“Before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times.”
And he went outside and wept bitterly.
—Matthew 26:75, The New Testament
In my chest, there’s a pain still gnawing at my soul’s entrails. My blood aches, and so do my eyes, for having denied that being, that master of my life. I spurned her eyes, her hands, the black reboso draped across her shoulders and over her head.
I remember her well, sitting on the ground next to her sienna-orange comales. She wore a white blouse upon which birds and flowers stood motionless. Her flowered petticoat was beginning to crumple, and the ground nibbled away at her plastic huaraches with each step she took. Her gaze, intense and heavy, was directed fixedly toward the people walking down that street.
Many people smile often; not her. She reserves that light for us and Doña Santa: her friend as a child, as a young girl, as a woman, and now, as a grandmother. They see each another often, tell stories, and laugh. When she goes out into the street, she never smiles, and this has led to the false conception that she is a negative person; even in town some people know her as Susana “Enojona” (The Grouch) Tetlauel. Of course, for those who don’t know her, this is an obvious fallacy because she is, in fact, quite the opposite; she laughs alongside us, makes up words, and has never hit us, not once. That was my father’s job. Her smile is a sunshower; she makes fun of almost everything and everyone without offending. At home, she gets up early to prepare our food. She serves the meal first to my father and to us; she is the last one to raise a piece of tortilla to her lips. So far, she has never complained about this life and I doubt she ever will. Her whole being exudes strength and valor.
Today, at 62, she climbs hills and sows our cornfield with a barreta and coa. She walks the two hours to the field carrying plates, tortillas, soda, and food on her back. As if this in itself wasn’t enough, she also has to feed fifteen or so pigs and twenty or so chickens every day. She gets tired, true, but she never complains. When my father hires day laborers—and their food is very heavy by default—he leaves the workers a while in order to bring the food in on his horse. The beast carries everything, but my mother also has to walk to their worksite to portion out the food and then walk back afterward with the empty dishes.
In my second year of high school, I went to go and study in Chilapa. One Friday, at seven in the morning, a bunch of us were waiting for the teachers to arrive. After a while, the principal came and told us that two teachers were not going to be able to arrive at all, so we’d have five or so hours free to ourselves. Some students who lived nearby went home; the rest of us went to play soccer. Afterward, we went down to the city center to find something to eat. That day, the day before the day of celebration for Chilapa’s patron saint, the streets were packed. On the main street, on the way to the cathedral, were countless vendors, men, and women, one of them my mother, sitting on the ground with her comales. I was walking in the middle of six of my classmates making jokes, when suddenly I saw a familiar face in the direction we were headed. She looked at me and smiled, as if wanting to tell me something. I quickly absorbed myself in conversation, making sure to stay in the middle of the group, listening to jokes, and I pretended I didn’t see her as I passed by. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw how that little light, born from her mouth, faded as she adjusted her gaze, heavy and strong as usual, to what it had been until that moment. I kept walking and did not turn back, careful not to arouse any suspicion that I knew her. I know that she was crying on the inside; maybe she was even regretting sending me to school, because the more one studies, the more one denies one’s origins. That day, I tried to push it all away, to forget I’d seen her in the streets of Chilapa, but as I kept walking I kept thinking about her face. I thought about going back and saying “hi,” of introducing her to my friends who would have, of course, been happy to meet her; some would even respect me for not denying my blood, a mother of the fields, an artisan, a good mother, and an expert in cooking the most delicious meals. Maybe, if I had gone back, I could have changed how things went, but instead, I kept walking, squarely between the others. On the way back, we took a different street as a shortcut back to school, and I bore the full weight of my disavowal.
When I got out of school, I went home. I walked in and my mother seemed a bit serious; she didn’t say anything and I didn’t either. She served me food and, after eating, I took my backpack and a machete and went to the field to help my father. Only years later did the moment come when I could no longer endure this death-like affront I had committed against the being who gave me life. From then on, I came to know many phantoms along the way to denying my origins. I, for my part, began to reflect, to rethink my actions, and eventually my gaze was able to cast light upon the ways of darkness. I watched how others denied their origins, how, when they graduated with a bachelor’s degree, they forced their parents to wear shoes, skirts, and city shirts; to speak Spanish when their parents had never before spoken that language; to force them to eat with cutlery without first having taught them. When I saw them, I saw myself.
One day, when I could no longer bear the pain that walked beside me all throughout the city, I took my things and went to go and look for her. I arrived at my pueblo and went straight to the house; she welcomed me cheerfully and rushed to warm some food. I hugged her as tightly as I could, and she smiled; she asked me if I was okay and I answered “no,” that my soul ached because of an act I’d committed against her long ago. Tears sprang to my eyes. She held out her arms and said nothing was wrong, that everything was alright, and she asked me to tell her, when I was ready, why I was crying. I only managed to blurt out a plea for her forgiveness and she said she forgave everything, that she wanted to know I was okay. I reminded her then of that morning in Chilapa. She thought about it for a moment, and said she didn’t remember anything and that, even if she had, she was willing to forgive all of it because I was her son. She granted me her forgiveness, but even so, I carry in my soul a wound that reopens whenever someone commits an affront of this kind.
