Category: Neto, his family and friends

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A Birthday in La Hacienda

The year was 2009.  I asked Neto how he would like to spend his birthday.

“I’d like to go to Hacienda del Tamarindo, and see Tio Gero and Tia Valvina. I would like to be there for my birthday and the Virgin’s novena.”

I had never been to Hacienda del Tamarindo, the small town near Rosario where Neto’s mother grew up. Neto’s great-grandfather was one of three men who founded the town in the early 1900’s. The family home, where Gero and Valvina raised thirteen children, is on the main street, directly across from the Catholic church. 

“Do we need to call and let them know we are coming?” I asked.

“Oh, no. Everyone is welcome. It’s the beginning of December. People will be coming from all over.”

“Where will we stay?”

“Tia will want us to stay with her in their big house.”

Neto was right. It was mid-afternoon when we walked in the front door and the living room was full of people. Most of Gero and Valvina’s children moved to the United States, but still came back every year for Christmas. Those who weren’t already there, were on their way. 

Valvina was in the kitchen, preparing food. Fruit and sweetbread was spread out on the big table, alongside pitchers of lemonade and jamaica. A grill was set up outside, coals already burning, for carne asada later in the day.

Uncle Gero met us at the door. A tall, distinguished man in his mid-90’s, he was almost totally blind as a result of diabetes. Neto introduced me to his uncle, and Gero’s charm came out in full Rodriguez style. He took my hand and led me around the living room, introducing me to everyone seated there. He insisted that I sit next to him and never let go of my hand.

Aunt Valvina, was equally charming. She hugged us both. Neto waited outside while she showed me around her home. I saw the laundry room in the back courtyard and her sewing room, where she sews linens for all the bedrooms and curtains for the windows.

Valvina proudly showed me the “barracho room,” a large dormitory on one side the patio, where the men sleep who are too drunk to come in the house. It was obvious the house had been enlarged many times to accommodate her big family. It was an old home with modern appliances, but no hot water.

Valvina called her neighbors to announce, “Neto is here with his friend, Lynda. Come for dinner.”

Soon the courtyard and the back patio were filled with people, most of whom looked like Neto with their thick black hair, flashing brown eyes and quick smiles

I was happy that Neto wanted to come to La Hacienda, but I noticed he didn’t mention his birthday. He told everyone he’d come for the Virgin’s novena. Only after most people had gone home after dinner, when he and I were left sitting around the table with Gero and Valvina, did he open up.

“There’s another reason I wanted to be here today,” he said shyly. “It’s my cumpleaños.”

Oh, my! Uncle Gero and Aunt Valvina both jumped up at once. Gero reached Neto first, and shook his hand. Valvina grabbed him and squeezed him tight. “Feliz Cumpleaños, Mijo.” They had tears in their eyes. So did I.

The next day, before sunrise, church bells rang. Portable cannons boomed in the streets. 

“What is that?” I wanted to know.

“It’s the beginning the novena.”

People came out of every home for a procession that happens every day for nine days leading up to the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Men in identical white cowboy hats joined the ceremony. Some came walking, some on horseback. 

A few men went inside the church to bring the statue of Mary outside and lift it onto the back of a truck. The procession began its slow walk through town. First the truck with the statue and then the parish priest. And then the townspeople, repeating the rosary together as they walked along the cobblestone streets, some carrying flashlights and some with candles to light their way. 

I stayed inside. It was still dark and cold outside. It didn’t feel right for me to join the procession. The prayers were in Spanish. It was a private moment for Neto, his family, his neighbors and his friends.

When Neto returned, he showed me how to take a shower, by rinsing myself with cold water from a bucket in the bathroom. It was so cold it took my breath away. I dressed quickly and joined Neto and his family in the kitchen for breakfast. 

That afternoon, when it was time to leave, Neto’s cousins came to say goodbye.

“We really like Lynda. How can we get you to bring her back again?”

“It would help if you had some hot water,” he answered.

They all laughed the same hearty Rodriguez laugh.

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Los Tres Amigos

It was the rainy season and the roof was leaking. Water poured into the bedrooms.

“When can we fix these leaks?” I asked, as we emptied buckets of water into the courtyard.

“When the rainy season is over,” Neto insisted.

“When will that be?’

“October 15th.” 

I’d never experienced rain like this before. Certainly not in Colorado. From June until October, rain flooded the streets. Palm trees bent in the wind until they were nearly horizontal. Dogs and cats hid under abandoned cars. The humidity was stifling. 

October 15th, Neto showed up with heavy-duty metal spatulas to scrape decades of tar and styrofoam off the roof. Publio and Pepé, his best friends, were with him. They assembled a scaffold and built a makeshift ladder from 2×4’s

Laborers in Mexico earn very little money. A skilled tile-layer or carpenter earns 200 pesos for a ten hour day. When I first moved to Mexico, that amounted to $20/day (U.S.). Now, under the current exchange rate, that amounts to $10/day. It is a shockingly stingy amount of money. Food costs roughly the same in Mexico and the U.S.. Clothing actually costs more. Housing is the only commodity that costs less.    

I rewarded my workers by providing lunch for them every day. As a special treat for showing up on Mondays, I ordered tortas from Tortas Kuwait, the sandwich shop down the street. The rest of the week I cooked. I bought a Mexican cookbook and worked my way through the pages: Tortilla soup, flautas, tacos, quesadillas, rice and beans, macaroni and cheese with marlin, whatever sounded good as I flipped through the pages. The only worker who was fussy was Christina. She told me during the first week that people in Mazatlan never eat black beans. “That’s for the poor people from the South.”

The roof project took more than three weeks.

Day 1. No rain. Neto set up the ladder. It consisted of a scaffold with a long board attached diagonally to one side. Small sections of 2×4’s  were hammered onto the board, to create footholds up the slope. Neto, Publio, and Pepé ran up the ladder and started working at 9:00. By 10:00 the sun was beating down on them and sweat was pouring off their faces. They drank gallons of water and kept working.

Day 2. Still no rain. Neto hauled a big bucket of sand up the ladder, along with a beach umbrella that looked like a giant watermelon. He plopped the umbrella in the bucket of sand and now they had shade. 

Day 3. Still no rain. I was beginning to believe the rainy season was over. Neto asked if he could borrow my boom box to take to the roof, along with the watermelon umbrella and the bucket of sand. Now the guys had shade and music. They sang and laughed as they continued to scrape layers of mold and crud from the old roof. 

Day 4. Neto brought a new worker, a young guy from Vera Cruz, to help load the old, stinky roof into buckets to take to the dump. Everyone called him “Vera Cruz.” I never knew his real name. Halfway through the morning, Vera Cruz fell off the ladder and needed to be rushed to the local Red Cross. He fell on his skinny hip and was hurt badly when he bounced hard on the cement. By afternoon, Vera Cruz was back on the job.

“How can he keep working? Isn’t he in a lot of pain?” I asked Neto.

“The doctor gave him a shot of Ibuprofen in his hip. He’s feeling better now. He wants to keep working.”

And that’s the way it went for the next three weeks. After the roof was scraped clean, the men laid a fresh coat of cement before spreading buckets of waterproofing across the roof. 

My house would never have been ready for guests without Los Tres Amigos. They arrived every day with a smile. They tried to understand my English and struggled to teach me Spanish. They thanked me every day for allowing them to work and for giving them lunch. They became my good friends, as well as Neto’s.

Publio is still one of Neto’s best friends. His family became my family, too. Sadly, Pepe died two years ago, from complications of a motorcycle accident and horrible medical care. Seeing Publio again last winter was a joy. But I will always have a hole in my heart, where Pepé used to live.

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Publio Donates Blood

It’s been a quiet week in Mazatlán. So while we wait for the next holiday which is, predictably, right around the corner, I’m going to tell you a story about one of Ernesto’s friends

Publio is Neto’s friend and his best surfing buddy. Fifteen years younger than Neto, Publio is from a very musical family and plays a variety of instruments. He is currently a drummer in a band with his older brother, a flute player, when he isn’t at his job delivering furniture.

Publio’s mother, a hard-working woman from Mexico, recently retired as a gardener at the Holiday Inn. His father, from Ecuador, used to work for Cirque de Soleil in Las Vegas. He was the strong man at the bottom of  the human pyramid until he fell and broke his back, never able to work again.

Publio grew up in Mazatlán and did well in school. Due to generous support from his father, he graduated from high school and followed his brother to Mexico City to attend the university. Publio and Neto returned to Mazatlán about the same year. Neto was evicted from the U.S. by a Tucson judge who believed it was time for Neto to go back to surfing. Publio dropped out of college, left Mexico City to join a Reggae band, and eventually found his way back in Mazatlán. They met one day at the corner grocery store. Neto loved the music of Bob Marley and was fascinated by this young guy from the neighborhood with long deadlocks, a quick smile and a quiet voice.

Publio’s mother never forgave Neto for encouraging Publio’s interest in surfing and, in her mind, leading him astray. Alicia wouldn’t allow Neto into her house, so Publio spent a lot of time at our place. He was Neto’s right-hand man whenever a job needed a right-hand man. Lots of time he stayed for lunch. I’ve always liked Publio. He’s a quiet, gentle giant ~ a nice contrast to Neto’s sometimes exhausting exuberance and impulsivity. 

One day Publio came to our house to let us know that he needed to donate blood for his diabetic uncle, a local Mariachi musician. Why a seemingly healthy man with diabetes needed fresh blood was one of a long list of Mexican customs I never understood and learned not to question. Before he could donate blood, however, Publio had to have his blood tested to make sure it was “strong enough.” At the time, Publio was only thirty years old, practically a virgin, and one of the strongest men in Mexico. His blood, however, was found to be too weak to donate.

Not to be deterred, Publio drank a concoction that the blood center mixed up. Since Neto was with him and thought that maybe his blood needed a pick-me-up, he asked if he could have one, too. It took them about thirty minutes to swallow their highballs of celery, garlic, tomatoes, vinegar, olive oil and liver powder. Publio gagged every time he took another sip. Neto just asked for a little Tabasco to make it taste better.

The next day Publio donated blood but then felt too shaky to come to work. Neto felt fine but he didn’t come to work either, out of sympathy for his friend who didn’t feel well.

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Honoring Jesús Flores García

Today’s Día de Muertos essay is written by Ernesto.

We don’t put up Dia de Los Muertos altars in my house. If we did, my father’s altar would include a couple bottles of Pacifico, a pack of filtered cigarettes, a plate of boiled shrimp, a rosary and a picture of Our Lady of Guadalupe.

Every morning my father knelt before La Virgin to say a prayer before going to his job as a blacksmith in downtown Mazatlán. When his day was finished, he sang his way up the street holding his friend, the tequila bottle, in his hand. He walked through the door and knelt again before the Virgin’s picture to say graciás for bringing him home.

My dear, kind, generous, honorable father died of a sudden heart attack in 1993. I was lost for a long time after he died. Papí was my protector. My guardian angel. He held me up and never let me down. I’m glad he didn’t see how much trouble I got into after he died but I know he would be proud of the man I am now. My father was my North Star, guiding my way with his constant good humor and basic decency. When I look to the heavens, he is still there telling me, “Ernesto, you are a good boy. Make sure that everyone knows that about you.”

Who is your North Star?