THE MUSINGS OF THE WHITE STORK

by Michael G. McLaughlin

 

 

Let me say to the reader, this happened many years ago in Mexico and the sweet memory of youth is always gentle on the truth. So please forgive me if my story meanders into wistful prose.

The best way to start my story about Mexico is: Once upon a time…. My father worked for Union Pacific Railroad in Sacramento, California and every year for three summers, Mr. Gomez came up from Mexico. They were both engineers and worked on a joint construction project.

When I was 12, my parents thought it was a great idea that I spend two weeks in Guadalajara with the Gomez family. I was excited, yet a little nervous traveling to a foreign land so far from home. I had never been out of California and Mexico was as mysterious to me as Constantinople.

On the drive to the airport my mother tried to instill the fear of God in me. I was to say, please and thank you and eat everything put before me. However, I was not to eat…I can still hear my mother’s words… “Like a horde of Huns.” Finally she said if I acted up…this was her most dire consequence… I would be left in Mexico to die in the desert, kidnapped by banditos or forced to become a priest.

At the airport, with a small suitcase in hand, dressed in a white shirt and small black bowtie, my first communion bowtie, I was lead onto the airplane by a stewardess with pastel blue gloves. I had on a small tag pinned to my shirt with my name and destination.

When I arrived in Guadalajara I was met by the Gomez family and whisked away in their station wagon. Mrs. Gomez, in all due respect to Mexican women, was short, round and brown. She spoke English with an accent so bizarre to my ears that I understood one word in seven. On the drive to their house she and Mr. Gomez informed me that the Mexican people had deep respect for the Irish people. At first, I didn’t know who they were talking about, I was American. They talked about brave Irish soldiers and how they died for Mexico. In great detail they told how the Irish soldiers were captured by the American troops and forced to watch the battle with nooses around their necks. Then after the American forces defeat the Mexican army, the Irish soldiers were hanged. On that point, Mrs. Gomez stuck her tongue out the side of her mouth and scrunched her face up imitating a person being hanged. She said all the Mexican people considered the Irish to be brave. I had never been called brave in my life. Plus, I really didn’t think being hanged was that brave nor did they seem to realize that all the hanging and killing were done by Americans.

The Gomez family had two children. Their son Paco was ten and, like his mother, a small ball of Mexican fire. Felize, their daughter, was 14 and almost as tall as I was. She had long black hair, chocolate skin, wore pink lipstick and very large, hoop earrings, the kind that Mexican girls to this day still wear. She called her brother “pip squeak” and he called her “the Mayan Princess.” Mr. Gomez informed me on the drive in from the airport the children could only speak English. They were out of school and he said the kids needed the practice. Then Mr. Gomez announced there was going to be a fiesta in my honor the next day and all the children from the neighborhood would be there.

The first thing I remember about the Gomez house was there were no carpets. In the center of the house was a small garden with a water fountain and purple and pink bougainvilleas hung from the trees. I had never seen such an exotic house.

At the fiesta, Paco acted as interrupter and the tall white kid from the Estados Unidos was asked a lot of questions. The kids seemed most amazed that we owned a television set. My first real taste of Mexico was when I popped a hot pepper in my mouth. My eyes bugged out and I frantically grabbed a glass of water. All the kids laughed and Mister Gomez waved his finger and said the water would be of no use. He offered me a tortilla to take the fire away. A piñata was hung and I was blind folded and laughed at for my failure to hit the piñata with a baseball bat. When time came to dance, Felize played her records. Most of Felize’s girlfriends took turns dancing with me all the time holding their mouths laughing. The other girls just stared at me. Paco said the girls called me “la ciguena blanca”---the white stork.

The next day was Sunday and I was disheartened to learn we were going to church. For some reason, I thought I would not have to go to church in Mexico. When I showed up wearing only casual clothes and the rest of the Gomez family was dressed up, I dashed back upstairs and put on my white shirt and little black bowtie. I do remember that Mrs. Gomez and Felize got into an argument about what Felize was wearing. She had on a scarf with a print of a hula dancer and Mrs. Gomez said the scarf was not appropriate for church. Finally after heavy stares and dagger looks, between mother and daughter, Felize changed her scarf. After church, Mr. Gomez announced we were driving to Lake Chapala for the day. Along with half a dozen other kids we piled into his station wagon and drove to Lake Chapala. When we got there, Paco and I swam in Lake Chapala. Then we all went to a restaurant and the action really started. Friends of Mr. Gomez arrived with more kids and the fiesta at the restaurant was indeed a horde of Huns. I mean, every person there started shouting, eating, laughing and singing. A band of Mariachis came over to the large table and it was the wildest, nosiest thing I had ever seen or heard. Some of the Mariachis wore gigantic sombreros and had big mustaches and looked like they fought with Poncho Villa. Felize again huddled with her girlfriends and stared at the gringo boy, the girls whispered into each other’s ears. As the fiesta swirled around I didn’t understand one word but the energy and happiness overwhelmed me. How could these people have so much fun?

When we got back into the car I was bursting with excitement and wanted to talk about what went on, but Paco put his finger to his lips. I didn’t know what was going on until I noticed Mr. and Mrs. Gomez sitting rigidly in the front seat of the car. They did not say one word on the drive home. When we got to the house, Paco took me by the hand and we rushed up the stairs to his room. He gave me a book to read and he began studying. Again I didn’t know what to make of it until I heard the loud arguing downstairs between Mr. and Mrs. Gomez. When I asked Paco why they were arguing, he didn’t know. I could hear Mrs. Gomez’s voice was muffled and Paco said she was in the kitchen while his father stood outside the kitchen door. When I asked why didn’t his father go in the kitchen, Paco told me the kitchen was the woman’s domain and no Mexican man, no matter how brave or drunk would ever, he blessed himself and kissed his thumb, argue with his wife in her kitchen. Things that made you bleed were everywhere. He went on to explain that when a Mexican man argues with his wife, God was on the side of the man. But, even if God is on the Mexican man’s side, it was only a fair fight with his Mexican wife. Then I heard foot steps and Mr. Gomez burst into the room looking for any excuse to be angry. I kept my head down in the book and Mister Gomez calmed down. Paco said his father could not say anything if we were studying. Felize next door did not fair as well. Like her mother, she was not about to quietly study and in her room and they went at it for some time. By the time we went to bed that night all the family seemed happy again.

The day before I was to leave, Paco said his parents had to drive him to school for matriculation. I didn’t know what the word meant and thought he was sick. His sister Felize was there to answer the door and if I wanted anything to ask her. After they left I sat in their library and looked at picture books. A short while later Felize wandered in and asked if I wanted to come to her room to talk. I followed her upstairs. Felize’s room was not too different from my sister’s room. She had pictures of Elvis on her walls, stuffed animals and lacy things all around. Next to her bed was a small record player that played 45s. She told me that I was the first boy ever to be in her room. When I asked hadn’t her brother ever been in her room, she waved her hand and then she made a cutting gesture across her throat. We talked some more, then she asked me if I cared to dance. I immediately thought she wanted to see the white stork one more time so she could laugh with her girlfriends later. A record plopped down and we danced fast to a Bobby Darin song. Then another record dropped and it was a slow, Mexican song. She asked if I knew how to slow dance. It just so happened that my parents in their infinite wisdom had made me take ballroom dancing lessons. So I took her hand, put her arm on my shoulder, my arm around her waist, maintained a fist distance between our bodies and did the two step forward, two step to the left, two step backwards. Suddenly, Felize stopped and said “No,” that was not how they danced in Mexico. “Like this.” She said, and put her body next to mine and her hand on the back of my neck. She said that in Mexico men and women danced with the emotion of the song. One had to feel the music. In the room the sultry music played and I was 12 year old boy that had never kissed a girl. As we danced she put her warm cheek next to mine and pressed her body against me. She slowly rubbed the back of my neck up and I knew if her parents came home and found us, I would have to marry her. Felize stopped dancing and looked up. Our faces were inches apart and I looked down at her red full lips and into those big brown eyes. She said, “Michael, your heart is beating very fast.” Then I said something that belied my young age. Maybe it was a line from a movie. I said to her, “Felize, you are a very beautiful girl. You will break many hearts with your seductive charms. I do not want my heart broken.” She laughed and buried her head in my chest. I felt very satisfied with how mature I sounded. Then she raised her face and looked me deep in the eyes and said in a low voice, “Michael, two hearts beat fast here.” That’s when I knew, if she had said to me, “Let’s go on a killing spree.” I would have done it without question.

The next day we drove to the airport, my visit was over. I thanked Mr. Gomez and his wife and felt very sad. Sad I would never see these people again. They had, for the briefest time, become part of my life. They would continue their lives in Mexico and I would go back to school in placid Sacramento. I wanted them to call my folks and say I had been acting up; then I would have to stay forever in Mexico.

On the flight back, yes, I thought of my dance with Felize; but I also thought about the wild Mariachi party, the hot pepper and the swim in Lake Chapala. That night, home in my own bed I dreamed I was a white stork, flying high out over Lake Chapala, looking down on a magical land and people.