My parents are Theresa and Gilbert. Their beginning was typical for people living in Albuquerque at the time. Late 60's, early 70's were a time of great social change across the country. In our area, the Chicano movement was gaining momentum. There was a great sense of cultural pride and comradery which caused people to unite. My parents were introduced by my uncle Elmer and his future wife, Angela. Angela was one of my mother's best friends. They grew up together in the South Valley. My father had just broken off a long relationship he had with one of his 1st cousins. They were in love but this type of close relationship is frowned upon by the deeply religious followers of the Roman Catholic church. My grandparents insisted they stop. After the deaths of my grandparents, speculation began about the daughter she gave birth to months after their relationship ended. She never disclosed the name of the father. It is entirely possible her child is my sister.
My mother was born after only 5 months of gestation. My grandmother's pregnancy with her began only a month after the birth of my mother's brother. She didn't know she was pregnant. My mother weighed 1 pound at birth. This was back in 1953 when premature babies her size died. They did not have the same technology available today. No incubators or sophisticated treatments. The nuns at St. Joseph's hospital cared for her. When she was 9 months old, she was returned to my grandmother. My mother was featured in the newspaper because she was a miracle baby. Sometime after my mother was born, my grandfather died. According to my aunt, he had some sort of heart defect and volunteered for experimental surgery to fix it. He died on the operating table. He was 31 years old. I believe my grandfather's death and my mother's birth left an impression on her siblings that somehow she was responsible for his death. Kids have funny ways of connecting unrelated events. Regardless, my grandmother drank heavily and was out dancing most nights. She was several years younger than my grandfather. The kids were left alone most of the time. My aunts were several years older than my mother and took out the frustration of caring for the family on her. They beat her mercilessly. They bashed her head against the wall on a daily basis. I believe this abuse in combination with lack of oxygen as an infant caused my mother's mental deficiencies. We would find in her 50's that her IQ was one point above mental retardation.
When my grandmother was in her mid 30's, she found out she had a fibroid tumor in her brain. The doctors insisted she have surgery to remove it as it was causing terrible headaches and loss of balance. They gave her a 50/50 chance of surviving the operation. If she survived, they gave her 50/50 chances for retaining her ability to speak, walk, and see. She miraculously survived the surgery with speech, and the ability to see. Unfortunately, she was unable to walk unassisted. This additional stress on the family increased tensions between my mother's siblings.
My uncle Isidro, my father's 18 year old brother was in Vietnam. In March of 1971, my father's family received the devastating news he was killed. My grandmother was hanging clothes on the vast sea of clotheslines located behind the adobe house the family built. Military men dressed in their finest broke the news to her. She fell onto the dirt. I have found the official letter from the government regarding the nature of his death buried in a dusty cabinet in my father's house. It tells the story of his time in Vietnam in a brief matter of fact manner. My uncle Isidro drove a tank. They were under heavy attack. One of the other tanks was disabled. The men driving it tried to get away but the enemy fire was intense. My uncle drove his tank directly into the line of fire to draw it away from the injured soldiers. The result was his tank was blown to high heaven. He received a purple heart and a medal of honor for his brave sacrifice to save his fellow soldiers. My grandparents received a small box containing his remains several months later.
My grandparents had 8 children. 4 boys and 4 girls. My father is the forth born. He has two older sisters and Isidro was his older brother.
8 months after my uncle's death, I made my entrance into the family. I was born on Thanksgiving Day 1971. I was the first grandchild born to my grieving grandparents. I was the miracle that saved the family from self destruction. My grandparents (my dad's parents) baptized me. My grandmother, Bennie, gave me the middle name Grace because I was a Thanksgiving baby. My grandmother Louisa gave me the middle name Lucenda. To Roman Catholics, baptism is a big deal. The people who baptize the infant take on responsibility of 2nd parents and will assume care of the child if the parents die.
It is interesting to note that my parents lived at in a small house close to my grandparents when my mom was pregnant. My mom was close to delivery when she decided to bake a cake. She walked up the hill to my grandparent's house to borrow a cake pan then returned home to bake. A short time later, my aunt Debbie flew into the house crying. She was maybe 12. Her grandmother (my great grandmother), Pablita had collapsed and she was in a panic. Pablita had a pace maker which I assume followed a heart attack. My family is weird about sharing medical information so I may never get a clear answer about what happened to her. According to my mom, Pablita collapsed in the bathroom. When my mom walked into the bathroom, Pablita was lying on the floor and appeared to be dead. My mother placed her hand on my great grandmothers chest. My mom felt one heart beat, then nothing. My mom was terrified. Traditional healers say that if an unborn child is exposed to death, the child will suffer from susto. Susto is an overwhelming fear that emanates from deep inside. It is difficult to explain the concept in English. It is the fear someone experiences when they have a near death experience or from extreme danger to their lives as in war. Combat soldiers suffer from susto. I have always suspected two things about my great grandmother's death. 1) My mother may have been able to save her life if she called paramedics immediately upon her arrival to the home. This is unlikely as in the mountains, it takes a very long time for medical personnel to respond due to their location far from the fire station. I am shocked she did not try. 2) I was in my mother when this happened. She has extreme reactions to death. I believe the rush of adrenaline and the extreme fear had a profound effect on me. Who knows?
My mother was very young when I was born. She had not chosen a name during her pregnancy. She gave me the first name that popped into her head. Nice. She was slow and had no idea what to do with me. She agonized with the nurses afraid she would not have the ability to keep me alive. The nurses reviewed feeding and diapering with her over and over. She could not grasp the concept. The concerned doctors and nurses suggested she have her tubes tied. This was not a normal protocol especially for someone so young even at that time. Perhaps they saw something in my mother that made them fear she would reproduce again. I believe it was foreshadowing. From what my mother says, they told her it was a form of birth control but she would still have the ability to have another baby whenever she wanted. I don't think she truly understood what they were doing to her.
We moved into a house on Sunflower Road. I was around a year old. We lived there until I was about three. I have a few memories from the time we spent at that house. One Christmas there I received a little red metal pot/pan set. The kind that come with strangely good and repulsive smelling plastic vegetables and a weird dehydrated looking plastic meat thing. My dad drew stove burners on an empty moving box for me with a marker. I also had an amazing yellow metal spinning top. It had a handle to push up and down which made it spin. It smelled a lot like vanilla. Sweet and delicious. I played happily for hours. My room was large (to a toddler) and mostly empty.
My mother has two older sisters and an older brother. Angie, Frances and Juni (short for junior.) My cousins Jessica, Sandie, Mark, and Martin came to visit us one summer day. The house on Sunflower was located on a dead end road. There was a fantastic small playground at the end of the dead end road. It had a merry go round, a couple swings and a slide. This was paradise to me as a toddler. The merry go round terrified me but I took every opportunity to get on it as I could. I felt like head honcho because my cousins did not have a playground so close to their homes. I remember fearing for my cousin's safety as they ran down the street without their mothers to the playground. I was terrified to do this myself so my dad escorted me.
My mother only gained a few pounds during her pregnancy. In fact, at full term, her belly was hardly noticeable. I remember my mother used to take diet pills constantly in an effort to remain thin. They were large gel capsules that contained tiny brightly colored balls. I would break open the capsules when my mother was occupied and eat each ball one at a time according to color. It was fun : )
My uncle Juni gave my parents an old police dog. It looked just like Lassie. She was a large Collie. She was a vicious dog despite her sweet appearance. My parents locked her in the back yard hoping to deter burglars since our house was adjacent to a shady part of town. One day while my mother was on a speed induced bathroom cleaning frenzy, I pulled a chair up to the back door and opened it. I wanted to pet the puppy. I remember toddling out into the yard. I put my hand on the dog's head. Next thing I knew, she was dragging me around the yard by my arm. I was badly mauled by the dog. My mother flew out of the house and punched the poor dog square in the mouth. It jumped the fence. We never saw it again. I remember looking down at my little hands and arms covered in blood and puncture marks. My mother was beside herself. Despite my mother's heavy drug use and my father's heavy drinking, those were good days.
My uncle Juni gave my parents an old police dog. It looked just like Lassie. She was a large Collie. She was a vicious dog despite her sweet appearance. My parents locked her in the back yard hoping to deter burglars since our house was adjacent to a shady part of town. One day while my mother was on a speed induced bathroom cleaning frenzy, I pulled a chair up to the back door and opened it. I wanted to pet the puppy. I remember toddling out into the yard. I put my hand on the dog's head. Next thing I knew, she was dragging me around the yard by my arm. I was badly mauled by the dog. My mother flew out of the house and punched the poor dog square in the mouth. It jumped the fence. We never saw it again. I remember looking down at my little hands and arms covered in blood and puncture marks. My mother was beside herself. Despite my mother's heavy drug use and my father's heavy drinking, those were good days.
We lived there for a brief time before we moved into the Canyon to be closer to my father's family. His family are original heirs to the land grant east of Albuquerque and all live along a single road there. I was around 3 or 4 years old. This move was the beginning...
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