Burro Genius

by Victor Villaseñor

  Hans and Helen Huelster laughed. They were my little sister Linda’s godparents and they lived out at Bonsall where they had a huge chicken ranch, and they’d come into town to see us.

  “Excuse me,” said my mother to Hans and Helen, “I’ll be right back.” And she got up and took my hand and walked me down the long dark hallway of our old ranch house to my bedroom. Ever since my brother Joseph wasn’t feeling well, I’d been sleeping alone in a room in the back. None of us were allowed to disturb our brother Joseph, who needed all the rest he could get.

  But when my mother and I went into my bedroom, the huge lizard was gone. He wasn’t outside of my window anymore. Now all I could see outside of my window was the storm and lightning and the hanging branches of our old huge, persimmon tree that was dancing in the wind to beat hell.

  “But he was right there, mama! I swear it! Right there, in front of those branches!”

  “It was just your imagination, mijito,” said my mother.

  “No, mama!” I yelled. “I really, really saw him! And he was huge, and he opened his mouth so big that I thought he was going to come in and eat me and the whole house!”

  “Get under the covers, mijito,” she said, “and I’ll sing you to sleep.”

  Hearing my mother say this, I instantly felt all better and quickly got under my covers. Mi mama began to sing to me “Coo-coo-roocoo-cooo,” as she gently soothed my forehead and tummy. Everything began to feel warm and good and safe and wonderful. Soon I must’ve fallen asleep, because no sooner had my mother left, and here was that huge monster at my window once again!

  But this time he was a frog. A great big, huge frog! And when he opened his mouth, croaking real loud, his long tongue came out, throwing up dead snails and burnt lizards all over me on my bed.

  I SCREAMED, leaped out of my bed, and went racing out of my room, down the hallway, and to the dining room table where my parents were now having after-dinner drinks and coffee with Hans and Helen Huelster.

  “MAMA!” I screamed. “HE’S A FROG NOW! And he threw up dead snails and lizards all over me!”

  My mother glanced at Hans and Helen. She looked kind of embarrassed. “Mijito,” she said, “there are no giant frogs or lizards. It’s all just your imagination.”

  “No, Lupe,” said my father, “the boy is right. I’ve seen these monster frogs and lizards, too. Even ants once, as big as trucks. Come here, mijito,” he said. “Tell me,” he added, holding me at arm’s length by my shoulders as he looked into my eyes, “man-to-man, what terrible thing did you do to some snails and frogs today?”

  I almost shit in my pajama bottoms. How did my dad know this? And if he did, did he really expect me to tell him in front of everyone what it was that Gus and I had done. We’d been awful! And that poor lizard, I could still see his mouth wide open as he screamed for help.

  “Come on, mijito, I’ve told you a thousand times, that to the cop or priest we might need to lie, but to ourselves or la familia, we never lie. What did you do? Did the snails come out by the hundreds this afternoon in the rain and you went around killing them?”

  I had to hold myself with both hands between the legs real tight so I wouldn’t pee. My God, how did my dad know this? “Yes, papa,” I finally said. “We…we did.”

  Hans laughed, saying, “Good riddance! Damn snails! They get into everything! But on our place the chickens clean them out!”

  “And that’s the way it should be, Hans,” said my father to the big German. “Nothing wasted. Just a normal part of life. Chickens eating snails, but here…we have a whole different situation. These boys were killing just for fun.”

  Hans laughed. I could see that he was feeling nervous. “Sal, he’s just a boy,” said Hans, “and boys will be boys, you know that.”

  “No, Hans, boys do not have to just be boys. That’s why my mother raised me up like a woman for the first seven years of my life, so that I, a male, would then have respect for all life just like women, who know that all life is sacred. Tell me, mijito,” said my father, turning back to me, “and the frog? What did you boys do to a frog?”

  “Nothing to a frog, papa,” I said, beginning to cry. “It was a lizard that we caught and we…we burnt him.”

  “Alive?” asked my dad.

  “Yes,” I had to say.

  My father nodded, and then nodded again. And when he reached out for me, I ducked, thinking that he was going to hit me. But he didn’t. Instead, he took me into his arms, and held me close. I could feel his whole chest expand and contract against me as he breathed.

  “Well then, you got good reason to be seeing all these monster lizards and frogs and snails, don’t you?” he said. I nodded. “So now you got to go to your room, mijito, and kneel down and pray and ask Papito Dios to forgive you. Because, remember, as I’ve taught you and your brother here on the ranch, we never take any life without showing respect. And above all else, we never torture or have fun in the act of killing. Got it? We know what we do, and we do it quick and gently and always for a good reason. To kill even a snail, just for fun, is not being respectful of—”

  “Of God, Who is in all things,” I said as I’d been told all of my life for as long as I could remember.

  “Exactly,” said my father. “So now go and pray and ask Papito to forgive you for having offended Him.”

  I nodded and I glanced around. Everyone was looking at me. “But I’m scared,” I said. “Will you go with me to pray, papa?”

  “No, this you must do alone, mijito,” he said.

  “But he says that he’s scared,” said my mother. “And he’s just a little boy, Salvador.”

  “How old are you?” asked my dad.

  “Eight,” I said.

  “You see, Lupe, he’s not a little boy. He’s eight years old. One year past being seven years old, and at eight is when we stop raising a boy as a girl and we step him through that needle’s eye…into manhood. He was big enough to kill and torture without mercy, Lupe, and so now he needs to earn his tanates, because tanates, without respect, are very, very dangerous.

  “And also, you tell me, Lupe, what’s wrong with him being scared? Eh, the deer lives her whole life in fear of the lion, but still she has her babies and a good life. Fear is good, Lupe. It helped you and me be strong in the Revolution, and now in peacetime, fear is the only thing that helps keep us, people, honest, especially men. Now, go on alone, mijito, and you ask Papito Dios to help you make peace with these monster snails and frogs. Then they’ll leave you alone.”

  Still, I didn’t want to go alone. No, I wanted to leap into my mother’s arms and have her hold me forever and ever. But I could also see that my dad was right, and I needed to walk down that long, dark hallway to my room by myself. I hugged and kissed my father that night as I’d never hugged and kissed him before, then I hugged my mother real tight, kissing her, too. Then I said, “Gute nacht,” in German to Hans and Helen, hugged them also. Then I turned and started down the long hallway, feeling more scared that I’d ever felt in all my life.

  But I could really see that what my father had said to me made a whole lot of sense, and in doing this alone, by myself, I was on my way to becoming un hombre a las todas, a man for all seasons, which meant, literally—as my dad had explained to my brother and me many times—a man whose balls had dropped so he could then reproduce in any kind of weather, hot or cold, all year long. Because males, whose balls hadn’t dropped, could then only reproduce during a few days in the spring of each year. And fear was the main reason why most men’s balls remained hidden up in their body.

  I could now see very clearly that Ramón, even though he’d just been a little kid, had already been un hombre de las todas with dropped balls in kindergarten. And my father, he’d been forced to become this type of man at ten years old in the Mexican Revolution. Suddenly, I realized that Jesus Christ must’ve really had big dropped balls or He would’ve screamed out in fear when they’d drove those nails into Him. Yeah, sure, this made sense. He would’
ve never been able to say, “Forgive them for they do not know what they do,” if He hadn’t had dropped tanates, and big ones, too.

  Thinking this, I felt a whole lot better as I walked down the long, dark hallway. Then I heard the floorboards of our old house screeching beside me as I went barefoot down the long hallway. I smiled. Jesus was here with me. I could feel Him. I wasn’t walking alone.

  Getting to my room, I immediately saw that there was no huge lizard or frog at my window. So I went inside, leaving the door open, and knelt down before my bed and I began to pray…as I’d never prayed before in all my life.

  “Dear Papito Dios,” I said, “please, I ask You with all my heart and soul to forgive me for having killed all those snails and that one lizard. I’ll never do it again. I swear, so please, please, please, forgive me. In fact, tomorrow, if it rains, I’ll pick up snails all afternoon on Stewart Street and help them get across the road so that the cars don’t run over them. Please, dear Lord God, I just didn’t know what I was doing.”

  After saying this, that I “just didn’t know what I was doing,” a bad feeling raced up and down my spine. Then this meant that I was exactly like one of those guys who’d drove the nails into Jesus’ hands.

  I started crying. “PLEASE, LORD GOD!” I yelled. “FORGIVE ME! FORGIVE GUS and ME! Because I now see that both of us really didn’t know what we were doing, or we would’ve never, never done it! Please forgive us! And I’ll tell Gus, too! No more stomping snails with our cowboy boots, EVER!”

  It was at this moment, as I said all this, that I heard a huge croak and I turned and saw that huge frog outside of my window again. But this time he wasn’t scary anymore. No, now his eyes were smiling and he looked so kind.

  “I forgive you,” said the frog.

  “You forgive me?” I said. “But I was talking to God.”

  “Yes, I know,” said Frog.

  At that very instant, I finally understood everything that mi mamagrande had been telling me ever since I was little and we’d lived in the barrio de Carlos Malo, meaning Carlsbad, and she’d taken me hand in hand all through her Garden. Because I could now see so clearly that this Frog was the Animal Spirit that had been given to me at birth.

  And the Animal Spirit that was assigned to a person when they came into this world was, indeed, the Window through which they could see God. And those Snails that Gus and I had killed were God, too. This, my Animal Spirit, Frog, was now telling me.

  All of Life was Holy, Holy, HOLY, and SACRED! This was why my brother Joseph had explained to me that our mamagrande, Doña Margarita, had never allowed him and my sister Tencha to “damn” anything. To “bless” ourselves and everything was the only way to live, I now saw this so “blessed” clearly!

  “Goodnight, Frog,” I said.

  “Goodnight, my Child,” said Frog.

  That night in my dreams, I had wonderful travels. I drew a Star in my sleep, colored it in, then jumped in the Star and I was off to Heaven! I’d prayed, found my Animal Spirit, and so I was able to sleep beautifully all night long up in Papito Dios’ Holy Arms.

  In the morning, I awoke feeling wonderful, meaning full-of-wonder. I was eight years old, one year past seven, and I’d done as my father had told me to do. I’d gone down that long, dark hallway alone, shitting in my pants with fear. But then I’d felt Jesus at my side and I’d prayed, asking for forgiveness, and I’d passed through the needle’s eye into manhood.

  CHAPTER ten

  Our huge house was DONE! FINISHED! COMPLETED! And this afternoon mi papa and I were way out by the front gates of our rancho grande. He was letting me drive our big new tractor while he hooked up the chain to a tree stump that we’d dynamited so we could drag the stump away. Boy-oh-boy, I now knew what I wanted to be when I grew up! I wanted to be a tractor-driving, dynamite-setting cowboy, then I could just about outdo even Superman!

  “Put it in reverse!” yelled my dad. “And come back real slow! That’s it! Real slow! I don’t want you running my ass over!”

  I did what he said real carefully, because I’d seen one of our workmen go to the hospital last week with a crushed leg, because our main tractor driver hadn’t been paying close attention.

  We were dragging stumps out of the way and getting the front grounds of our ranch ready for our big housewarming celebration. It was almost sundown when a man drove up in a beautiful, long baby-blue convertible. He wore a white panama hat and looked like he’d just stepped out of a magazine, he was so clean. Even his shoes were spotless. He didn’t have cow shit anywhere on him, and it wasn’t even Sunday.

  “Excuse me,” he said, getting out of his car and walking up to my father and me, who were covered with dirt and mud and probably some cow manure, too. “But isn’t this the place where they’re going to have a big celebration this weekend?”

  “Y que cabrones!?!” said my dad, wrapping the chain around the next stump that we needed to move. We were now working next to the little three-bedroom guesthouse that my parents had built near the front gates of our rancho grande so that we could stop people from coming all the way down our long driveway to our main house. My dad and I had been working outside for hours. My mother and brother and two sisters had gone down to San Diego to check on the last of our furniture that was being shipped in from Europe.

  “Do you speak English?” asked the man. He had on a short-sleeve shirt with colorful birds and flowers on it, and cream-white slacks and those damn—I mean, blessed—clean two-tone shoes.

  “English?” said my dad. “Yeah, sometimes! But then, some other times, no damn way!”

  “Oh, I see,” said the man, looking confused. “Well, I was wondering if this was where the mansion was built, but this house,” he added, referring to the guesthouse, “doesn’t look that big.”

  “Hell, no, this is the guesthouse!” shouted my father, having wrapped and hooked the chain and signaled for me to now put it in low gear and go forward. “The castle IS THAT WAY, past all those eucalyptus and orchards!”

  “A castle? Really?”

  “Twenty or thirty rooms, and each room big enough to hold a horse and buggy.”

  “Yes. I’d heard that, too,” said the man with a big smile. “Do you work for him?” yelled the man, wanting to be heard above the roar of the tractor as I now went forward.

  “WHO?”

  “THE OWNER! I hear that he’s NOT from THESE PARTS!”

  “HELL, NO!” yelled my father. “He’s from Europe, I hear. And Mexico, too! He has castles, I hear, ALL OVER THE WORLD!”

  “Really?”

  “Well, I don’t know,” said my dad, signaling for me to cut the motor. I guessed that I’d pulled the stump far enough out of the way. “I never seen them, but that’s what I’ve heard!”

  “Then you do work for him?”

  “Yeah, my son and me, but we’ve only seen him just a few times. You see, he comes, you know, at night, then he’s gone. But we got to keep everything ready for him day or night, in case he and his wife show up.”

  “I hear tell that his wife is beautiful!” said the man.

  Hearing this, my dad turned and looked at the man, sizing him up. Myself, I could hardly keep from laughing. My dad turned and gave me a hard look. I stopped my smiles. “Get this damn tractor to the barn!” he barked at me. “That’s it for the day!”

  “Look, I’m sorry I’m disturbing you,” said the man. “I don’t want to get you and your son fired,” he added.

  “You won’t,” said my dad. “The owner, he’s not here right now. Come on, I’ll show you the place. And yes, I saw his wife once. Not from real close, but what I saw, I’d say that yeah, she’s more beaut-eee-full than any movie star you’ll ever see!” said my dad with pride.

  “Really?” said the man.

  “Yes. Now, come on, you give me a ride in your car, and my son will take the tractor in for the day.”

  “You trust a boy with that huge tractor?”

  “Hell, I trust that boy with my life!”
yelled my father. “He can out-ride, out-think most grown men! And next year, he’ll have his own gun, so that no son-of-a-bitch man can walk on his shadow without permission!”

  “A gun? But he’s a child!”

  “It’s never too early for a boy or girl to learn about the ins and outs and responsibilities of life!”

  “But with a gun?”

  “Shit, yes, with a gun?” said dad, opening the passenger door to his car.

  Suddenly, I could see that the man wasn’t too worried about guns anymore. Now he was all upset about my father getting into his nice clean convertible. My dad saw it, too, but he just winked at me and got in the man’s car, then dusted all the dirt off himself. The man almost shit a brick. I had to work hard not to laugh.

  “Straight ahead, friend,” said my dad, acting like he hadn’t noticed the man’s reaction.

  “Ford. John Ford,” said the man.

  “Juan. Juan Puro Pedo,” said my dad, taking the man’s clean hand in his dirty hand.

  They drove through our big white stucco gates, passed the Spanish-style guesthouse, and down the long line of towering eucalyptus trees, and passed the orchards of avocados, lemons, and oranges. I put the tractor in third so I could go a little bit faster, and followed them down the long driveway, then took the right fork up towards the tractor barn and horse corrals. They took the left fork and drove up the newly blacktopped driveway to our new two-story home.

  For over a month, we’d been planning this great big housewarming celebration. We’d fattened a steer, two goats, three pigs, and there were a dozen women working on homemade tortillas, enchiladas, frijoles, arroz, salsa, potato salad, corn on the cob, string beans, and fresh apple cobbler a la capirotada, with fresh honey. All of Carlsbad and Oceanside were invited. The celebration was to last three days. Mariachis were being brought in from San Diego and Tijuana. Tequila, beer, and wine were going to be served by the barrel. More than five hundred people were expected. Cars and trucks and horse-drawn buggies were going to be parked in the orchards.