I wasn’t at Lucia’s house for Ricardo’s joyol, so I only know what Lucia and my parents told me and what I saw with my own eyes. Ricardo left for Cancún the morning after his failed petition. I’ll never forget how he looked when he slung his backpack over his shoulder and thanked my mother for the toasted tortillas that she held out to him. He looked like he’d been in a fight, but it was just his broken heart that had burst to the surface leaving little red wounds all over his face. There were tears in both Ricardo’s and my mother’s eyes when he left. We didn’t see him for a long time after that.
My parents were also deeply disturbed by what had happened at Carmela’s house, but they were more exhausted than anything when they returned. I didn’t ask them what had happened. I just waited until after Ricardo left to go see Lucia.
Fortunately, Lucia was home alone when I arrived, sitting by the fire with her arms folded around her. She looked like a kitten who had been attacked by a wild dog and was curled up by the fire licking her wounds.
Why do our traditions hurt people so much?
She pulled a wooden block over to the fire for me. I sat down beside her. “Ricardo left for Cancún today,” I told her. “I just wanted you to know so you won’t worry about seeing him on the path or anywhere else.”
“So he left. May God forgive me for the shame I brought your brother and our families.” Lucia covered her face and started to cry. I touched her knee to let her I know that I didn’t blame her. Finally, she stopped crying and told me about the joyol.
“Everyone knows that I don’t want to marry, but they thought I’d change my mind when I saw that Ricardo wanted to be my husband. They didn’t know how strongly I feel about not marrying. My mother begged me to accept your brother, but I told her I couldn’t be a wife and a healer.
“It was so hard for her to tell your parents and Ricardo that I didn’t want to marry him. When your parents were seated in our kitchen, my mother gathered up all her courage and explained to them that she didn’t want to show them any disrespect, but that because I had a lifelong cargo, I couldn’t fulfill the duties of a wife, that it wouldn’t be fair for me to make a man suffer by marrying me.
“Your parents protested, saying that Ricardo was an unusual man who followed the madres’ instructions that men should help their wives around the house. They said that he cooked and cleaned before you were old enough to help your mother, and he made all his meals and washed his own clothes when he was working in Cancún. It would be no problem for him to do part of my work after they married. And he was ready to live with us for one year to help my mother and me. Then, after we were accustomed to being together, we would move to his land and build a house where my mother could come live with us so she wouldn’t be alone.
“I was sitting in the corner of the kitchen hearing my life plotted out for me and feeling like I was going to throw up. I was terribly afraid that my mother didn’t have the strength to keep rejecting your parents. But my mother told them two more times that she knew what a fine man her godson was, but that it wouldn’t be fair to him to have a wife like me.
“Your parents paused before they spoke again, because they knew that in joyol the parents of the girl make her seem unworthy because they don’t want to give her up. But your parents could see that my mother really meant what she said, that her words weren’t according to tradition, but about something more serious. They looked at Ricardo who was sitting with his head bowed and holding his hat between his knees. I think he was trying not to cry.
“Your parents decided to end things there, and so they accepted my mother’s words and apologized for bringing her any grief. Then they said goodbye and carried home all the corn, limes, oranges, bananas, and the case of soda that your brother had brought.
“After they were gone, I thanked God that nobody got angry with each other. I just hope that your parents won’t blame my mother and me for Ricardo’s unhappiness. I know that my mother is sad too, because she really wanted Ricardo to be her son-in-law, and I think your mother wanted me to be her daughter-in-law. Ricardo’s almost like a son to my mother. If I had agreed to marry him, my mother’s life would become much easier. She wouldn’t have to work in other people’s fields anymore. Perhaps God will punish me for being a terrible daughter.”
After I finished recalling Ricardo’s failed joyol, I picked up the blouse I was embroidering and Verónica filled a couple cups of water for us. Finally, Verónica asked me if I wanted to tell about Victorio’s joyol. She was eager to record something more that day, since the full version of Ricardo’s joyol wouldn’t go into Lucia’s story. But I told her, “No, I’m finished for now. Tomorrow I’ll tell you about my marriage and how Lucia’s life continued.”
So Verónica picked up her tape recorder and wrapped it in the tortilla cloth where she’d been storing it. Then we went to wash our clothes on the rocks behind the house.
I DECIDE TO MARRY
EARLY THE NEXT MORNING when Verónica came into the kitchen, she told me she had dreamt about Ricardo. I smiled to think that my stories had entered her dreams. “Tell me your dream, daughter,” I said. Verónica sat down and told me what happened in her dream.
“Ricardo was in Cancún working in a hotel where he met a woman like the women he told you about who don’t talk to indigenous men. He was dressed in a white uniform that sparkled next to his brown face. His cheekbones arched up like wings, and he held himself tall. He was very handsome.
“The woman picked him out among the group of other young men waiting to help people with their bags and asked him to carry her bags to her room. They talked the whole way and once they got to her room they kept talking. She didn’t want him to leave, but he did because, of course, he was working.
“Soon after, Ricardo asked the woman to marry him. She said yes, but there was a condition. If he wanted to marry her, he had to agree to live in the United States where she was from. He agreed, and they went to live in a place called Atlanta where they had a big house made of bricks, and Ricardo drove a taxi.”
It might have been nice for Ricardo if he had married a rich woman from El Norte, but as it turned out he married a girl he met in Pantelhó when he went there to sell cabbages. Soon after he returned from Cancún, Ricardo asked my parents for some of his inheritance, and on that land he planted cabbages. He had heard that there was a big demand for cabbages in Pantelhó, so he took his harvest to the market there.
But when he got off the truck with all his costales, he saw that the market was filled with vendors selling cabbages. He didn’t have any choice but to try to sell his crop, so he sat there all day in the hot sun trying to sell, but only a few people bought any of his cabbages.
Bad luck seemed to follow my brother wherever he went. But that day God must have wanted to make up for all of Ricardo’s past suffering, because the girl who would become his wife came over to where he was sitting and bought cabbages from him. After she bought two cabbages in the morning, she came back later in the day to buy two more and this time she brought him a glass of atole from her mother’s stand.
I think my brother fell in love with her because of that glass of atole. She must have looked like an angel to him, because he was hungry and thirsty and needed to save the little money he had made from selling cabbages to pay his passage back to Lokan.
It took a few months for Ricardo to make money to buy the gifts for joyol, but eventually that woman, Marcela, became my sister-in-law. Marcela’s parents were happy to have Ricardo as their son-in-law, and my parents were relieved not to have to go through another rejection.
Now my brother and his wife live on land on the other side of Lokan, just beyond the Zapatista co-op store. In many ways my sister-in-law reminds me of how Lucia might be if she were here with us now. Marcela is intelligent and knows a lot about how to use plants to cure different sicknesses. When she comes to visit, I feel as if little bit of Lucia has come with her. I always laugh a lot when Marcela is in my house, like I used to do when Luci
a visited.
I wanted to get this joyol business over so I could move on to another part of Lucia’s story. So I told Verónica to get her tape recorder, and we could talk while we were making tortillas. Even though there would be a little slapping sound in the background, she could still make out my words. Verónica grabbed her shawl and looked for her tape recorder under a pile of thread on the table.
“Why are you in such a hurry, Mother?” Verónica asked me.
“We’ve talked too much about the problems of marrying,” I replied.
“That’s fine,” she said. “But please don’t rush through your joyol. I’ve waited all this time to hear how it sounds. You told me you’d give me the words so people will know our traditions.”
“I won’t rush. But let’s get started so there’s still time before I open the store to tell you about when Lucia helped me at your brother Abolino’s birth.”
As soon as I saw the red light, I began.
Now you know there are three visits in joyol. We’ve only talked about the first visit, because Bernabe and Ricardo never got past that one. If the girl’s parents accept the gifts that the boy leaves on the first visit, then the boy and his parents, or whoever else he has asked to come and vouch for him, can return on a second visit. The families set the date for the second visit and the boy begins to gather together all the gifts he’ll bring on the second and third visits, because he can be pretty sure that the girl and her parents will accept his petition to marry her.
At that point Verónica turned off the tape recorder because Victorio had come into the kitchen. She told him what we were doing. He chuckled as he pulled a chair close to the fire and said, “Your mother’s parents really made me suffer!”
I laughed and said, “But you were so nervous, and you didn’t want to live very long with my parents!”
“The two years of bride service that your parents wanted wasn’t fair,” Victorio said.
“That’s true. But our parents finally settled on one year, and that was fair. And you know it wasn’t that bad. My parents treated you like a son, and my father was always grateful to you that you encouraged him to plant coffee.”
“Yes, it’s true,” Victorio said. “Working alongside your father in the fields was like working with my own father. He was also a good influence on me because he didn’t drink like my father. When my year was up, it was hard to leave your parents, but we had to because it’s our tradition.”
“Father, did you have a ceremony when you and my mother left her parents’ house to live in your parents’ house?” Verónica asked.
“Yes, we followed the traditions. The day that ended my service, my parents came to my in-laws’ house to ask if I could return to them. They brought one kilo of meat and a case of sodas instead of four bottles of pox, because your grandparents weren’t drinkers.
“Then my father said, ‘I came in order to talk with you because the time we agreed upon has come, the time when my son is to return to our house. This is why we came to talk with you and your wife, who is your companion, like your daughter is my son’s companion.’
“As he spoke, my father got on his knees to ask pardon of your mother’s parents because it was necessary to take their daughter from her house to another house. They drank the sodas, and then my father-in-law said, ‘Yes, that’s fine, we’ll send your son and our daughter to you.’
“Before your mother and I left with my parents, my father-in-law said to your mother, ‘Now the hour has come that you must go. But, daughter, remember that you always have your duties, your chores. Take care of your husband. Grind the corn well so that your husband doesn’t suffer from hunger. Also, obey your father-in-law and mother-in-law with all your heart. Always ask your father-in-law if he wants matz or tortillas. Only in this way will you be content when you work together in the house and in the fields. It will go well for you in your in-laws’ house, and you and your husband will become a true man and a true woman.’
“On all the major fiestas after that, your mother’s father asked my parents to drink pinole and eat bread and meat at their house. When he saw my father-in-law in the market, my father would say, ‘I invite you to my house to come eat because it’s our custom, the way the ancestors did it.’
“When they finished eating, your mother’s father would give my father a bottle of pox, because they knew he liked to drink. Your mother’s parents would drink sodas, and then my father would say, ‘Thank you for the food and pox.’ Then they would talk about how your mother was adjusting to life in my house, and her father would tell my father and mother to come talk to him if she wasn’t doing her chores or wasn’t happy for some reason.”
Verónica interrupted Victorio and asked, “Please tell me what your parents said when they came to ask Mother’s parents if you could marry their daughter. Mother doesn’t like to repeat the traditional prayers and petitions.”
Victorio shifted in his chair, leaned over the tape recorder, and said, “I’m ready, daughter. Turn the machine on so you can hear how my parents spoke.”
Verónica quickly turned on the tape recorder and Victorio began.
My father spoke first. He got on his knees in front of my in-laws and said, “It’s good that you’re here, that you let us enter your house. We come to talk with you. We come to visit with you. We have our conversation with you and with your daughter.”
“That’s fine,” my in-laws said.
“We come to visit with you and your daughter here in your house because our son, here, he fell in love with your daughter. Thanks to God and our Mother Moon, the Virgin of Guadalupe, that you have a daughter and that our son’s eyes fell on her. We don’t want there to be any lack of appreciation of your daughter or you. Let our talk be accepted. Let our children marry because it’s our tradition, it’s the way the ancestors did it.”
My mother also said similar words, and then my father said, “That’s fine, you see where we’re going to leave these things.”
We had left our gifts outside the door. “These things aren’t for you to throw away, but to use. We want you to eat all that we’ve brought.”
After your mother’s parents accepted the case of soda, bread, and corn, we set the dates for the next three visits when I would come back carrying more gifts accompanied by my parents and my godparents.
I had to find the money to buy the gifts for all the visits, especially the last one, which is what mestizos call the wedding. I went to work for a few months cutting sugar on a plantation, and I borrowed a little money from my godfather. It took me a long time to pay him back because for the first year of marriage, I was only working for my father-in-law and not making any money.
On the last visit, my petitioners helped me carry three half-bushels of corn, a half-bushel of beans, a load of pitch pine, ten kilos of meat, bread, sugar, pineapples, limes, oranges, and three cases of sodas. We had to make a couple trips to bring all the gifts.
My mother also had to make pinole to drink with the bread. Before we ate, the elders gave your mother and me instructions about how to be a good wife and a good husband. Your mother’s father read a part of the Bible, from Ephesians 5. The Bible is inside my bag. It won’t take long to find the part. I’ve got it marked. Here it is:
“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church—for we are members of his body. For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”
When Victorio finished reading, he leaned back and stretched his arms over his head. He hadn’t had any breakfast yet, so he went to find som
e masa and mixed his own matz. I put a plate of beans and a stack of tortilla on a little stool in front of him. It was silent in the kitchen while Victorio ate and Verónica toasted tortillas in the coals. I picked up my loom from the floor and put it around my waist. As I wove, I wondered what my daughter was thinking about everything she had just heard.
MY SONS ARE BORN
“IT WASN’T LONG before I realized I was pregnant. I was nineteen when I had your brother, Abolino.”
Verónica had just asked me how I felt being a wife and living with Victorio. We were talking in our store, between customers. We had to take advantage of any opportunity to talk, because we could see that this experiment was going to take a lot longer than we had thought. Telling Our Stories expected Verónica to collect more than one woman’s story!
“At first it was hard to be married,” I told Verónica. “Your father and I slept in separate beds on opposite sides of the room for ten days. After that we slept together in the same bed with just a curtain between us and my parents and my little sister.”
I quickly changed the subject to how happy my sister was when Victorio moved in. He joked with her and helped her behave better, which the rest of the family could never do. He also helped her with her homework at night. Even though he hadn’t finished primary school, Victorio had learned how to speak and write Spanish well, better than me. My parents were impressed when they heard him reading from my sister’s school books.
“What did Lucia say when she found out you were pregnant the first time?” Verónica asked.
“I didn’t tell her right away. You know we don’t tell many people when we are pregnant,” I replied.
“But she was your best friend! Didn’t you want her to know?”
“I wanted her to know. Yes, I wanted her to know. But we didn’t see each other often after your father came to live with us. Things changed for us after I married. I have to tell you about that time, but first let me drink something. I’m so thirsty.”
When a Woman Rises Page 11