The Children of Sanchez (57 page)

Salvador fell in the doorway and my
papá
saw that he was full of blood. He was stretched out on the kitchen floor, with his feet across the doorsill. My father unbuttoned his pants and saw the wound.

We were very frightened and I began to cry. My
papá
sent me to get Roberto, who was eating supper at his friend’s house. Roberto went for my aunt Guadalupe and Ignacio, who came running with Prudencia and her son. Someone sent for the Red Cross ambulance. The cut was very deep and my cousin’s intestines were coming out; my
papá
said he didn’t think he would last long.

The ambulance took him away. He died while they were operating on him. My poor aunt! It was the work of God that she didn’t go crazy, because she gave out tremendous screams. The old bastard who was her boss in the café wouldn’t give her permission to take that day off and she had to look for someone to stay with her dead son.

Then that Prudencia, who had always been envious and mean, said the wake could not be held in her room, though it was the only home Salvador had known. My poor little aunt told me that Prudencia had never liked Salvador, in fact, that no one had liked him and that even his grandmother would chase him off. When Guadalupe had gone begging Prudencia to let them stay in a corner of her room, she was told, “My house is yours, but there is no room for your son.”

They moved in with Prudencia anyway and had to suffer her snubs and abuse. Sometimes she would lock herself in with her children and wouldn’t open the door even if it were raining. Guadalupe, Ignacio and Salvador would cover themselves with newspaper and stand huddled in the entranceway of the
vecindad
until she decided
to let them in. That’s why my aunt says it is awful to live off someone else and that she must have been born under an unlucky star because she suffered all her life.

When Salvador was killed, my aunt had to plead with Prudencia for permission to put the coffin and candles in the courtyard. So the wake was held outdoors. Years later, when Prudencia’s son went crazy and was put in the insane asylum, my aunt Guadalupe said, “Yes, we pay for everything we do in this life. God is slow but he doesn’t forget.”

Of all the women I know, my aunt Guadalupe was the one I most admired. She was the kind of woman who knew how to suffer! I wish I had her courage to go on, to never let trouble conquer and to be resigned to whatever happens. True, she complained a lot about money and was always worrying about paying the rent, but she was so resourceful that no matter how little she had, she managed to cook enough for everyone there. She would buy fifty
centavos
worth of pork, twenty
centavos
of bruised tomatoes, a few
centavos
of oil, dried up onions and garlic and make a casserole full!

She said no one ever gave her anything or helped her out, and that she had to open her own path in the world. Even though she had a mother, no one showed her the way. Perhaps that is why she was never able to give me worth-while advice or to be a true mother to me. She was so lacking in moral judgment herself I

As for helping her, only Manuel could be accused of never giving her a thing or not visiting. Roberto and Consuelo came often and would give her a few
pesos
whenever they were working. All the time I lived with her, I gave her money for food, so that my children would eat well. Every day I would buy one quart of milk from the CEIMSA, the government store, until they passed the rule that for every quart, we had to buy one egg. That made it difficult, because some days I had enough for the milk, but not for the egg. And who needed so many eggs, anyway? They did it just to bother people!

I got along well with everyone in that
vecindad
—with Julia and her husband Guillermo; Maclovio and his wife; Yolanda and her husband Rafael; Ana, the janitress;
Don
Quintero; and all the others. Many of them had known me since I was a baby. Yolanda and I would wash laundry at the tubs together, and go to the market. I don’t know how she stood the life she led with Rafael. He was all
right for the first few years, but when his mother died he took to the bottle and stopped giving Yolanda money. All she got from him was hunger, blows and babies. She was a factory, producing one child after another. There were seven ragged ones already, and another on the way.

Yolanda’s mother, Julia, wanted to give her lemon ice with red wine to chill her matrix so that she wouldn’t conceive again, but Yolanda wouldn’t hear of it. I, too, was tired of bringing babies into the world, but I refused my aunt’s offer to cure me with water that had been boiled with a gold ring and a piece of bull’s horn. Who knows why I was afraid to be cured?

Nor have I ever tried to produce a miscarriage, although I know many remedies … strong orégano tea, vinegar, cinnamon tea, douches of permanganate. Women here make many sacrifices to have miscarriages, but for those with tough matrixes, only “a cleaning” works. For that, the midwives want 150
pesos
, so few women do it. Medicines and operations are so expensive that we have to place our faith in herbs and household remedies.

In my aunt’s
vecindad
there was no lack of gossip. Everyone noticed who had more and who had less, especially in clothing and food. If someone bought something new there was a lot of envy and suspicion. “I wonder how he did it?” was what the neighbors would say. Anyone in that place who owned a bed, a mattress and a wardrobe was a “somebody.” When I lived there, Ana was considered on “top” because she was the janitress and both her daughters were working. She also sold
pulque
on the side, and all her grandchildren helped her with some piecework. Now Julia and Guillermo are on “top” because they have a television set.

Life should have been sad in that
vecindad
because everyone was so poor. The men drank and the wives had to feed large families on less than five
pesos
. If a woman bought a new rag of a dress, she would have to hide when the man came to collect the installments. But in spite of that, the people would laugh and joke. The very tragedies which some suffered, gave others something to laugh about. The men were always making love and rolling around with women. If it wasn’t some husband sleeping with a neighbor’s wife, it would be some wife running around with a neighbor’s husband.

No sooner do men know that a woman has made a misstep, when they come offering her the world. The first thing they do here is to
offer to set up an apartment or to take you elsewhere to live. But I had suffered such cruel disillusionment I didn’t believe any of them. They would take me all right and then leave me in the middle of the road! In my aunt’s
vecindad
several men went after me, Rafael, Maclovio,
Don
Chucho and
Don
Quintero, but I rejected them all.

Of the bunch, the nicest was
Don
Quintero, with whom I had an innocent friendship. He was a shoemaker and we became friends when I gave him a pair of my daughter’s shoes to repair. He was about forty-two years old, had grown children, and called my girls “daughters.” He was separated from his wife and lived alone. Naturally, he did suggest a few times that we get together. He would say, “Don’t be stupid, Shorty. If you’re not happy with your husband, why stay with him?”

I felt attracted to
Don
Quintero because he told me he was not potent any more and that we could go to bed like brother and sister. I wanted a man who couldn’t have children and who wouldn’t be making use of me every moment. But I treated it as a joke and nothing serious developed between us.

It was Yolanda who told me that Soledad, Ana’s daughter, was angry because she thought I had an understanding with
Don
Quintero, who was her lover. Soledad went around calling me “hot pants” and “the slippery one” until all the neighbors thought I was going to bed with him. There was so much gossip, it got to Crispín. He went to
Don
Quintero and accused him of being the father of the child I was expecting. Think of it! He thought
that
man, who couldn’t even do it any more, was the father of Trinidad! My husband was always doubting the paternity of his daughters, even when he was the only one I went to bed with. And still I stuck to him!

That year, I went to Chalma for the first time. All my life, I had wanted to go with my aunt and would cry when my father wouldn’t allow me. He would say, “Go? What for? It’s pure foolishness! They don’t know anything about God and just go to get drunk. And they’d probably leave you there.” When I married, it was Crispín who wouldn’t let me go.

So when my aunt told me she was going with Mati, my uncle’s niece, I decided to take my two daughters and go along. We had twenty-five
pesos
among us, two blankets, two quilts, extra clothing for the children, a clay jar, powdered coffee, sugar, and other food. We had to carry the children and two large packs.

It began to rain as we were standing in line for the Chalma bus
and I bought Concepción a plastic raincape for two
pesos
. She and Violeta both had the measles and were completely covered with red spots … that was why I didn’t want them to get wet. It was still raining when we got off the bus at Santiago that night, and my aunt took us to the courtyard of the municipal building where a lot of people were stretched out for the night. We spread our bedding and saved a place for my aunt’s goddaughter and
comadre
, who were coming on a late bus.

The courtyard looked like a sheep pen with valises, packs and people everywhere. Soldiers were on guard to see that the pilgrims were not robbed, but even then some bundles disappeared. All night, gangs of boys and girls made noise and people kept arriving or leaving, getting up or lying down. Before we went to sleep, we women had hot coffee spiked with alcohol.

At three in the morning, my aunt woke us to leave for the pilgrimage. “Let’s go,” she said, and we all got up and packed. My aunt’s
comadre
Luz had come with her husband and daughter, so there were eight of us when we started out. It was still dark and the only light we could see were the kerosene lamps of little food stands here and there on the road. We stopped at one for coffee, and learned that we had lost our way in the dark and had to go back to find the right road. As we walked up and down the hills, through the woods and over large rocks, I felt happy. I loved being on the move and seeing the little Indian women selling coffee,
tortillas
, chickpeas, cheese and butter to the stream of pilgrims passing by.

We walked all night and the next morning, until we arrived at Ocuila. I couldn’t walk any more so we rented a little shed for twenty-five
centavos
per person and rested until the next day. I had to hire a
burro
for three
pesos
to carry our packs, because by that time both children wanted to be carried all the time. I was so tired, I wanted to go back, but all the women said, “You must not turn back, because the road will become very difficult and you will never arrive.” I don’t know whether that was the truth or just a belief, right? but I kept on until we arrived at the
ahuehuete
tree.

Because it was our first time there, my children and I had to look for a godmother to give us each a crown of flowers so that we might dance before the tree. We gave a
peso
to two old Indians to play for us on their violin and guitar. As we danced, I felt all my fatigue drop away … then we placed our flower crowns on the cross.

My aunt told me to bathe the children in the spring because the
water was miraculous and cured many illnesses. The girls were burning with fever … even their eyes had measle spots. I was afraid to put them in the cold water. I said, “
Ay
! these girls are going to die on me here.” They were hot and sweating from the road, but my aunt dipped them in the water. I thought we would be burying them in
petates
right there, but no, the spring didn’t hurt them at all.

From there to Chalma was a short walk, only about two hours. We passed the enchanted rocks and arrived at Chalmita, where my aunt’s godmother lived. She received us well and let us cook there without charge, before we went to the shrine. All along the decline to the Church, the road is lined with stalls and shops, so that wherever we looked we saw roofs of tin or wood. There were dancers who blew on the
chirimía
as they went along, making a sad kind of music. The penitents on their knees, blindfolded and wearing crowns of thorns, others with cactus leaves on their chests and backs to fulfill vows, bands of musicians playing … seeing so many of the faithful who had come to venerate the Lord, I was filled with feeling and began to cry. Pilgrimages and churches have always made me cry and there, at Chalma, almost all those who reached the Church door were crying.

The Lord of Chalma was very miraculous and very punishing. I prayed for my father and all of us to be saved. I asked Him to send me a good job, but He never did, and I prayed that if Crispín was not for me, then for my sake and for my daughters’ to take him away from me forever.

The trip back was boring. The children cried and I was tired and desperate to get home. We sold the clay jar on the way because by then we didn’t have enough
centavos
for food. I think I had only five
pesos
left. I couldn’t walk any more, so I spent two
pesos
for seats for my aunt and myself on a truck from Ocuila to Santiago, where we waited in line for a bus. Mati and the others had remained in Chalma to drink
pulque
, and were no longer with us. The bus fare was three
pesos
each and I didn’t have enough money to pay, so I sold an extra pair of shoes I had taken with me. Just think, they gave me only four
pesos
for them and the shoes were almost new! But what else was there for me to do? I couldn’t leave my aunt there, could I? So I bought two tickets and we arrived in Mexico City without a single
centavo
.

I would like to go to Chalma at least once a year, because it is a good thing to see the
Señor
and to pray, no? Especially since I hardly
go near a church any more. I cannot go to Sunday Mass and confess the way I did when I was a girl because I am living in sin. I pray an Our Father or an Ave Maria to myself at home, or when I get very desperate I go to the Villa to ask the Virgin for help. After I give birth, I go to thank the Virgin.