not to carry histories of reports, figures, and results but for those memories and anecdotes that were told to me at the San Miguel plant 17 years ago when I began to be a part of the cement family as a receptionist. The day I completed three months in the company came to mind, and sitting on the bus back to Sanarate, the colleague next to me told me that he was celebrating 35 years of working in the company. That memory came with many others. I recalled Dr. Adolfo Gramajo mentioning that before the implementation of OH&S, the windows were cleaned by getting on a front loader. I also remembered Mr. Carlos Secaida preparing chicken broth in the automotive workshop. Those days of delivering pay slips to different work areas, Fridays of carnitas and chicharrones, legends of the ghost child in the plant, and radio calls to operational areas before the arrival of cell phones. I remembered when Mr. Plinio Herrera, Tommy Dougherty, and Mr. Frederick Melville visited the plant and greeted each one by name, making the sense of family noticeable. In that journey to the past, I remembered that I was one of the seven women working at the San Miguel plant, a headquarters of approximately 700 employees back then.
Today, I am in the present, still seeing coworkers with an admirable trajectory within the organization. Around me, I see opportunities, inclusion, expansion, achievements, and challenges galore. Today, I am in the present and standing, even though it is sometimes difficult to remain so. But I know that I am supported by the strong root of my past, my trajectory. Sometimes I run out of strength, and I want to let myself fall, it’s true, but instead, I prefer to let my letters fall, one by one on paper, and see how they transform because they are resilient. Today, with my effort, I try to leave a golden legacy through my work, that often seems like just a grain of sand. Today, I am at La Pedrera, an iconic place for Zone 6 and the city of Guatemala. I am here building the stories and anecdotes that I want to remember later. The present, like the train track, is crucial to reaching my destination, achieving my goals, and fulfilling my objectives. These are everyone’s goals and objectives because, how could they not be everyone’s when we are all traveling together on this train that, in addition to freight cars of history, has passenger cars traveling together to the same destination? Towards Progreso.
And yes, I also went to the future. I saw that future that intimidates me and excites me at the same time because it has uncertainty, but it also has high expectations. It is that dreamed-of future that we share and that we are building together. Although achieving a uniform coupling between cars is sometimes difficult, our imperative mechanisms are mature enough and provide the necessary tension for our chain of objectives not to come off the hook that drives it.
Sustainable locomotion has been fundamental. Because, like in a semi-permanent coupling, our wagons, like a composition, are destined to always circulate together.
We will reach our destination well. I know we will.
