ABSTRACT
MUSIC, MEMORY, AND WAITING: LIVING LIFE IN A SERIES OF LINES
This collection of essays explores culture and acculturation. The way identity begins, evolves, and forms around so much that is complicated: family (close, extended, ancestral), friends, relationships, the luck of draw, random biological imperatives, and sheer determination. No heroes or villains, just real individuals with complicated backstories and inclinations. The settings of these stories take place in a Mexican Barrio known as “North Side” of Visalia located in the heart of California’s Central Valley. The stories capture what it means for a growing family to live on the “poor side” of town to move to the “rich side” of town. A family that has to deal with pre- disposed roles, to be limited by class and culture, yet are still able to find meaning and even transcendence within these boundaries. Music and cruising are identified as forms of escape and a way to bond and bridge gaps between family and friends. More importantly, these essays are about the working class experiences from the perspective of Mexican Americans living in the Central Valley from the 1940s to present day
Jacqueline A. Huertaz May 2017
MUSIC, MEMORY, AND WAITING: LIVING LIFE IN A SERIES OF LINES
by Jacqueline A. Huertaz
A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing in the College of Arts and Humanities California State University, Fresno May 2017 APPROVED For the Department of English:
We, the undersigned, certify that the thesis of the following student meets the required standards of scholarship, format, and style of the university and the student's graduate degree program for the awarding of the master's degree.
Jacqueline A. Huertaz Thesis Author
John Hales (Chair) English
Steven Church English
Corrinne Hales English
For the University Graduate Committee:
Dean, Division of Graduate Studies AUTHORIZATION FOR REPRODUCTION OF MASTER’S THESIS
I grant permission for the reproduction of this thesis in part or in its entirety without further authorization from me, on the condition that the person or agency requesting reproduction absorbs the cost and provides proper acknowledgment of authorship.
X Permission to reproduce this thesis in part or in its entirety must be obtained from me.
Signature of thesis author: ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I’d like to thank John Hales for supporting my writing the last four years as an undergraduate and graduate student here at Fresno State. Thank you for believing in my art, my vision, and for seeing the beauty in my stories when I didn’t see it. Most importantly, thank you for your endless support and encouraging me to apply to the program. I also owe thanks to my professor Steven Church who encouraged my working-class stories and took my writing to new directions that I did not know was possible. Next I’d like to thank Connie Hales and her poetry classes which have had a profound effect on my writing. And because of you I’ve found ways to weave poetic language into my stories. I’d like to thank my friends Monique and Mia for their endless support and friendship in this three-year journey. The many conversations and beers we shared together at the Red Wave talking about our writing and listening to music are my most cherished memories in the program. I owe gratitude to Cindy Bradley who I first met as an undergraduate thank you for being a constant source of encouragement and for helping me piece my thesis together. I would also like to thank Jacob Hernandez and Anthony Cody for their support and friendship in my last semester. Thank you for the many conversations, chismes, and coffees. Thank you to my peers and professors who workshopped my essays, talked with me after class, and believed in my work. And finally, I’d like to thank my family and friends in Visalia. Thank you for never giving up on me and for always being there when I struggled, and when I thought I couldn’t succeed. Thank you for being there for me to lean on. TABLE OF CONTENTS Page
INTRODUCTION: TIA OLGA HAS THE HOOKUP ...... 1
PART ONE: MUSIC AND MEMORY ...... 4
THE CUTLASS THAT COULD SING ...... 5 TALL CANS AND CRUISING: A GUIDE TO CRUISING THE RIGHT WAY ...... 11
YOUR CHICANO PLAYLIST ...... 14
PART TWO: FREE FALL ...... 20
THE HOUSE OF NO DREAMS ...... 21
FREE FALL ...... 30
TEETERING ...... 36
SUNDAY FUNDAY ...... 44
PART THREE: WHAT IT IS TO WAIT ...... 49
BORROWED LINES ...... 50
LIVING LIFE IN A SERIES OF LINES ...... 53
SPANISH AND ME ...... 63
JULISSA’S STORY ...... 68
PUBLIC NOTICE ...... 73
INTRODUCTION: TIA OLGA HAS THE HOOKUP
Yeah—me and your tia Olga used to drive around the barrio looking to beat bitches up. Sandra said this socking her fist into her palm. I understood what that meant without her saying it—the clashing of skin into skin—the collision of neighborhood and culture—of boundary and territory—and respect and place. Her hands conveyed a separate narrative, an unspoken story she shared with me—a life you could only understand if you grew up on the north side of Visalia. Mija—you’re a Chicana don’t ever forget where you come from, tia Olga said to me once, I can’t exactly place how old I was, or the year, but I do remember how confident her voice sounded and how reassured I felt in that moment. Trump has been in office for over a month, and preparations for a wall that would divide United States and Mexico was what was currently trending. Trump had already started deporting illegal immigrants in LA, Chicago, and Seattle and I wondered when raids would start appearing in our small Central Valley town. Tia Olga was convinced that Trump was a Russian spy. A text from tia Olga: Meet me outside. Before I had a chance to respond, a car started honking. Parked in front of our driveway was her silver 2002 Honda Accord, her work vehicle—not the car she liked to cruise in. It was late February and the weather was warm and breezy. Tia’s rims glistened in the fleeting sunlight. It would probably rain tomorrow. It felt like a drug deal going down and flashes of scenes from the Sopranos or some jailhouse exchange kept drifting into our conversation. A couple of days before my tia told me how she got a job working at the Visalia Emergency Aid as a food distributor, and here she was keeping her word 2 2 two days later with an abundance of canned food, bags of rice and beans. Over the phone she told me she could give me food but she said it as a secret—something my dad often did when he had the hook up on something even though the hookup was never anything illegal. Like he knew a guy who knew a guy that would pass my car at smog or my tia had a friend who had a friend that could help me get a job. I imagine we communicated our connects as secrets out of this heighted fear from living paycheck to paycheck. We lived in this space where we knew everything could be taken away—that’s why we were always wary to answer a knock at the door or an unknown telephone number. We expected the worst to happen at all times but living that way prepared you for the stuff you could live without. What’s up mija! Long time no see, she said giving me a hug. Help me get these boxes down, I can’t lift them my back is killing me. Damn Tia how much did you bring? You didn’t have to—what happened to your back? I hurt it at my damn job—it’s okay though, because now I have this job and it’s not as stressful on my body like the factory job. Anyways—yeah there’s all kinds of food for you…she said this cupping her hand over her mouth so the neighbors that weren’t home wouldn’t hear. So yeah mija—I’m going to be distributing meat next Tuesday. And it’s good meat from Savemart. Damn Tia from Savemart? That’s topnotch shit I said pulling a box from her trunk. We walked into the driveway and set the box down by the front door. Yeah I’ll hook you up with some ribeyes and chicken. Anything helps, I really appreciate this, peeking my head into the box. There were bags of beans and rice, an assortment of canned vegetables and pastas. 3 3
How’s your mom, is she inside? tia said adjusting her glasses. Yeah she’s getting ready for a coffee date. She goes on more dates than me. No shit—tia said cocking her head back and laughing. I better head out mija—tell your mother hi—I have to be on my way—I have a few more boxes I have to deliver. I’ll come by next Tuesday and bring over some meat. Give me a hug. Take care of yourself Jacquelina. Tia got in her Honda Accord and drove away. I watched her turn the corner on Sweet and Conyer and wondered whose house she was going by next. My mom, brother, and I weren’t starving but we did struggle and the help tia provided was extra gas in our car, a coffee at Starbucks, a new top at Target or a beer at Froggies. Next Tuesday she showed up as promised and said in a secret mija I hope you like salmon.
PART ONE: MUSIC AND MEMORY THE CUTLASS THAT COULD SING
Visalia, 1993 When I was ten years old my father purchased a used 76’ Cutlass Supreme. His used ride was not in mint-condition, nor worthy of praise or car show drool. The Cutlass was a third-generation Oldsmobile coupe that differed in style and size from the original model. My father’s new ride was lengthy, compared to our 89’ Suzuki Swift. The Cutlass had a dusty white exterior with deep plush suede seats. The white paint on the Cutlass was chipping from sun exposure revealing its bare metal and when I rubbed spots with my fingertips it felt cool and ashy like a chalkboard. Its waterfall grill had vast colonnade pillars that separated the headlights giving the vehicle a monolithic appearance. The Cutlass was wide and lengthy, and every time we turned a corner, the turn felt endless. This was the first time we had space in a car, where our skins, breath, and odor weren’t touching. We could look out the windows and actively escape into the houses, stores, and people we passed by. We had the freedom for our imaginations to roam and linger, to be curious and nosy. We didn’t get mad at each other when we drove around as a family to do errands. My sister Karisa never said when are we going home. I remember the facial expressions of the people from our neighborhood as me, my dad, and little sister casually cruised by their houses, bumping Brenton Wood, War, and Malo. The memories now have slipped into one composite memory and I imagine it happened like this: the sun is setting on the northside of Visalia, creating a blood orange hue. It’s May and the heat mixed with the valley air feels like lukewarm water to the skin. My father is wearing black wayfarers, and in between his legs there’s a golden Corona tucked tightly in a brown paper 6 6 bag. He coolly takes sips every time we turn a corner. There’s a rhythm in the way he sips and turns, sips and turns, as if he is creating his own musical beat. People from the neighborhood stop their chatter mid-sentence, they stop washing their cars, and watering their lawns, their eyes transfix on the Cutlass because of the music your dad is playing and for just a moment they escape too, into a time of oldies and friendship, of chisme and red lipstick, the smell of sex and Aqua Net. The feeling of youth and possibility. The moment is fleeting yet infinite as your father turns the corner and sips his Corona into the descending summer sunlight.
Yeah, my father was a catch back then. He’d put the car in park, a loud BANG would emit from his muffler, white smoke ascending up in the air attracting lots of stares from faculty and students, but I don’t remember caring as my little sister and me crossed the street to Crowley Elementary, tugging our back packs closely underneath our arms. It was winter and most of the kids in our neighborhood had to walk to school in the cold, but we didn’t. We had a ride. As we scuttled to our class line- ups, I could hear his brakes screeching as he turned the corner in the distance. The screeches suddenly fading as my dad put on a new old school jam that overpowered the early morning hours of our neighborhood. Damn that Cutlass could sing. I knew he was taking the long way to work so that he could cruise, so that he could savor in the funk and soul of one last Motown jam, before he went to his 8-5. And I knew, even then as a little girl, I knew it was the only time my father felt like a king. 7 7
Life seemed simpler back then. We lived in a small two-bedroom apartment that was tucked away in a cul-de-sac on Rinaldi Street. Like other cities, which have their designated “bad area” of town, our barrio was no different. Our city was divided into two main parts, the south rich part of town and the north poor side. When people asked where you lived the common reaction was, “oh, you live there?” followed by a look of disgust and silence as they quietly asserted the label of my apparent poverty. Of course most of these reactions came from people who didn’t grow up on the north side, they maybe ventured to our neighborhood to pay at bill at the Oval or attended a house party but our neighborhood wasn’t as bad as everybody made it out to be. Our houses were gated with metal iron bars, paisas cruised on bicycles, homeless dogs ran in packs, and you could always find a random mixed breed Chihuahua kicking it in the middle of the street, but it wasn’t bad. More than anything our neighborhood was alive--a rooster crowing in mid-day, young beautiful Mexican mothers pushing their strollers to Fairway market, neighbors were always having parties, Mexican music drifting in through the back door. Mexicanos always out and about either walking to church to oblige their Catholic duties or hitting up the Circle 7 for a tall daddy. Our neighborhood didn’t bother me when I was little, but then again I had never lived anywhere else.
Visalia, November 2012 Every Friday when my father finishes work he drives over to our once “happy home” on the south side of Visalia. As he pulls up in a dingy white 94’ GMC truck his brakes screech to an unsettling halt. The sound of the brakes is somewhat masked by his stereo system that he installed instead of purchasing legitimate tags. Still, we hear him turn the corner onto our street, the song “The 8 8
World is a Ghetto” by War is playing. He pulls up to the front of the house his tires taking over half of the sidewalk. He exits the truck leaving the music still on full force so that my mother can hear it. A part of me wants to believe that my father keeps the music on so that my mom will remember the happy times they had together, but I know better, he keeps the music blaring only to piss her off. My parents do not speak to each other. It will be almost five-years since their divorce. Now the only type of communication exchanged are snarky comments they indirectly make to each other, in the space of his truck and my mother’s front door. After my parents’ divorce my mother quickly remarried an out-of-work white man who moved into my father’s home, with his son, and the house changed. Remnants of my father’s presence in the house were stripped away as if he never existed. She repainted the walls, rearranged furniture, and added new country color décor. Hoping to breathe new life into the house, but no matter what she masked over, or rearranged: our memories, laughter and misery still hung heavy in the house. The new house paint slowly chipped away with time and the colors of an unsettled past and uncertain future began to mix and merge together inevitably resulting in my mother’s second divorce. * My mother pretends to wash dishes as she peers through the kitchen window watching my two younger brothers and I greet our father with half hugs. We stay silent as we listen to our father make the same remarks he does every Friday your mother is a selfish bitch. The house has gone to shit—how can you live here. If I were still around this place would look nice. We don’t say anything and let him vent, we listen to him, and half-heartedly nod our heads. * 9 9
My father makes another comment about how shitty the front yard looks and he is right. Our once luscious green yard is now decaying into yellow itchy grass. The happy blue trim that danced around our house is now chipping away in fat chunks creating obtuse patterns of zigzag shapes. Weeds sprout around the rocks my mom proudly added as yard decoration hoping to mask some of the decrepit foliage. She cannot keep the house at bay. The house like us is weakened from the divorce. The house is falling apart from the fighting. It is falling apart by the anger, hate, and the misplaced souls of our family. Soon if she cannot short sale the house it will go into foreclosure and I wonder what will happen to us. * I can feel my mother’s eyes on us as my brothers and I form a little circle around my father as we listen to his music as we listen to him talk about his new bootlegs or a new chica he is meeting up with that night. We talk about getting better jobs, or plans to get the car fixed. I listen to my father talk about what other people have: nice cars, homes, jet skis, iPhones, and he says, “One day−one day, I’m gonna get me one of those” nodding his head self-assuredly. He doesn’t look at us, when he says this he stares off into the distance. We keep our heads down, and give complacent nods. We know he never will. He never will.
Visalia, 1983 I imagine my mother trying to hide all her anxiety with make-up. She puts layer upon layer of Maybelline foundation. She powders her creamy white skin again and again hoping to conceal her fear, hoping to keep the unsettling trepidation at bay. Yet it swims and wiggles anxiously in her pores trying to reach the surface. She puts on more powder, then carefully tints her cheeks with coral crush blush until they are perfect round spheres of Greek beauty. She continues to 10 10 keep the foreboding emotions away, applying more and more make-up. She traces her lips with mauve lip-liner, creating a flawless arched lip, she gently fills her lips in with blooming rose lipstick resulting in pouty virgin lips, but this innocence quietly dissipates into the past as she stares at the final result of her wedding day beauty. She stares into her vanity mirror and studies her face hoping to see some kind of remnant of her 15-year old self. She does not recognize herself with all the make-up, in a traditional wedding dress her mother made her wear. She examines her face more closely hoping to find some clue of the young girl who dreamed to go to college. Inside her small 115 lb. body you are growing inside her. Her heart is beating fast as she looks up at your seventeen-year old father. He reaches for her hand and squeezes her palm, they half-smile at each other and say I do.
TALL CANS AND CRUISING: A GUIDE TO CRUISING THE RIGHT WAY
Don’t Roll Out in a Dusty-Ass Ride Bust out the manguera, drive your car over to the carwash or have your kids wash it for free. Just don’t go cruising with bird shit on the hood of your car. Remember your vehicle is a representation of how you maintain yourself in the hood. Back in the day your pops would never cruise the north side of Visalia in a dirty ride. You remember how he had a rhythm with how he’d wash his Cutlass Supreme. The jams always booming in the background whenever we had to do chores. Take your pick of So Rough, So Tough, Cutie Pie, or my personal favorite Your Old Stand By, by Mary Wells. He’d washed his car to the tempo of every song. A process that sometimes was an afternoon affair. Sipping slowly on a Corona in one hand and a water hose in the other, you’d remember how his eyes hid behind black wayfarers and how his shoulders and head swayed back and forth to the beat. Imagine it’s 1967 and you can’t afford a new car, and after World War II ended new car parts are too expensive. So you buy from junkyards—and from the mechanics in your neighborhood. You fix up your old ride that your dad handed down to you-- it’s 1967 and Martin Luther King is advocating for black civil rights, America is at war with Vietnam, Rodolfo Corky Gonzalez is reaching out to Chicano Youth, Cesar Chavez is organizing field strikes in the Central Valley. And you, you live in a world of two spaces—othered by Americans and othered by Mexicans, you’re Chicano.
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You Got to Have the Jams Let the music relax you—let it guide you. Get a feel for your neighborhood. Select songs based on your mood, oldies, old school, funk, even Norteno, Banda, or Ranchero depending how paisa you feel. But if this is your first time, let me guide you. It’s best to begin with War. I’d suggest beginning your excursion with Spill the Wine, Cisco Kid, and All Day Music. Transition to some funk. So Ruff, So Tuff by Zap and Roger Flashlight by Parliament Hit and Run by the Bar Keys, Humpin by The Gap Band. Adjust your seat, lean back, lean into the music, kick your head back, tap your fingers on the steering wheel, don’t worry, no one cares in the barrio, they listening to the jams too. They get it. Snap your fingers. Release. It’s okay—let go. Okay time to put on Cutie Pie by One Way and get a tall daddy.
You Have to Buy a Tall Can Look, you’re not going to get all messed up and go to jail. It’s justthere is something about the taste of a cold beer fused with music and cool evening air that makes the ride magical. So don’t worry. Stop by the Quick-and-Go and buy a tall can. I’d suggest a Bud Light. Don’t buy only one. Buy the three-pack, just in case you decide pick up one of your homies. Put your beer in a brown paper bag, you have to be incognito, and drive real slow, just in case you do start buzzing. When low-riders and cruising emerged in the 1960s it was called bajito y suavecito low and slow.
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Make Sure You’re Dressed to Nines You don’t know where you might end up during your cruise so make sure your shirt is ironed. Your hair is done and that you look presentable. Pack an extra set of clothes just in case you are invited to a house party later. You don’t need a low rider to cruise, or even a badass ride. No. Cruising is about breaking free from your 8-5—forgetting about the bills you can’t afford and enjoying what you do have in your life at that very moment. For my dad it was having a little bit of gas in his car, good music to listen to, and family and friends to visit.
YOUR CHICANO PLAYLIST
The songs you grew up listening to at weddings, quincerneras, backyard boogies and cruising with your family and homies.
“Don’t Let No One Get You Down” By War. Okay so you never heard of Warwell you better get familiar quick. If you are not originally from the Central Valley and if you don’t have a squad of old school Chicano homies, then this music is probably not in your inner circle. Perhaps you’ve heard of War’s popular songs “Cisco Kid” and “Slippin into Darkness” that are in constant repeat on mega 97.9. The songs lament and meditate on the mundane experiences of the working class. “Cisco Kid” is considered an anthem while other songs like “Don’t Let No One Get You Down” speak to its audience directly giving advice to the harsh realities of what to expect from the world. When you hear War think of brown pride, junior high, cruising, and frosty Coronas. Your cousin’s red lips, silver hoops, and your tia Olga’s there’s a thin line between love and hate tattoo. Remember your family’s first apartment on Rinaldi and Houston next to Double D mini-mart where your dad and neighbors picked up tall cans after work. The band originated out of Long Beach, California in the 1960s. Known as a multi-ethnic group because their members are black, white, and Chicanounprecedented for that time, and still is today.
“Sabor a Mi” by El Chicano “Sabor a Mi” is about an internal lovea love that will transcend over time 15 15 even if the lovers part ways. “A Taste of Me” means the flavor of me, the blood of me, the trace of me, and the imprint of me. The song conveys the different ways lovers will be eternally connected. You are reminded of the John Donne poem “The Flea” and think about blood and juices swirling in a tornado circle. You remember how Luis tasted the first and last time you had sex. You wonder if you’ll always carry an imprint of him, your best friend and lover who allowed another man to call you a bitch. When you were young this song was played at every Mexican wedding you went to. And when you listen, you are reminded of your tios and tias swaying hip to hip in a tight embrace.
“Suavecito” by Malo Known as the Chicano national anthem, "Suavecito" was released in 1972 when Chicanos were struggling for basic rights and recognition in the U.S. The song became a symbol of unity. “Suavecito” means “soft” or “smooth” in Spanish. (Inspired by band member Richard Bean’s poem on a high school crush.) Eduardo Arenas is a famous bassist in Los Angeles and says in regards to Suavecito “it's like a universal thing. You don't grow up wanting to listen to it — you're already listening to it."
“You’ll Lose a Good Thing” by Barbara Lynn Barbara Lynn made waves in 1962 with this hit. Not only could Lynn wail, she could play the piano and guitar which was unprecedented for an African American female singer during the 1960s. A song that speaks to the older generation of Chicanas, that lived in the 1960s and 70s. When you lived with your Nina Terry in your last semester as an undergrad she’d karaoke Lynn on her patio 16 16 staring into the night sky. You’d watch through the patio window, as she’d close her eyes and belt the lyrics to her dogs Chookie and Corazon. You’d watch as she swayed her head and pointed her fingers and imagined that she was singing to her ex-husband Ernie.
“Your Old Standby” by Mary Wells Known as the first lady of Motown. The song is about a woman in love with a man who only comes around when his old lady breaks up with him. In Chicano culture we refer to our significant others as my old lady or my old man mi vieja or viejo. Ms. Wells speaks to the reality of love. She conveys how love can make a person desperate. Her music takes you back to barbecues on Sundays at your grandma Josie’s house.
“Please, Please, Please” by James Brown You like the yearning and vulnerability in his voice as he repeats please over and over again. The way James Brown sings captures what it’s like to be vulnerable at your core. There is something to be said about Chicano male pride in this song. You imagine this song speaks your father Tommy’s pride, when your mother filed for divorce, and left him. When you and your father get together you pump a dollar into the jukebox at Froggies and hit play next. You watch his lips move and hear him sing softly. You imagine he is thinking of your mom and begging her to forgive him but you know that is a dream, he’d never say I’m sorry.
“Por Tu Maldito Amor” by Vicente Fernandez Before you play this track grab a cold Modelo. This is not a recommendation but a command. You cannot listen to Vicente Fernandez without 17 17 a beer. Make sure the volume is at maximum. Break out the subwoofers and turn that shit up. You need to feel his voice, you need to feel the sorrow. Vicente’s lyrics are deeper than a Shakespearian sonnet. He speaks not only of love, loss, and tragedy but also to the oppression and displacement of your people.
“Tristes Recuerdos” by Ramon Ayala Ramon Ayala is another Mexican staple. “Tristes Recuerdos” is played at every family event, birthdays, weddings, funerals, and quincerneras. You grew up listening to Vicente and Ramon Ayala in your grandma’s kitchen. This song is about a man who is lamenting on a past love a love that is lost to him. You think of Carlos when you hear this song, when he said sharply to you only pochos listen to Ramon Ayala. Sadly, you don’t think of your grandma’s kitchen or mixed cassette tape with different Spanish songs, you don’t think of your grandma dancing in her red apron to Ayala. No you think of Carlos and how he reminded you that your family would never be Mexican enough.
“Por Un Amor” For a Love by Linda Ronstadt Linda Ronstadt came out with an album called Canciones de Mi Padre (songs of my father) in 1987. You identify with Ronstadt because she is Chicana and like you she doesn’t look Mexican. When she sings the song you can hear the pain in her voice. You can hear the torment of her beloved. You wonder why the women suffer so much because of love in Mexican songs. You wonder if you’ll always suffer because Mexican men will always be machismo. You are not the suffering dutiful forgiving woman. Refuse to be her. Dump Carlos for calling you a bitch, for calling you fat in front of his friends. For never saying thank you when 18 18 you cooked him dinner and cleaned his house. You don’t have to be your grandma and marry a borracho.
“Si Una Vez” If Once by Selena Is about a woman who regrets giving her love so freely to a man who does not appreciate it. What you love about this song is the fury in which Selena sings it. There is a lot of repetition of “Yo” that creates tension and emphasizes her rage and passion to this man. You love her tone in this song and how she approaches the lyrics, there is sharpness like snakebite after each lyric. Your grandma introduced you to Selena in the early 90s. She’d record Selena’s performances on vhs tapes and you’d watch them together. When Selena died in 1995 at the age of twenty-three from a gunshot by her best friend you saw your grandma cry for the first time. She was able to capture the hearts of Mexicanos in Mexico, which no Chicana had ever done before. Selena is that she was born in Texas the same state where your great-grandpa Filiberto met your great-grandma Emma. Like you, Selena’s first language wasn’t Spanish but she learned Spanish at a later time. Your grandma Carmen always said to you mija you have to learn Spanish but you never did.
“Living For The Love of You” by Isely Brothers Remember the time you offered to take your cousins who look more Mexican than you to Orange County. You made plans to visit two colleges, Chapman and Costa Mesa University. Your two older cousins asked for a ride, they didn’t own a vehicle. They complained on the highway 101 when you turned changed the radio station from classic rock to your mixed CD. You borrowed the old school jam CD from your father. He’d downloaded the music and shuffled the 19 19 songs in a specific order. You skipped to the last track, your father liked to end his night cruising with this song. You were on highway 101 and the air felt fresh and full of possibility. You noticed yourself being pulled to something more, you felt excited but sad, to drive forward willingly, you felt compelled to remember your neighborhood and dad, who was the one to introduce you to old school songs. When the song started, your whitewashed cousins complained, you ignored them and turned the volume louder, you turned the volume to the max till you didn’t hear voices anymore.
PART TWO: FREE FALL THE HOUSE OF NO DREAMS
You never really got to know your grandpa Tommy Huertaz. You never had anything that bonded you two together. You wish you had a memory that tied you two together like a fishing trip at Kaweah Lake or a trip to Thrifty’s for an ice cream cone. The only memory you have of him is compiled into one. And as you wait to say good-bye to him for the last time you remember how his voice sounded airy and sweet like the air blowing into a whistle lollipop. In the ICU waiting room tia Olga is inconsolable. Not my dad, not my dad she says over and over again. Your father is sitting across from you and has already retreated into his black wayfarers. Your tio Baby sits alone, face transfixed into the off-white linoleum floor. Tissues are on every coffee table, chair and counter. Your sister and one of your brothers are there too. Like you they don’t know what to say. Your grandpa Tommy never told you he loved you. You never got the chance to get that close. You came to the hospital to support your father, you can’t bear to think of him going through this alone. * You tell your mom the house killed him. In 1993 the Huertaz family moved into a three-bedroom home on Court Street in Visalia. One of the newer houses on the north side, the house was built on the outskirts of the barrio. My grandparents had five children: tia Olga was the oldest, followed by my dad Tommy Lee, Mark Anthony, Steven Stanley, Christopher Michael (tio baby) and the youngest was Pati (short for Patricia) Olga and Pati lived together in one room. 22 22
When Christopher Michael was two years old and my tia Olga was ten, she gave him a bath, burning his feet to the second degree. He was rushed to the hospital. After the accident his named changed to Baby. The youngest of the family, the injury solidified “Baby” as his continuing role in life. Their house on Court Street had a beautiful green yard. Grandma Josie planted pink and yellow roses and grandpa Tommy planted a tree for shade in the middle of the yard. They purchased their home after receiving twenty thousand dollars in an automobile settlement. My grandparents started as field workers then moved into working class positions. Tia Olga revealed to me that besides being an experienced field worker grandma Josie knew how to drive tractors, she could operate the same machinery like the men and was given permission to transport all the field workers to and from work. My grandma smoked. Drank beer. Cussed. And wasn’t afraid to give direction to the men unlike the other wives in the fields. Callate negra grandpa said. He liked to tease her because her skin was darker than his. The Huertaz family worked as a unit. If one of them fought, they all fought. The same loyalty applied to personal problems. If an uncle or aunt’s spouse was cheating it was like their own spouse was cheating. The Huertaz tribe would confront the cheating spouse with promises of We’re going to fuck you up. My mother referred to them as the lynch mob. I viewed them as the hood rendition of the Three Musketeers. Yet I admired this dark beauty about them, the way they carried each other’s pain and love. * In 1999 my parents moved our family out of the north side of Visalia and purchased a house on the south side of town. Our new house was painted brown with blue trim. Neighbors walked their dogs on leashes, front yards looked 23 23 spotless with razor precision. Our garage had been converted into a separate bedroom except there was no ventilation. So in the summer it was muggy like a sauna and felt like an igloo in the winter. There were four bedrooms, plenty of space for our family of six and our Chihuahua Chulo. We had a real swimming pool. Not an inflatable pool, no, a built in pool. Before our new pool we spent our summers cooling off with the water hose. We filled water in the uneven spaces of our old driveway and created mini swimming pools. * You were a freshman in high school when you moved into the new house on Sue Street. You remember the extra cabinets and closets. You remember feeling socially accepted at school because you no longer lived on the north side of town. The move solidified new friendships and social status. As you said good-bye to the north side you entered a different path and moved away from your pre- determined destiny. * Everyone in your immediate family expected you to get pregnant in high school. Your family expected this to happen because your mom had you when she was sixteen. At sixteen Grandma Josie became pregnant with tia Olga. At seventeen tia Olga gave birth to your cousin Curtis. At eighteen your tia Pati had Monique. The cycle continued. You had no desire to be a north side mom or just another Tulare County statistic as your mom put it. She’d say Don’t get pregnant. Don’t get pregnant. Don’t get pregnant. Do you want to end up like me Jacqueline? She repeated this to you so much that it’s what you think of first when you reminisce moments of your childhood. 24 24
You didn’t want children. You spent your entire child hood taking care of Karisa, Thomas, and Nicky. * When Grandma Josie died in 2001, parts of their house began to wither away. The lush green grass wilted. The pink and yellow roses hung heavy like a Catholic prayer. My grandpa Tommy didn’t show any of his grief publicly. His kids said it was pride but I felt he channeled his sadness with busy work. It became the norm to see him with the garden hose watering dirt, longing for the grass to grow back. Still nothing grew. Life didn’t improve life remained the same for my grandpa day after day filling the hours with some monotonous project. * You wonder how you did it—how you escaped your pre-determined destiny. How you broke the cycle and moved onto college. You think of the hard working women in your life and think about your mom who juggled a full-time job and was the first child in her immediate family to receive an Associates degree. Like your grandma Josie, your mom was responsible for handling the finances. She made sure bills were paid on time. She budgeted money for the groceries and shopped wisely for our school clothes. You watched your mom continue to grow and she hustled at her second job. When she went back to school to take transferable classes so that she could transfer. She always was trying to improve her life. Your mother begged your father to go back to school to complete his GED so that he could apply for a higher paying job. You imagine your father might be intimidated by education but you’re not sure, because you never had conversations with him growing up. You remember in 25 25 your senior year in high school you and your father enrolled at the adult school together. You were taking economics and your dad was enrolled in a course to receive his GED. At break your father would ditch his class and go to Searcy’s, a dive bar down the street. Don’t tell your mother he said lighting a Marlboro red. I won’t as long as you give me twenty-dollars. You said this with a stern tone. He reached for his wallet and pulled out a crisp bill. You folded it in half and placed it into your jean pocket. Pick you up at 8:30 be out in front he said flicking his cigarette into the air. You kept this story a secret but told your mom after your parents divorced. I’m not surprised your mother said. * Your grandpa Tommy was always a hoarder. After his wife died his bad habit became progressively worse and he was unable to throw away any of his wife’s clothes and shoes. He kept old bills in her name. When you were younger you remember how broken down cars riddled their front and back yard. You thought it strange how none of his vehicles worked and took up so much space in their small property. You realize as an adult your grandpa couldn’t part with them because they’d work someday. He never turned down a stray dog or cat from the neighborhood and every time you went to go visit there’d be new animals frolicking around the property. You see it now in your thirties: your grandpa was a hoarder to the point where his property resembled a junkyard. Baby never moved out. Olga moved out in 1995 only to return ten years later after separating from her husband. Steven lives there off and on. Sometimes 26 26 showing up in the middle of the night. I’m back! he shouts waking up half the house. Your father moved in when he lost his job and got a DUI. He lived on the couch for two years, your little brother Nicky lived with him too. As you got older the house became a revolving door for dreams that had no space to grow. You jokingly referred to your grandpa’s home as “The House of No Dreams.” Mark and Pati were the only children never to move back. * Your family makes their way to the hospital room to say good-bye to grandpa. The ICU hallway is quiet. Your uncle Mark walks ahead of you his arm is wrapped around his daughter’s shoulder. You and his daughter Amanda both go to the same college. Your uncle Mark owns an upholstery shop and graciously gives your father a job when he was fired. You remember what uncle Mark said to you once about his daughter Amanda I’m going to do whatever it takes to make sure Amanda graduates college. And this has always stayed with you. Your uncle asks about your education and your goals. Your father never has. You remember that one time he did at Froggies only because a friend of his asked first and you thought he must’ve felt compelled to ask too in fear of looking bad in front of his friend. Your mother used to say your father will do more for his friends than he will for his own family. It took you years to notice it. How he’d jump to help a friend move out of their house, or fix their car. But he wouldn’t jump for his own family. When your mother asked him to go back to school to get a better paying job, he seemed content with your mom having two jobs. You remember the time you asked him to fix the heater in your car and he ignored your phone calls, you went to the house of no dreams and found him cracking flower seeds and watching movies. 27 27
He fooled everyone with his good favors, so when your mom left your dad everyone felt sorry for Tommy. * It hurt you to turn your father down when he asked if he could borrow money for your grandfather’s funeral but he had a reputation for not paying people back. You remember the day he asked, he offered to come take a look at your car. You thought it strange he offered and got excited, because he might care. It hurt you to tell him no. But he didn’t pay people back and you were a student with no job and shitty car. * You start to piece it together the way your grandpa and father depended on people and objects to survive. You start to see these traits in yourself. * Down the hospital hallway you look over at your dad and notice how he walks unevenly like an injured animal his hand pressed to his side. He only staggers like that when he’s had too much to drink. You recognize he repeats this walk when he wants attention or is playing the victim because he wants someone to feel sorry for him. You can’t help but to remember the time when you were in a bind and he borrowed money so you could borrow money from him. You wish you could hold his hand and walk side by side like father and daughter. You imagine your siblings Karisa, Thomas, and Nicky feel the same way too. You want to console him and tell him everything is going to be okay but you can’t do it, all you can be is a presence in the room, a body count for support. You can’t help but to reflect on the memories where you needed him. You remember driving from Visalia to Fresno with a broken heater to your 8:00am classyou had to wear extra sweaters to keep warm and you could visibly see 28 28 your breath as you drove on highway 99. This was after your parents divorced and you remembered feeling like no one gave a fuck. Your father responding with we’ll see in regards to fixing your car. We’ll see a common phrase my dad used. Dad can I play softball? We’ll see. Dad can you buy me this new book? We’ll see. Dad can you teach me how to drive? We’ll see. The phrase was so vague but it gave my father the permission to never commit to anything. He’d never tell a friend we’ll see. * You enter grandpa’s hospital room. Your grandpa is sleeping. Machines are keeping him alive. You squeezing your grandpa’s hand say goodbye. The Huertaz family forms a tight circle and bows in prayer together. Everyone around you is sobbing uncontrollably yet you still cannot produce a single tear. You want to partake in this sadness with your family. Tia Olga leads in prayer and everyone follows. Their sobbing and prayers are interrupted by laughter from the nurse’s station you look over at your sister Karisa you two are the only ones that notice. * Everyone is dressed in black at the Miller Memorial Chapel. Otis Redding’s “I Have Dreams to Remember” is playing softly in the background. Pictures of my grandpa’s life pop in and out of focus on a projection screens next to the casket. You see yourself in some Easter and Christmas pictures but you don’t remember taking them. An Indian Catholic priest with a thick Hindi accent presides over the rosary. He says Tony instead of Tommy repeatedly. You sit with your mother and siblings and some aisles in front of us your father is holding your nephew Mason in his lap. * 29 29
Your parents divorced during the housing crisis. Your mom eventually lost the house. After your dad left the grass stopped growing and the house fell apart. You lived in a two-income household and your mom couldn’t make it on her own. * You believe the house killed him. Not the actual house itself, but the energy of the house. The house condoned co-dependency and enabled and pacified the behavior of the family members that lived there. You didn’t realize this when you were a child but as an adult you now know that’s why you stayed away, that’s why you didn’t like to go over and visit. You imagine this is why your father kept you and your family away when he was married to your mother. This is the reason why you are not close to your grandpa and you do not want to get close to your father. You are scared to be like them. Three years after your grandpa passed away uncle Baby started to allow people from the streets to live there. Some months later the house mysteriously caught on fire forcing everyone out. Family members said that a neighbor had beef with Baby and wanted to kill him, others said that uncle Mark hired an arsonist to reclaim the house he grew up in. The house didn’t completely burn down and eventually was seized by the bank and eventually was purchased by a company that flipped houses. You still wish you had a relationship with your father but this is who he decided to be. Out of curiosity you go back to the house of no dreams and you are completely surprised how it has been restored. You think of what it meant for a Mexican family to purchase their first home and lose it. You think of your grandpa watering the dirt hoping for grass to grow. . FREE FALL
To descend into the unknown, untethered from anything physical, to fly, to leap, to plunge, to jump, to dive−to swallow fear and to let go, to fall into the depths of a new beginning. A diver’s brilliant bow. She’s a good girl, loves her mama. Loves Jesus and America too. Fall in love. A quote: “Self-destruction would be a brief, almost autoerotic free fall into great velvet darkness.” Fall from grace. Let the bodies hit the floor. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what it means to free fall. Mostly, the ideas associated with losing yourself in some type of ecstasy, euphoria or transcendence. A song: Tom Petty wrote “Free Fallin” in 1989. The song addresses the nostalgia and the high of success after Petty left his hometown of Gainesville, Florida to pursue his dream as a musician in California. I imagine the sensation of free falling is like a cocaine climax. Numb and out of body. I imagine in the song Petty is conveying that free falling is this act of shedding our former selves to begin anew.
Visalia, May-August 2007 You receive an acceptance letter from Sonoma State University. Your mom brags to your family that you’re going to college and takes the credit for your hard workyou let her because this is as close she will ever get to the pursuit of something more. Your dad doesn’t say a word hiding his response behind thick black Wayfarers. Your grandma’s smile is reservedshe is elated but insists for you to stay because Mexican girls shouldn’t move so far away from their families. You’re finally leaving Visalia, the north side, the hood, the barrio. Leaving 31 31
Mr. Roscon’s rooster that crows at 3:00amleaving the dicey voice of your drug dealing neighbor Joe. Leaving the possibility of pregnancy, and marriage behind. Leaving Tulare County where we have the highest teen pregnancy rate in the state and the sun’s sweltering summer rays peak at 106 degrees.
Sonoma, October 2007 To get to Sebastopol take Gravenstein highway route 116. It’s the fastest commute from Rohnert Park to Dutton Estate winery. Drive with the windows rolled completely down, salty air drifts in from Bodega Bay, the temperature on average is a sublime 77 degrees, notice how your car glides through the luscious green rolling hills that look like juicy Granny Smith apples. Gaze into the never- ending Pinot and Chardonnay vines, and watch their pinky promise at the horizon. Just before you turn onto Green Valley Road, there is a little hill that gives the sensation of a roller coaster ride and you feel suspended in time. Swallow your surrounding views. Break away from your neighborhood mold, break away from the expectations of family and friends, free fall into the limbs of possibility. If you Google “free fall,” images of skydivers, cliff divers, and base jumpers appear. The people in the photographs all look the samearms are extended outward like the Christ the Redeemer statue, their chins hang high into the indifferent blue skyas if God is attempting to hoist them up to heaven with an invisible fishing pole. Described as “the greatest female skydiver in history,” Cheryl Stearns is the only woman in the world with over 19,000 skydives. Stearns defines the experience as: “to a skydiver, free fall is peace. It’s a place to be mentally and physically detached from the man-made crust on the Earth’s surface.” 32 32
On a forgotten cotton gin mill, twenty-five miles southwest of Bakersfield CA, on 12112 Copus Road, is Skydive San Joaquin. And if you have $200, transportation, and gas money, you can free fall from an altitude of 13,000ft, descending at 120 miles per hour. I think of the different ways class and culture free fall and how no matter what your ethnicity or your background, we all need that release that out-of- body experience to make us feel alive. A push and pull occurs when I think of the idea of free fall or what it means to lose yourself and to transcend your pre-disposition and culture. What does it mean for a Mexican girl from the north side of Visalia to get educated and to eclipse the neighborhood stereotype? Does she truly transcend as she moves farther from her culture? Perhaps, free fall is also this idea of losing your self in a momentlike doing something you love. * “I don’t have time to be depressed Jacqueline, I have bills to pay,” my mother said to me once as she got ready to go to her second job. Grey pools of exhaustion cowered in the underbelly of my mother’s eyes. To be sad—was a privilege in our house. But sadness was an emotion that we never discussed growing up and it was an emotion I could never openly convey. I’d never tell my grandma I was sad or bored. If I did she’d find some obscure chore for me to do attached with the same childhood narrative of when she was my age she had to work in the fields and pick cotton and oranges and how her only dream was to go to school. When my mother answers the office phone she says, “hi, this is Christine from Human Resources. How may I help you?” Her tone on the phone is always 33 33 cheery, always cordial. Even when she was demoted at work. Even when my father didn’t support her return to school. Even when she had to acquire a second job on the weekend bartending at Orosi pizza house. Even when she only made enough tip money to cover her gas to get the bartending job, still her voice remained lively and cheerful. My mother’s voice is what I love about her the most. On Thursday nights she sings karaoke at the Lamp Liter Inn in Visalia. Her favorite song to sing is Donna Summer’s Last Dance. She engages the bar crowd like she is Chaka Khan live on stage, swaying her hands in the air, periodically posing and dancing with fans. And as she belts the final verse she closes her eyes. I imagine when she closes her eyes she experiences a kind of ecstasy, that the music whisks her away from her life as receptionist and bartender, from mother of four, and wife, and in that moment, in the space before the song ends, when the crowd is still cheering with woozy Coors Light grins, she free falls. *
The end of Sonoma in several snapshots:
A month after my departure my mother files for divorce. Dad cries to me for the very first time. Dad can’t cope so he tries to commit suicide. I’m driving to work with expired tags. Mom claims dad raped her. Dad commits himself to a mental institution.
34 34
Visalia, July 2008 You move back to Visalia after a year of living in Sonoma. There’s no job that awaits you and you’re not sure how you will pay next month’s car payment. You move in with your grandma. At 7:00 pm every night we watch the novella Tres Mujeres, and at 11:30 pm Jay Leno. She never misses his monologue. During the commercials of Tres Mujeres, my grandma chismaes on her landline with her comadre Carmen Mesa, I listen in fascination as she effortlessly speaks in English and Spanish.
Joe, my grandma’s next-door neighbor for over twenty-five years, can be seen scaling the streets at all hours of the day. He fits that stereotypical north side hype, his face is hard and cratered like an over boiled egg. Still he has the swagger of an old school pimp and tilts his head forward like a gentleman when he greets us. Let me open the gate for you he says with a cigarette dripping from his lip. I’d never known Joe to own any transportation but on that particular day he cruised by on a tricked out bicycle. Not a child’s bike, or mountain bike, but a low rider bicycle: a shiny crimson frame rose gold chrome spikes, a black velour banana seat. On his ape hangers were two rear view mirrors, and around their frames gold diamonds. I waited for Joe to tilt his head in my direction but he never did. Instead he cruised by in a dreamlike daze, looking into the cloudless summer sky, singing “Free Fall” by Tom Petty. In that moment, I wondered what Joe was thinking, or maybe he wasn’t thinking at all, I thought about how completely lost he was in that space. And I fell into the memories of Sebastopol and the green rolling hills. I remembered what that felt like—to exist in a space and feel completely warm and at peace. 35 35
I imagine Joe internalized something so insignificant so minuscule and found a kind of bliss that some people will never experience. It made me think about how we define and perceive transcendence in regards to class and culture. Transcendence comes from the Latin prefix trans meaning "beyond," and the word scandare, meaning "to climb." So when you achieve transcendence, you have gone beyond your ordinary limitations. You have gone beyond yourself in the present moment.
There is this push and pull that occurs in Mexican culture if you’re female. Moving away—pursuing a dream—pursuing a degree—or just pursuing anything beyond the role of the all forgiving, dutiful, complacent Mexican mother, wife, or daughter, means moving further from your culture into a space that pushes against tradition and convention.
When my mom and Joe free fall I don’t think they know they are transcending. I do believe that they are consciously aware of their class and place in their culture and society. But I do believe in that moment of when they do something they love—they move beyond the space of secretary and drug dealer— of mom and hustler—and are free in a space that no one can take away. TEETERING
The futon in his living room is our bed. The August night air is humid and sticky. A ceiling fan circles lazily with hopeful promises of fresh air. You’re sipping on a Captain and Cokemostly Captain. His legs drape over your legs. Your white knees exposed and he gives each one a wet kiss. Los Bukis Quiereme plays in the background. When you are together he selects songs that you didn’t grow up listening to. You sway your feet back and forth to the music. Carlos kisses your hand, and you rub the back of his neck. It’s never been this romantic. He smells like a twelve-hour workday: motor oil, beer, and tobacco. He does not sip, but instead takes hefty gulps of the drink you just made him. He asks you to make him another. Then another. Tonight you are the beautiful Mexican girlfriend in the Marco Antonio Solis music video. Your hair is curled, your toes are painted red, and your lips are wet with gloss. He invites you over to his house when he is finished hanging out with the guys. His time with the boys usually involves drinking Tecates in a garage at a friend’s house. They stand around and talk shit, pretending to tinker on an old car that will never run. He rubs your forearm and then squeezes tightly to assert his masculinity. To remind you that he is a man—a todo hombre is how he identifies himself. His coarse hands are what you like about him the mostthe physical indication of a hard worker. A buildera man who constructs from scratchan artist in a different esteem. He kisses your fingertips. 37 37
He is not your boyfriend—but you want him to be. You’ve wanted to be official with him for the last two years. He disappears then returns, and you always end up on the same couch, listening to the same song, trying to prove to him that you’re Mexican enough to date. Make me another drink please, he says, twirling a piece of your hair. His eyes are bloodshot red and you are starting to feel a little buzzed. Carlos keeps a full bar with top-notch tequilas, from Tequila, Mexico where he was born, and where his parents still live. You refill the drinks, placing more ice cubes in his rum than yours, hoping to water down some of the alcohol. You don’t want him to get that drunk—because he won’t remember all the nice things he has said to you tonight. You walk back over to the futon with two full drinks. When you serve him, you feel like you’re an actual couple. He is more rooted in Mexican culture than you. His mom only speaks Spanish. Carlos moved from Mexico to California in the third grade. His first language is Spanish, yours is English. Your dad is the only person in your immediate family that speaks Spanish. Now you mostly hear slang. What Gloria Anzaldua in her essay identifies as the Pachuco formthe language of the zoot- suiters. She says, “Pachuco is a language of rebellion, both against standard English and standard Spanish.” Born in the 1960s out of the Chicano movement, Mexican Americans needed to identify themselves because they were not accepted north or south of the border. Carlos is Mexican and you’re Chicana. Carlos calls himself the new Machista and translated means male chauvinist. He incorporated the “new” because you imagine he feels that he does not completely meet the stereotypical criteria of what it means to be macho. By 38 38 using the word “new” Carlos considers himself an open-minded Machista. As contradictory as that sounds he is open to the idea of Chicano culture. Whereas many Mexicanos are not, because they feel that Chicano culture/Spanish is a mutilation of the Spanish language and history. Another summer another night and Carlos offered to cook you dinner. You sat at his kitchen table drinking a glass of red wine. You didn’t talk because there was a tension in the air. You watched him grate cheese and fry chuck steak in a skillet. He cooked with ease and patience. The first and only time he ever made you dinner. You felt so special that night, sipping on your red wine, in your black maxi dress because your man was making you dinner. He placed the plate of food in front of you and as you made your way into the first bite he said sharply my father would’ve never served a woman. You remember putting the fork back to the plate, and all the excitement you felt drifted away. Even though he invited you to dinner, and even though he offered to cook, it was still your fault. You realized that it would always be your fault. He sat down next to you and consumed his sandwich in two bites. You drank more wine to tell yourself that this was okay. You let your sandwich get cold and he eventually asked if he could have yours. He was still hungry. You both have to play these roles: machismo Mexican man who expects everything from his wife and the dutiful Mexican woman who carries the weight of the world on her shoulders. If you want to be with Carlos this is who you have to be. Machismo-ism and the dutiful all forgiving Mexican woman was brought over by the Spaniards during the conquest. In Mexican culture the woman is 39 39 compared to the Virgin Mary. That is why Mexican men expect their women to be pure, all suffering, and all forgiving. They expect so much from you it doesn’t matter if you suffer. To move away from these roles is to move away from traditionessentially your culturea culture that is disappearing as you and your family keep growing and become more and more assimilated. Carlos exists in two different places; you watch how he teeters between his life in Mexico and his life in California. You watch how he teeters in this undefined relationship you are in. You imagine if he makes it official with you, he’ll feel that he is moving away from his culture because you don’t speak Spanish. Like you, he’s neither been married nor has children. You both grew up in the barrio on the north side of Visalia, a small Mexican community where the music of Fito Olivares and the crowing of a rooster can be heard at anytime of the day. Your Grandma Carmen kept the Mexican traditions alive in your family. She made Menudo and cooked tamales. Your grandma added salsa in everything she cooked just like how she added Mexican music to everything we did. Norteno music played loudly in the background in her blue Nova on your way to Fairway Market. Mija you need to learn Spanish, she’d say in a tone that wasn’t resentful. You weren’t opposed to learning Spanish, but the language didn’t come naturally to you. Your grandma didn’t teach your mother because back then teachers in your community schools and employers didn’t want their students and employees speaking Spanish. So your family had to assimilate. 40 40
In high school they required you to take a foreign language to graduate. You enrolled in Spanish class. You struggled with conjugating verbs, and when you brought your homework to your grandma, she couldn’t help you because it was proper Spanish. The white kids in class received A’s you barely passed with a C. Why you receiving C’s? Aren’t you Mexican? students in class questioned. Ashamed you retreated to the back of the classroom. You never enrolled in another Spanish class again. In her memoir Mexican Enough, Stephanie Elizondo Griest goes to extreme lengths to identify with Mexican culture. Half-white/half Mexican, Griest identified with being white until she realized she could reap the scholarship benefits of being a minority in high school. “Mexifying myself” Griest said, in Chapter One, involves immersing herself in Mexican staples such as: drinking margaritas, decorating her walls with posters of Frida Kahlo, and collecting mini- statues of the Virgen de Guadalupe. She changed her middle name from Ann to her mother’s maiden name Elizondo. I pitied Griest because she had to go to that extent in order to feel Mexican. It can be understood as this: as Chicanos become more and more Americanized, we become more removed from our culture to the point where we have to cling on to the stereotypicallike drinking margaritas in order to remind ourselves that we are still Mexican. Carlos has his tradition, Griest has her margaritas and you have Carlos. You wonder what will happen when the Mexican traditions are no longer part of your lives. As I get older and have kids what will I pass on to them? How do you keep tradition alive when you have to keep assimilating to survive? * 41 41
Still in these moments late at night as he drinks to the point of blacking out, where his behavior is now the norm you can’t help but picture the two of you as an Mexican stereotype: He the sullen drunk, staying out late with guys, and you the dutiful wifey serving him, then cleaning his kitchen before you leave. Some nights you flirt with that role but deep down you know you couldn’t do it forever. After you ended your relationship with him you reflected on all the times Carlos disrespected you. When he flirted with other women in front you. When he told you to lose the fat. Your weight is holding back your relationship. When he picked fights with you when he was drunk, and when he belittled you in front of his friends. * Listen to this next song first, I dedicate this one to you. Carlos raises his drink to me, his eyes are red and glossy, he stretches indifferently like a cat, and plops his head childlike in my lap. He has a woozy smile. He presses play on his phone. “Por Tu Maldito Amor” by Vicente Fernandez starts to play. In 1991 The Houston Chronicle said Fernandez is “The Sinatra of Ranchera music.” The man who does things his way. He is the epitome of todo hombre with his trademark charro outfit, and wide sombrero. He has a star on the Hollywood walk of fame. Fernandez’s music is a crossover sensation, extending north and south of the border. The music video “Por Tu Maldito Amor” begins with Fernandez dramatically throwing a bottle of alcohol against a wall at his viejas’s picture after reading a good-bye note that she left behind. Fernandez’s lyrics run deeper than a Shakespearian sonnet. One of the lines in the song says: And what would I want a grave for if you’ve already buried me alive. In the next scene Fernandez is sitting broken-hearted in a bar alone with a bottle of tequila. 42 42
Not crying but weeping over his lost love. Your favorite song of Vicente’splayed at birthday parties, barbecues, holidays, and weddings. Carlos belts the ending verse spilling some of his rum on his jeans. Por Tu Maldito Amor Por Tu Benedito Amor. His eyes are watery as he finishes the final lyric: for your blessed love. You don’t know what it is about this songperhaps it’s the weeping tears of someone as todo hombre as Vicente Fernandez. Maybe it’s because you’ve never seen a Mexican man cry so painfully over a woman. Maybe Ranchera music is just so fucking moving. You get pulled in with Carlos as the music stops and begin to tear up too. Ranchera is derived from the word “rancho” because the music originated on the ranches of rural Mexico. Literally means “music of the ranches”: music of the people. Ranchera music was born out of a new national consciousness during the Mexican revolution. The songs are usually about love, patriotism, and nature. Mexicanos needed to cope with the rural conditions of working on a ranch, they had no money, no voice, and the only way to express themselves was through song. Ranchera music has the power to mediate the oppressive attitudes in our Mexican culture. I’ve seen Mexicanos and Chicanos get drunk together at the bar listening to Pedro Infante, Linda Ronstadt, and Vicente Fernandez. The music bridges the language gap between us. And for a few minutes not knowing Spanish doesn’t matter. When you listen to Ranchera none of it matters. We are the same. In the space of that song we understand our roots run deep in Mexico. We fall asleep, 43 43 legs and arms haphazardly on top of each other. The music is on repeat. An aerial view of us: I imagine that we look like Henri Matisse’s last painting The Snail. With its choppy orange border and colorful uneven shapesshapes that don’t exactly fitpiled on top of each other exposing empty white space. When Carlos introduced me to his family, they liked me immediately as we mutually made fun of Carlos together. He, oblivious to all the jokes made at his expense, was too drunk to realize what was going on. He just sat there smiling, his head wobbling around like a newborn baby. His brother-in-law Matt told me a story of how Carlos fell into the pool drunk one summer, and he hit his head on the side rail knocking him unconscious. Matt jumped in and rescued him from drowning. Everyone laughed it off and never said to him that his excessive drinking was a problem. Our future in a paragraph: A back yard wedding followed by a vacation in Puerto Vallarta where a tourist will take snapshots of us click, click, click, happiness crystalized showcased on our mantle. Months later into our new reality you will arrive home from class and excitedly recite a line from a Lauren Slater essay. Beer in hand he will pretend to care about what you said and then exit into the garage. Where he will spend the rest of the night working on his Bronco. * Sunlight shines through the living room window. Let’s go to breakfast he says running his rough hand up and down my thigh. I smile excitedly. Doesn’t take us long to get ready, half-drunk and half-asleep we manage to get out the door. I offer to drive and we head to El Tarasco, a Mexican restaurant downtown. I order a Michelada with a Modelo Especial. Carlos orders a double Jimador and squirt. Then another. And another. SUNDAY FUNDAY
Can I order a Michelada with a Modelo Especial? I say rubbing my right temple. Yeah, I’ll have the same, and a menudo, wait do you have pozole? Mari says, adjusting her gold bangles. Yes. We have menudo and pozole on Saturday and Sundays only. Our waitress says collecting the menus. A text message from Faith: Hey prima, order me red beer. I’m on the way! The waitress scurries off to place the cure for our hangovers, as my girlfriends and I begin piece together our girl’s night from the night before. A forty-dollar cab ride. A phone number from a guy named G written on a napkin torn in half. A Jack in the Box receipt for thirty-dollars. Who ordered the jalapeno poppers? Montell Jordon’s “Get it on Tonight” still on playing in my head. Here you go ladies, enjoy! Beerfest mugs overflowing with clamato juice and Modelo Especial accented with jumbo shrimp garnishes, and tejan salted rims decorate our previously naked table. Mari and I take our time snapchatting our drinks to let everyone know how much fun we had the night before. Our buzz revives as we take the first long sip of our Micheladas. In walks my cousin Faith wearing yoga pants with a white tank top exposing her cheetah print bra. A Mexican family is seated in the booth behind us. The wife gives a curious glance our way, followed by her husband. The couple’s two-year old plays 45 45 peek-a-boo with me over the partition between our joining tables. An innate part of me wants to hold the baby in my lap and feel its warmth against my skin. It’s after 12:00pm and families begin to slowly trickle in after mass. And I’m thinking we should’ve gone to the El Tarasco on Main Street, a darkly dimmed bar, for our borrachaness. The hostess seats more Mexican families next to ushusbands in Portrillo cowboy boots, wives in beautiful dresses from JC Penny’s and Dress Barn. And that occasional white family you don’t expect to see, but down for Mexican food. I start to feel anxious in my clothes from the night before, my face still halfway composed with greasy makeup, topped with even greaser hair. I reach for my sunglasses, an attempt to create a barrier between myself and the families. I don’t want to think about marriage, children, or church. I don’t want to think about why I’m thirty-two and single, still drunk from the night before. I don’t want to be reminded of the things I should be doing, on a Sunday in my thirties.
My girlfriends are:
Divorced. Student. Mom. Single. Homecoming Queen. Cheerleader. Writer. Teacher. Banker. 46 46
So what’s the haps? What exactly happened last night? I don’t remember a thing, Faith says, resting her shades like a headband on top of her head, before reaching inside her handbag for a Kleenex. She wraps the Kleenex around her index finger, swooping makeup boogers from the corners of her eyes. With each swipe she makes, I feel closer to my old self. The guilt from an eighty-dollar bar tab and the guilt of hooking up with a guy named G feels somewhat lifted. You spent how much at the bar? You hooked up with G? On Nadia’s couch! Whaaaa! Isn’t he related to Raymond? Wait didn’t you date Raymond back in the day? How did you get home Faith? You were on the dance floor hoeing it up! I don’t remember taking that shot You drunk dialed your ex? Fukkkk You left your chonies at my place I don’t know how I got home I think I left my card at Lums ABC Taxi picked us up Wait, oh shit, that’s my friend Brian, we went to high school together. I haven’t seen him in years. Faith waves over at him excitedly. Fucking Faith she knows everyone! Wait don’t call him over here, I look like shit Mari says, reaching for her sunglasses. We all look like shit! At least you showered, I remind her, sinking further into our booth. Brian strides over to our table with a spirited grin. He is Portuguese cowboy meets Jason Statham. Before proper introductions are made, Faith starts drilling him with questions. But the only question we care to know is if he is single. 47 47
I’m going through a divorce. He says leaning into our table. We were married for fifteen years. His Jason Statham camera-ready grin fades and he looks into a football game on mute behind our table. Aw, sorry to hear that, we say in disingenuous unison. Faith exchanges numbers with Brian, no one has to mention it, but we all secretly hope he will call. That he will join us later for a drink or two. Because on some level we need Brian or the Brians of the world to remind us that it’s okay to be a little displaced in life. * Another beer. Another bar. Another beer. Another bar. The sun is setting on Main Street as we walk into Tommy’s restaurant. More girlfriends have joined our Sunday Funday posse, and now we’re rolling five deep. We’ve transitioned from Micheladas to anything with vodka. Okay, one “last, last” Mari says making Dr. Evil quotation marks with her fingers. Then home. Yeah, right we aren’t going home. It’s Paisa night at El Presidente, let’s go dancing! I say moving my shoulders and snapping my fingers in my seat. Hey. Wait. Is thatis that…Brian sitting at the bar? Mari says peeping from behind the specialty cocktail menu. Oh shit it is! Faith starts giggling out loud. I think he’s with someone. She still waves unapologetically. Brian catches our gaze and waves casually over to us. He does not leave his seat to say hello. Instead, he tips his Coors Light bottle in our direction. I think he’s on a date. What the fuck? That’s our date! I think I know that girl. Um…Yeah…I don’t like her. 48 48
Is she cute? I can’t see that far. Mari goes into stealth mode and puts her shades on to get a good look. Yeah. I mean…she’s all right. It looks like they’re on a first date. Yeah. Her laugh is annoying. Whatever, that fool has five kids anyways. We place our drink orders and watch the sun completely set. Something shifted in all of us and somewhere in the space of ordering drinks and Brian’s date we lost our momentum. One-by-one our girlfriends closed their tabs, and said their goodbyes. Mari and I stayed a little longer, not ready to go home to our empty spaces and observed as Brian engaged in first date awkwardness. We listened to the nervous pitch in his date’s laugh; we noticed her order drink after drink in attempt to dilute her awkward timbre. Brian, his date, Mari, and I, kept drinking until the bar closed. Brian and his date left with his hand on her lower back, turning back once to say goodbye with his movie star grin. I called ABC taxi to pick us up. We decided to skip dancing and head home. We both had work and school in the morning.
PART THREE: WHAT IT IS TO WAIT BORROWED LINES
Take a number and wait for your name to be called. Select a seat where you can easily blend in. Try to shake off the anxiety of bumping into someone you know. You don’t know anyone here. Tune out the cries of children that surround you and rehearse what you will tell your caseworker. Breathe. Try not to feel guilty, you don’t really want to be here but you don’t have anywhere else to go. Your number is called: thirty-eight to window seven please. Numero trienta y ocho. Thirty-eight. Numero trienta y ocho. Window seven please. Walk casually to the counter don’t pay attention to the curious stares of people who are also seeking assistance. You didn’t know what to wear today; you had no idea what the wardrobe aesthetic is when applying for welfare. So you decided to keep it breezy, and opted for faded blue jeans, Vans, and a black t-shirt. You were so nervous to come in and apply, you didn’t want to be noticed, so you spent forty-five minutes putting together the most casual outfit ever. You’ve never liked when people looked at you, even in the most informal of settings. Like walking up the church aisle to receive communion, or raising your hand to contribute a thought in a class discussion. You’ve always wanted to be invisible and left alone, even at a young age. You try your hardest even beyond the space of the welfare office to not be noticed. You choose a nude lipstick instead of red, you wish you could be that girl who isn’t afraid to wear red. Identification please. Two forms. You hand her your driver’s license and social security card. You notice that she is thirty-something like you. She looks familiar but you can’t place her, and hope that she doesn’t recognize you or that you share mutual friends, so you stare 51 51 down at your shoes and pull strands of your brown hair forward. She makes copies of your IDs. What are you applying for today? Cal Fresh? Financial Assistance? Medi- Cal? Cal-Fresh. Do you have health insurance? No. Are you working? Yes. I have a job, but not in the summer, I say, pulling more hair forward. Okay. Fill out these forms and take a seat. Your caseworker will call you when they are ready. Same number. Okay. Thank you. Fifty minutes later, they call your number. Except this time you’re whisked away through a side door into a labyrinth of pale offices with sliding doors and wide windows. As you pass the rooms you notice all the different families, single men, and women, being interviewed to see if they qualify. You walk and walk, turn corners, and walk some more, until she finds a vacant space. You slide into your seat and she turns on a computer. The office reminds you of an interrogation room set in a dystopian thriller. Since this is not her office but a borrowed space, no family photos, or personal trinkets riddle her desk. Your caseworker, who looks twenty-something, has charms on her acrylic nails and when she hands you more papers to fill out, you can’t help to think how her fingers look like mysterious crustaceans of the sea. Thankfully, you don’t know who she is and you answer each question with thought and poise because you’ve been rehearsing for two days now. 52 52
You convey to her you are a substitute teacher, but there is no work in the summer. You are currently looking for part-time work but no one wants to hire you based on the fact you already have a job. All the money in your possession is going to bills bills that you can barely afford and wonder how you will pay this month. You tell her that you don’t want to be here today, but you have no choice. It’s a scary feeling when there is absolutely no one you can lean on when going through difficult times, not your mom or dad, not a boyfriend or husband, you have no one. You asked your ex-boyfriend once if you could borrow some money so that you could pay a bill and buy some groceries. No he said because he thought it would ruin your friendship. It took a lot to ask him that day, you two were still dating. You didn’t want to ask him, and wondered why he didn’t offer, you’d spent your last twenty dollars till payday on him at the bar. But you never told him that. You were too embarrassed to tell him that you only had twenty dollars to your name, so when he asked you to order a beer for him at the bar, you reached into your purse and handed the bill over to the bartender. You watched him sip on his tall Modelo without a worry in the world. You didn’t think twenty dollars could break you, and make you feel sick to your stomach, but it did. So when the caseworker approved you for emergency food stamps that day, you wanted to give her a hug, you wanted to start crying, but instead you just sat there frozen, afraid she was going to retract your approval and dismiss you like Carlos did that day. LIVING LIFE IN A SERIES OF LINES
Another shot of fireball. Another screwdriver. Another anything with vodka. You’ve been at the bar for an hour and a half. But still no buzz. But you’re not just at any bar, but the divest grittiest bar in Visaliathe Pump House. A makeshift barn located on the outskirts of downtown. There’s a sign that says CASH ONLY duct taped above their outdated register. Inside, patrons light up Marlboro lights and throw peanut shells carelessly onto the floor. A place where greasy mechanics, cholos, and wealthy local businessman swig together on plump Coors Original bottles while listening to “Neon Moon” by Brooks and Dunn. You meet up with Casey, your comadre’s brother who is visiting from out of town, who looks like a Ryan Gosling knock off and dresses Hawaiian hippie. You really didn’t care to catch up with him, it just gave you an excuse to go to the bar. Casey’s childhood best friend Stevie tags along he is unemployed, bald, and wears cholo jeans shorts, you know, the kind of shorts that might as well be pants. He rubs his hard-on against your leg while showing you a picture of his child to be. You remember how Stevie was kicked out of the pool party last summer for hitting on your married cousin. His erection feels nice so you don’t stop him but feel sorry for him because that is all he has to offer. Casey just finished grad school and you have one more year to go. In between shots of Fireball you both talk about being broke in your 30s and still living at home. You invite your friend Elena you want to have a girlfriend there with youto support youto listen to you and tell you what you should do. Casey gets a twinkle in his eye. He fucked Elena last summer. 54 54
Tomorrow is Tuesday and at 9am you have to go to court to disclose to a judge why you requested a restraining order against your brother Thomas. But you’re not sure you want the restraining order any more. You’re not sure if this is the right thing to do. So you look for answers in your Smirnoff vodka and generic as fuck orange juice. You text Carlos, the guy you’ve been dating off and on for years who you don’t openly call your boyfriend. PICK ME UP PLEASE. Even though you’re not drunk or ready to go home just yet but you’re being a tad theatrical which isn’t typically like you. You’re hoping maybe he will have an answer and tell you what to do. You think about the names your brother called you: bitch, loser, slut, whore, asshole, motherfucker, and cunt. You think about how he chased you out of the house, locked the door and left you outside in the summer103 degree heat. You think about how you were on your period that day and your tampon gave out because you were locked outside for so long, how blood began to trickle down your leg. You remember that image of you: bloody, sweaty, and barefoot in a grey maxi dress from Ross. You think about how he ripped your favorite necklace from your flesh and threw it into the street. You think about how you waited for your dad to intervene, to stop him, but he never did. He was scared of him too. You think about how you waited for your dad to be a man that day. How you waited for him to punch your brotherto pummel him to the floor. You think about what kind of father allows another man to call his daughter a bitch, a whore, in front of him. Another bar. Another drink. You are finally feeling something, getting closer to that release. Stevie’s pregnant girlfriend picks him up, Casey and Elena get cozy together in their bar stools. You pump dollars you don’t have into the 55 55 jukebox and play “Mustang Sally” your favorite Wilson Pickett song and text Carlos I’M READY. He doesn’t respond to you right away so you contemplate taking an Uber home. Twenty minutes passes and he shows up, pokes your back while you’re picking out more old school jams to an empty bar. What are you doing dork? His smile is cheesy. He’s not used to you calling him for a ride, in fact you’re the one who regularly picks him up from the bar. Listos Borracha? Yeah, I’m ready. You say bye to Elena and Casey who at this point have sloppy grins and glossy eyes. No one speaks on the ride home, you don’t usually spend the night together but tonight he stays. You both like your space and it’s been years since you could care about someone again. * You read the line of yet another essay where a fellow classmate has decided to write about Mexicans. It’s not that you’re mad that she decided to write about Mexicans. No. You’re upset with the fact that she is perpetuating a type. You’re upset that the only Mexican in her story is Juan the drug dealer, who is the antagonist in her story, and responsible for selling drugs to her friends. You’re upset that she implies that Juan and his family are responsible for the demise of her quaint Central Valley town. You’re upset with how she depicts Mexican students as childlike and ignorant. You’re upset with how the Mexican grocery store is portrayed as some kind of novelty rather than an actual part of the townlike it’s where the white people head when they are feeling adventurous. You’re mad because you considered this person a friend. You’re livid because she didn’t take the time to 56 56 give them any humanity. You’re disappointed because she didn’t even think to do so. You’ve tried again and again to educate why perpetuating stereotypes is hazardous. That if you write about a person of color—do so at a distance and be fair—be mindful. Even though you pointed this out to her she still submitted the essay to you anyway. You couldn’t look her in the face that day—you were that upset. She sat there in boutique clothes waiting for class to start unaware that her essay made you so sick you wanted to go home. Did she hear your heart beating fast, or see your sweaty palms, could she taste the acid in your stomach every time you had to articulate a point to defend your people. No. She didn’t think of you in class that day, because she never had to think of you before. She didn’t think of you the Chicana from the north side of Visalia who had a best friend named Juan. She could write about Juan and close her book. You had to work to transcend that stereotype everyday. * You trace the outline of the only childhood family photo you have. A picture from 2006, you are twenty-two, and it’s Christmas. This is the only picture you have now of you and your siblings. In the midst of your parents’ divorce your father, who wanted revenge, stole all your family photo albums and hid them somewhere he does not remember. The photo is washed out and has lost all of its presence. You see it every day. But when your brother Thomas was arrested the first time and you watched him leave in the back of a cop car you began to look at the photo again. You began to trace the outline of his face and remember when he sang in chamber choir and played defense on the football team for El Diamante 57 57
High School. You came home that day from the gym to police cars and a fire truck, your neighbor tells you that the police raided your backyard. Your brother looks subdued, out of it, sitting in the police car. His head is tilted to the side but he isn’t looking at you and you’re scared to look at him. You’re scared to look because you’ve known for a long time that that isn’t Thomas anymore. * You wait in line at Miller’s Memorial Funeral home to view your grandma’s body one last time. When you approach the casket you touch her silver hair lightly, you ask your mom if it’s okay to remove her rosary, you want to keep it. She says yes, but on the condition that you replace the rosary with a piece of your jewelry. You take off your rose gold ring with pastel flowers and put it on her finger. You adjust her top making sure there are no wrinkles. The lines in her face appear softer now. Your grandma raised you while your mom went back to high school to finish her junior and senior year. You remember going to Fairway Market with your grandma and she’d buy you strawberry fruit roll ups, you remember going to Woolworth’s and Montgomery Ward and she’d buy you clothes for school on credit. You remember that she cooked everything with Manteca and that going to Burger King was a special treat only if she made a little extra on payday. You went to work with her at the Senior Citizen Center where she was a sous-chef because no one else could watch you. You had a small space behind the industrial sized cake mixer where you colored in a Tiny Toons coloring book and munched on left over chicken patties from lunch. You were her shadowtogether at all times because your mom was only sixteen when she had you. When you turned twenty-two she co-signed on your first car. Put gas in your car. Helped you buy your textbooks and even paid your 58 58
$400 car payment when you spent your money selfishly on tops for the club. When you got older you made promises to visit her. You didn’t always follow through. When she was diagnosed with dementia and went into a special home you hardly made the time to go see her. Once you let three months pass, and when you saw her, you didn’t think she’d notice. She did and started to cry and said Jacquelina, I haven’t seen you in so long. Where have you been? Why haven’t you come to see me? You cried too. You don’t know how she knew you were absent from her life. You wrapped your arms around her and said you’d visit more and went every Sunday for a while but eventually you let that promise escape you. When your family brought her home to die, Thomas kept vigilance over her in her last days. He monitored her breathing and took initiative when her sheets and clothing needed to be changed. He jotted notes from hospices diligently and repeated instructions of what he learned from the nurses to the rest of the family. The family was proud of him the last three days of your grandma’s life and they and even you thought he had found his calling. Your grandma was the oldest of thirteen siblings, the matriarch of the Cabrera-Velasquez family, a woman who worked in the fields during WWII and the Civil Rights movement, she was a homeowner and president of the Guadalupana Society, she was that beautiful blend of English and Spanish and when she exhaled for the final time you held her hand and said I’m sorry. She died on a weekday in January surrounded by fifty-bodies of family and friends. * Carlos is leaving to Mexico, the same day you have court, to visit his parents. 59 59
He says he’ll be gone for a month but its usually a little over two. He lives part-time in Visalia and part-time in Puerto Vallarta. Your relationship has been like this for years, yo-yoing back and forth, never completely invested or grounded. This relationship is what is normal to you. You’ve watched your father waver in and out of women and jobs your whole life. Like your father you like to play life by ear, that way you never have to fully commit to anything. Carlos is sitting on the edge of your mattress getting dressed, you are clutching at your comforter with no desire to get out of bed. You know I have two brothers that are lost to the streets he says sliding his right foot into his black work boot. Yeah, there is nothing you can do for your brother at this pointall you can do is help your mother and protect yourself. He pivots his left foot into the other boot and stands up. You know what I mean? Ya, you nod removing gunk from the corner of your eye. You just hoped for an alternate solution. You didn’t want to have to go this far. You had hoped something would happen in the space between bottom shelf vodka and Wilson Pickett songs. You imagined your dad looking for his son at night on the north side of Visalia. Finding him, fighting for him, beating the shit out of him and setting him straight like the heroic father figure in the movies. You imagine: your father in one sweeping motion tossing Thomas into his 98’ white Chevy pickup and taking him to rehab. Like a scene in a film your father’s car door shuts dramatically, the tires of his Chevy screech into the pavement, and together they drive into the night, in the rain, through a red light far away. Reality: Your father doesn’t even ask about Thomas, not to you, or your sister, or your youngest brother. 60 60
You walk Carlos to his car and he traces the outline of your lip with his coarse thumb and kisses you on the forehead. See you in a few months. * You can’t exactly pinpoint in time when your brother started to change. Vague memories of his behavior start to surface after his first arrest. You remember when he was fifteen years old and he pushed your mother against the wall in the hallway and started to choke her. She managed to pull free and call the cops. You thought it strange that your brother claimed your mother, in fact, choked him. You thought it strange how he couldn’t hold down a job, at McDonald’s, Lowe’s, your uncle’s upholstery shop, Walgreens, and Leo’s Nursery. He seemed content with you and your mother going to work while he tuned in and listened to the raspy voice of Alex Jones and his theories about a New World Order and the Illuminati. At first you thought his interest into conspiracy theories just a hobby, then he started to dress militant, wearing camouflage army pants, combat boots, and a black bandana. He walked around town packing a machete, and changed his Facebook name from Thomas to Freedom. Your mother tells you that in men schizophrenia typically starts in the early to mid twenties. Thomas is twenty-four. * You look at the imaginary line that Thomas cannot cross. Approximately100feet from your house. If he crosses the invisible line on Sweet and Conyer per the restraining order the judge granted you, you will have him arrested. 61 61
You went to court that Tuesday morning and held your mom’s handshe too, requested a restraining order. You sat next to her and listened to her plea in front of the judgein front of strangers, who were there at 9:00 am to testify against their spouses for canine custody and child support. Your mother’s voice starts to crack when she hands the bailiff a police printout of the ten different times law enforcements came to your house. She tells the judge Thomas’s behavior is unpredictable he stalks, lurks, and intimidates her. He was recently arrested again, your honor. He’s at Bob Wiley. Her voice like her disposition is frail. Anxiously she shifts her weight to the right leg, then to the left, while the judge examines the new information. The courtroom feels stale, like an outdated grocery store and smells medicated like Lice shampoo. You notice your mom begins to pick at her cuticles, so you grab her hand again. Ms. Cabrera and Ms. Huertaz I am granting you protection orders for the next three years. If you decide to see or contact him during that time they will be registered as invalid. You wait to hear the striking sound of a gavel on his mega desk but inflated melodrama only happens in the movies. Instead he says, please, take a seat. * You were the first one in the family to cut all ties with Thomas. You couldn’t support him or his lifestyle any longer. And he hated you for it. Your mother had asked him to move out, but he knew his squatter’s rights. You and your mother changed the locks and barricaded the patio and garage. He started living in the backyard and built a tent city with some help from the junkies down the street. He pounded on your bedroom window at night when he knew you were home. Sometimes you caught him gaping at you through the kitchen 62 62 window. You remember coming home from work and hearing a voice from the roof. You look up and see him rapping “Me Against the World” by Tupac with a bike chain around his neck. Other days you were too afraid to leave your house so you waited hours for him to leave. You showed up that day to your house to police officers and firemen, to a K-9 unit and five cop cars, to a fire truck, and to neighbors standing in the street. You walk into your driveway in a strange stupor, the officer in a bulletproof vest asks you does your brother have any mental problems? You blame yourself for dismissing his bizarre behavior, for diagnosing him as a lazy entitled child. You watch him drive away in the back of a police car. You’re not sure who to call first. Your momno, she’s missed enough days due to Thomas already. Your dadno, he’ll just say something dumb or won’t react at all. Your sisterno, she just had a baby. So you just sit on the couch, in sweaty gym clothes, with your cell phone in hand and stare out the window. You watch the remaining police officers in bulky black swat gear file in their cars and leave. You watch the lines of the cars become fainter and fainter as they disappear down the street. SPANISH AND ME
At thirteen years old my grandma Carmen, the oldest child of Filiberto and Emma Cabrera, had to leave the eighth grade to work in the fields. The year was 1941. In 1941 Hitler and Mussolini were at war with America. In 1941 Franklin D. Roosevelt was inaugurated for his third term as U.S. President. In 1941 early tests for the atom bomb were underway. In 1941 teens danced to the jitterbug and gas cost only eighteen cents a gallon. In 1941 women moved into the workforce occupying industry jobs for the economic home front. And in 1941 in a rural Central Valley town my grandma Carmen picked oranges, cotton, and lettuce for thirty-cents an hour. My grandma was the oldest of thirteen children and since she was the first- born it was her responsibility to provide for the family. My great grandfather Filiberto Cabrera said since she was the oldest she had to work and provide for the family. Whenever I complained about schoolwork and chores. She’d say Mija you don’t know what hard work is. I imagine my great-grandfather and grandma picking walnuts side-by-side in silence. They have a rhythm, a movement in how they pick, in how they move around each other. I think about my grandma’s coming-of-age experience how she was forced to work just as hard as a man. I think of the working conditionswhere did she go when she started her period. I think of her bleeding, her cramps, and the discomfort she felt in a ten-hour workday. I think about how every single paycheck went to her parents. I think about her sweaty bloody body in the heat. I 64 64 think about how my grandma never complained about any of it. I think about how her stories are a reminder of how hard I’d never have to work. 1941 was also the last year my grandma ever attended school. For the next thirty years, the Cabrera family worked and traveled to different labor Camps in Arizona, Texas, and the Central Valley, settling in Visalia, California, in 1965. * My mother was sixteen-years old when I was born. My mother went back to school and my grandma became my mom. I was her “go to” person at weddings, mass, rosaries, birthday parties and anniversaries. I can’t count how many funerals I attended. I stayed the night every weekend and watched the novela Tres Mujeres on channel five. When the novelas ended, my grandma called her comadre Carmen Mesa to chisme about the show but mostly to chismes about their children and neighbors. My grandma’s comadre always answered on the first ring, the kidney shaped landline phone, had a long spiral cord that reached from the living room to the kitchen. I put my book down and listened to her ice skate in Spanish and English. Spanish language was not passed on to my mother. At the time urban areas were still structured under Jim Crow laws. Mexicans were forced to assimilate, and speaking Spanish in a conservative agriculture town like Visalia, California, was deemed ignorant and dirty. * A snapshot of why my family does not speak Spanish: at school before my grandma worked in the fields she was hit with a ruler if she answered the teacher in Spanish. * 65 65
Over the years I became mindful of what I complained about. Her stories kept me humble and made me appreciate what I did have. My job at DD’s Discounts, my 98’ Dodge Stratus that overheated at least once a week. She’d say mija you’re lucky you get to keep your check when I was your age my money always went to my parents. Back in the day that’s how Mexican families survived and that is what was expected of their children. * In college I’d complain about the cost of textbooks and gas, my car payment and cell phone bill. My grandma’s stories kept me in check—put my life in perspective. Her stories allowed me to take on two jobs. They helped me process the unbearable moments of my parents divorce. I wish I could go back in time and we could watch novelas together again. I want to hear her chisme to Carmen Mesa. I want to see her cooking food in her red apron in the kitchen. I want more than anything to be with her driving to pay a bill at the Oval in her blue Nova. * Fact: Mexican Americans had the highest percentage of Congressional Medal of Honor Winners of any minorities in the United States. Did you know that Chicanos were amongst the most highly decorated soldiers in the Vietnam War. And that most of them reside in the Central Valley. Specifically, in Corcoran and Lemoore, Calif. * When you think of World War II and the Vietnam War do you think of Mexican boys? 66 66
My uncle Ben is married to my great-aunt Loraine, your grandma Carmen’s younger sister. Ben has that reserved cholo swag about him, in the way he carries himself. In the way he walks, and stands perfectly aligned to the rhythm of the world. The day after Thanksgiving it’s his 70th birthday party. I select the station War radio because I know he likes old school, just like my dad. “Spill the Wine” starts to play and with one song I’ve relaxed the entire room. Uncle Ben cannot stop grinning tonight. His youngest daughter Katherine, my second cousin passed her state exam making her an official nurse practitioner. In the space of the third and fourth bottle of wine I start speaking to him about the importance of our family stories and the absence of the Mexican American narrative in literature. The conversation digresses into a memory he had as soldier in the Vietnam War. Family members begin to vanish into the music and his narrative whisks me away to1969. My uncle tells me how he was the only Spanish-speaking soldier in his unit. A Spanish colonel, whose camp was two hundred miles away, had spread the word that he wanted to converse with someone in Spanish. Information spread through the wire and this colonel of Spanish descent who immigrated to the United States secured a Boeing CH-47 Chinook chopper to meet twenty-year-old Ben Reynoso from Visalia, California. Ben said they’d meet every two weeks and spoke only in Spanish to each other. He said they smoke cigarettes, drink cheap whiskey, and discuss history, politics, sports, family and women. I don’t remember his name Ben said, he was colonel in high military ranking and from what I remember he had hundreds of soldiers under his command. 67 67
I think about the power of story telling, I think about the longing to hear your culture in another person. When my grandma was diagnosed with dementia there were days that she’d only speak in Spanish to me. When I moved to Sonoma there were no Mexicans in my classes or in the neighborhood I lived in. I felt very disconnected from my culture and longed to hear the language. I’d go to the University pub and play Mexican music even though I didn’t understand what exactly they were saying. I think of this yearning, this inescapable desire to hear your language. I think about the Colonel who was willing to fly two hundred miles in hostile territory to talk to man he never met just to hear it. JULISSA’S STORY
“Julissa, what makes your family’s story different from anyone else’s?” She cradles her mouth at the lip of her wine glass and pauses, gazing into the muted white subtitles of an episode of “Cops.” The TV is our third party, our buffer that our eyes escape to when the emotion gets too thick. She doesn’t answer. Instead takes another swig of the Zinfandel I brought over. We are about two glasses deep, and shit is getting real. “Okay,” I say opening a word document on my laptop. We have to write the story in way that sets your dad apart from any other deportation case. The judge has to see what makes your father uniquewhat makes him special. Why should he be allowed to stay in the United States?” Her eyes become glossy as she turns her head to the TV, expecting maybe there might be answer there. She is wearing mesh colored leggings with a black scoop neck that exposes her supple shoulders. Our feet dangle together to the same rhythm as our bodies merge deeper into the sofa. When I’m with Julissa, I am reminded of my age. And a small part of me has a desire to be twenty-one again. To laugh and really mean it. To be thin and eat fries guilt free. To have a cute boyfriend named Jesse who brings me Fro-Yo on my lunch break. Julissa is an old co-worker. She was my first friend when I accepted a position at DD’s Discounts. A store that is cheaper than Ross, they sell the defective products from major retail stores. Her house is located on north side like mine in a suburb mostly occupied by Mexicans. Inside the Arriaga household bottles of Don Julio, and Patron, are sequestered on a shelf below the ceiling, creating a Sky bar. 69 69
“My father doesn’t drinkhe just likes to collect them.” Julissa points this out to me the first time I went over to their home. “But my mom, yeah she likes to party.” She snickers under her breath so that her family won’t hear. Her mom is making dinner in the kitchen we’re not that far off in age. There is something so tender and pure about Julissa’s smile, the way her lip arches in optimism, the way her long brown hair dances free in photos, the way she flows like water around her family, the way they flow around her like antibodies in the bloodstream. I feel compelled to protect it. Or help in anyway I can. “Let’s create a list. Maybe that would be the best way to get main ideas on the page.” My creative non-fiction persona takes over. “Okay, what’s at stake in your story?” “Whatat stake?” she gazes into a lamp with no shade. I don’t hold back on my question. I don’t want to see Julissa upset but it’s important that we include this expository information in the narrative. The judge needs to empathize with the Arriaga family. “Like what will happen if your dad gets deported back to Iguala, Mexico?” Tears trickle down her cheeks. She adjusts her scoop neck and runs her hand through her hair. “I will have to drop out of school.” “Andwhat else?” “We will lose our house. I will lose my car. I will have to provide for my family. I will be the head of the house. I will not see my father again…thenthey will come after my mom next.” Julissa falls silent and our eyes drift in unison to the floor. We are both barefoot and buzzed. Neither one of us speaks, so we just listen to the muffled voices on the TV. 70 70
If Donald Trump is elected president he estimates that it will take 18 months to round up roughly 11 million illegal immigrants. Yes, he said “round up.” The Donald plans to construct a wall that will border the United States to Mexico if he becomes president in 2016. There are approximately 33.7 million Hispanics of Mexican origin living in the U.S. We account for nearly two-thirds (64%) of the U.S. Hispanic population. We account for 11% of the overall population. There are more than 50% of Mexican immigrants who live in the United States illegally. There are only 32% who are permanent residents There are only 16% that are naturalized citizens. Julissa’s father has been living in the United States illegally for more than twenty years. In 2016 the United States may have the very first woman President, in 2016 Nasa’s Juno spacecraft is expected to arrive at Jupiter, in 2016 the summer Olympics will be held in Rio de Janiero, in 2016 the last remaining troops from Britain, America, and Australia will withdraw from Afghanistan, in 2016 there will be a pill to prevent sunburn, in 2016 Kim Kardashian will have given birth to South West, in 2016 there will be the very first hotel in space and in 2016 “The Donald” may be the President of the free world. In 2016 on a quiet weekday night Julissa and her two her sisters will be sleeping quietly in bed. Her mom Maria and father Julio will hear someone pounding at their door, the knocking sounds like thunder collapsing on a mountain. Startled, scared, and half asleep Maria says ven a la puerta Julio untangles his body from his blankets, fingers each eye removing orbs of green 71 71 gunk, he struggles to detach himself from bed, from his body that feels like an anchor from the two welding jobs he has taken on to support his family. He walks cautiously down the hall. Family photos riddle their walls, his daughter Zitaly holding a soccer trophyhe is their coach. A high school graduation picture of Julissa hugging her grandmaClass of 2011, and a candid photo of them at Christmas making tamalessmilinglaughing. Beads of sweat brew at Julio’s temple; he knows it’s the I.C.E. Who else would be pounding on his door in the middle of the night? He takes a moment before opening the door and looks around his home one last time, gazing into the new mesh brown porcelain floor he just installed, the cherry wood dining table his girls do their homework on, he looks up at his sky bar and takes in all the different tequilas he will never get to taste and then opens the door. ARE YOU JULIO ARRIAGA? The I.C.E. officer asks tricked out in complete black wearing a bulletproof vest. “YesI am.” There are six more officers behind him. They have automatic weapons. They ask Julio to get down on all fours and handcuff him. They are pointing a gun to his head. They raid the rest of the Arriaga home, flashing lights inside the girls’ bedrooms. GET UP, GET OUT OF BED! I NEED TO SEE PAPERS, ID, PASSPORTS, ARE YOU HERE ILLEGALLY? The girls scramble to find they’re U.S. ID cards. Then they are rushed to the living room where they see their father subdued like an animal, they start to cry. 72 72
LOOKS LIKE WE HIT THE JACKPOT! Shouts an I.C.E officer. Julio tries not to cry when he is escorted out of his home. It will be six months before he can make any contact with his family. They will send him back to Iguala, Mexico where he was born, where he hasn’t visited for over twenty years. A city that is unfamiliar to him, a city he left to escape the abuse of his alcoholic father. He moved to the United States for opportunity, for a chance to break the barriers of predisposition, Julio will tell me this in our very first interview. He will also tell me that he just wanted a better life for his family. On a melancholy fall night in October 2015 over carnitas, chile, and red wine, the Arriaga family will ask me to help them with a letter to a judge so that Julio can stay in the United States… and then Julio will ask me to help write his story…his journey of coming to America. It’s 2017 and Trump is our President. For now Julissa’s letter waits to be read by a Judge to determine if her father can live in the United States. I think of the Arriaga family everyday. Trump plans to build a Wall separating the United States from Mexico. In recent news, there are reports that ICE is detaining illegal immigrants in Chicago and Los Angeles. PUBLIC NOTICE
BE QUIET WHILE COURT IS IN SESSION. Notice the military font of the “Do Not” lists that are taped behind the mesh colored brown pews in the courtroom. Notice the way the antiquated benches succeed the judge’s lifted mega desk. Every few minutes more people trickle in wearing mixed matched business attire from Sears. Notice how they nervously gaze around the room, before locating a place to sit. When you arrived you paused and gazed too, never allowing your eyes to become completely absorbed in another’s. A courtroom far removed from any episode of Law and Order. The layout of the courtroom feels like an outdated religion and is awkwardly quiet. It’s 7:50am, and the court requested your presence at 8:00. You’re early.
NO DRINKING. Don’t think about the sixty dollars you spent on screwdrivers and shots of Crown Royal at the Pump House the night before. Don’t think about the other twenty- dollars you pumped into a jukebox to listen to Mustang Sally, your favorite Wilson Pickett song. Try not to think about the money you wasted at a bar with a friend you don’t care about. The sign in the Courtroom says “No Drinking” but all you can think about is having a drink. You want to be seduced by a vodka tonic and swim into the arms of a Sequoia Red IPA. You pick at your cuticles until they bleed because you’re missing work and can’t afford to miss work. Forty-five minutes later, and the judge still hasn’t called your name.
74 74
NO EATING. NO FOOD IN COURTROOM. Despite your anxiety you still want to eat. Your stomach moans, so you fidget with your purse to mask the rumbling sound. When you requested a restraining order against your brother, you started to eat unhealthy shit to cope with the stress. You processed your brother’s recent homelessness with trips to late night dollar menus. The ten pounds you recently lost, gained back in two weeks. Avoid thinking about your brother hungry and homeless. Avoid thinking how he visits your sister’s restaurant because he has nowhere else to eat. Try to avoid thinking of him. Think of you. Think about how he stalked and harassed you. Think of the names he called you. Repeat: bitch, slut, whore, and cunt, in your head. Get mad at him. Try to hate him for making you miss work. Another twenty-minutes passes, the classroom clock above Judge Eucido’s mega desk reads 9:05am.
NO WEARING SUNGLASSES, OR HATS IN THE COURTROOM. In the courthouse you cannot hide behind your black wayfarers or your Fresno State University baseball cap. Everyone anxiously waiting to be called in front of Judge Eucido is exposed and vulnerable. No eye contact is made. Silence. The shuffling of papers fills the quiet moments in between testimonies. When your brother’s behavior started to change so did his wardrobe. He swapped jeans for baggy army pants. Converse for combat boots. He’d wrap a black bandana underneath his Volcom hat and complete his entire ensemble with a clip-on tie. He’d accent this daily outfit with an aged, beat-up briefcase he purchased at a garage sale. I imagine he thought with the briefcase he was someone important or it gave people the impression he was doing something important. You feared that he would show up to court today with his hat and briefcase but to your relief he never showed. 75 75
TURN OFF ALL CELLPHONES AND ALL PAGERS. The bailiff is hypervigilant at all times. No facial expression surfaces behind his beady brown eyes. Even though signs riddle the courtroom walls with “Turn Off Cellphones” people still pull out their androids and iPhones, completely oblivious to the rules that now surround them. The bailiff jumps at the opportunity to harshly scold someone out of his arena for using their phones. When your brother was arrested the second time he called every member of your family from jail but you. But no one answered. No one wanted to pay the fifty-dollar fee the correctional facility charges to accept outside calls. No one had the extra fifty dollars to even accept the call. You recently read in a Vice article that within six months of release twenty-percent of inmates are rearrested for a new crime. After three yearssixty-eight percent, and by the end of five years, a staggering seventy-seven percent.
ABSOLUTELY NO TALKING OR COMMUNICATING TO INMATES IN CUSTODY. (THIS IS A VIOLATION OF CALIF PENAL CODE SECTION 4570). An inmate in an orange jumpsuit is sitting in the pews adjacent to the judge. A clunky silver chain bands his hands and feet together. No one in the courtroom seems to notice or care about this thirty-something man. The inmate and your brother embody the same chiseled GQ cheekbones and lean physique. Your brother started to change when your parents separated and your father attempted suicide. You wondered what that was like for a fifteen-year old boy to witness. To watch your father’s stomach purge the poison, to watch the doctors wrap bandages over faulty slits on your father’s wrists. 76 76
Approximately twenty percent of inmates housed in jails have a serious mental illness. Your mom tells you that schizophrenia runs on your father’s side of the family.
ANY VIOLATION(S) COULD RESULT IN EVICTION FROM THE COURTROOM AND/OR ARREST, AND CRIMINAL PROSECUTION. You’re sitting in the courtroom and waiting. Waiting. And more waiting. You had to miss work this morning, and you’re thinking about those missing hours on your paycheck. There’s a chance you can still work a partial day. You want to rise from the pew and scream at the almost divorced couple for taking up the majority of your morning with their dog custody battle but if you do the beady eye bailiff with a Burt Reynolds stache will arrest you. It’s now 9:45, and you’re not nervous anymore. You just want this to be over with. You’ve rehearsed in your head all morning what you are going to tell the judge. My brother’s behavior is unpredictable. I’m not sure what he is capable of anymore. His anger towards me is escalating because I refuse to give him rides and money. He does not want to help himself. Judge Eucido finally calls your name.
ONLY THE IMMEDIATE PARTIES ARE TO APPROACH WHEN THE CASE IS CALLED. You didn’t know what to wear to court this morning. You don’t own black slacks or tweed skirts, nylons or a pantsuit. So you opted for black leggings and a navy long-sleeve top with grey ankle boots. Your hair is pulled back in a loose bun, and for some reason you decided to leave your handbag at home, and sport a tote bag from this year’s AWP conference. The tote is a symbola beacon that represents your other life beyond this place, but reveals to courthouse people 77 77 that you don’t belong here. When Judge Eucido calls your name and asks you to come forward, you suddenly feel hyperconscious of the way you look. You pull down your top, trying to conceal some of your weight. All eyes are on you and your ridiculous tote that does not match your outfit. He shifts through your documents, statements, and police reports, you submitted in addition to the order. Silence on silence. Ms. Huertaz I’m granting the order for three years. Please take a seat and wait for the paperwork. You walk back to the pew in a strange stupor and wait again for your name to be called. * You don’t feel vindicated when you leave the courthouse that day. You are not greeted with cheers or hugs, or a fist pump gyrated into the air. No. There is no victory today because this is about your brother. This is about a court order that specifically states that he can no longer be a part of your life for the next three years. The restraining order represents the lengths you had to go to keep your brother at bayto keep him away from your mother’s house. This is about your brother who can’t keep a job, and steals, but never said no to picking you up drunk as fuck from the bar when you couldn’t get a cab. This is about your brother who is court mandated to stay 500ft away from you. Who for your thirty- second birthday bought you a typewriterthe only member of your family to ever encourage your writing. This is about your brother who started using drugs, and now has nowhere to live. This is about your brother who might be schizophrenic, and now, there’s nothing you can do to help him. Fresno State Non-Exclusive Distribution License (Keep for your records) (to archive your thesis/dissertation electronically via the library’s eCollections database)
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