Watching Simone with Abuela

My grandmother doesn't understand most sports, and she doesn't care to. But this August, she became completely obsessed with the Rio Olympics gymnastics.

She called me every evening during the competition. "Mija, come over, they're doing the floor." I'd drive over with snacks. She'd already be in her armchair with her glasses on, a rosary in one hand and the remote in the other.

She yelled at the TV in Spanish. She gasped at every flip. When Simone Biles did her floor routine, my grandmother stood up and started clapping, all by herself, in her living room, at eighty-four years old.

"That girl flies," she said. "Like a bird. How does she do that?"

We watched every night until the Olympics ended. On the last night, she told me it had been the best two weeks of her summer. I think it was the best two weeks of mine too.