If Down Didn’t Work, Up It Is!!
Testing The Holy Waters
Having been disappointed with, and worse let down by the Dark Side my mom instead decided to turn to elsewhere for some other worldly assistance. Heaven was her next obvious choice.
Just before bedtime late one Saturday evening she announced that in the morning we would begin attending church. Since we didn’t have a reliable car (she didn’t know how to drive anyway) our choice of places of worship was pretty limited, so the obvious pick had to be the Catholic Church located about three blocks away. Her announcement came as a surprise because I had never attended any kind of church, and to my knowledge she hadn’t either, so I really didn’t know what to expect. Turning on her heel she ordered me to get plenty of sleep because we were getting up early.
Although I was quite familiar with the little church on House Street, having passed it twice a day every day on my way to and from the school bus stop, I had never actually ventured onto the property it was situated on. From my sidewalk view the grounds sported a fine cover of lush green grass dotted randomly with small areas of brightly colored flowers. This was in stark contrast to some of the yards in our neighborhood (including ours), which were dominated with grayish-green clumps of sprouting weeds randomly interrupted by the occasional cluster of dandelions swaying gently in the breeze. On either side of the church were a couple of metal statues, probably saints, heads streaked white and green from countless deposits of pigeon poop, arms extended, ever gazing pleadingly skyward. And at the rear of the property stood a series of single story buildings, wrapped in soft beige colored brick, with windows shuttered in deep red stained cedar. These, I found out much later, were used to house the priest-in-residence and the church’s covey of nuns.
During the school year I occasionally spotted a few nuns, usually in pairs, gracefully and magically gliding across the grass in their long black dresses with their heads bowed serenely and their hands clasped reverently just below their bosoms. They never seemed to look up or around—they just floated forward, terribly mysterious and stunningly exotic. Black swans.
Curious as to what had prompted her to make this choice I finally asked my mother why she had decided to attend Catholic Church.
“Well,” she said stoically, “if it’s good enough for the neighbors it’s good enough for us. After all, it must be the right thing to do because most of the husbands bring home their paychecks.”
Ah, it was a money thing. Got it!
The next morning after being nudged awake I was ordered to make sure to take a really good bath.
“And, don’t forget to scrub good behind those ears, mijo!” Mom chided.
Growing up for me was never easy. What most people took for granted as just normal events in their life were to me major operations. And that would include taking daily baths. The first time I recall taking a shower with real hot and cold water on tap was on the first morning after my enlistment in the Air Force at Lackland Air Force Base, in San Antonio, Texas. I was eighteen years old.
Since we didn’t have any kind of water heater in our rented single frame three room house, my mother would fill a couple of buckets with water and set them on our little four burner gas stove to heat up. When ready she would take the metal buckets filled with bubbling boiling water and empty them into a metal wash tub that she’d set inside the old porcelain bathtub in our tiny bathroom. Then she’d run cold water from the old squeaky faucet into the boiling water to finally bring it down to a tolerable temperature.
After undressing I would climb into the bathtub and squat down or sit on the cold porcelain. Using a metal ladle I scooped out the warm water from the metal tub and poured it over my head to wet myself down. After dipping a raggedy washcloth into the water I would soap it up with whatever soap bar, or combination of soap bars stuck together we happened to have that particular day, and scrub away. Again filling the ladle I would rinse off and repeat the process until I was squeaky clean. I was always careful not to use up all the water in the metal tub so that my mom would only have to heat up one more bucket of water for her bath.
Stepping out of the tub that morning I saw that she’d already laid out a pair of white boxer shorts, a red plaid flannel shirt and my best pair of school jeans. On the floor was my only pair of shoes, cheap brown oxfords; each shoe stuffed with a white cotton sock.
Walking out of the bathroom directly into our slightly larger kitchen I saw that on our pathetic little wooden eating table mom had set out a bowl and spoon alongside an almost empty glass bottle of milk, and a small box of Post Toasties Corn Flakes. Although she always tried her best to seal the cereal box to prevent our resident roach population from raiding it and setting up camp inside, I never failed to conduct a thorough sight inspection, followed by a violent shaking of the cereal box to ensure that only corn flakes ended up floating in my milk.
Finishing up, and after rinsing my spoon and bowl I went into the front room to wait for my mother to finish her bath. The day was breezy and cool, and the brilliant morning sunlight flowed softly through our plain glass windows, filtered by the threadbare linen-like white curtains before softly splashing on the checkered black and white linoleum floor. Staring out and with nothing to do for a while I decided to call for Jerry to tell him where we were planning to go that morning.
Legs crossed and sitting on the floor across from each other I told him we were going to a church. He asked me if I knew what to do once I got there.
“Um, I don’t know, it’s my first time,” I said. “Do you know?”
He shook his head no.
“Well, I’ll know after I get home, then I’ll tell you, OK? Sorry you can’t go.”
But of course he never ever left the house.
Dressed in her best going out dress (one of her two only dresses), my mother came into the room and gave me one last visual going over. I watched cautiously as she began to wrinkle her brow and stare at my forehead. Trying not to panic, I knew what was coming next: the dreaded thumb/spit/simultaneous/eyebrow pastedown!
It kind of went like this. After sticking both thumbs in her mouth to deposit sufficient spit on them she quickly secured each side of my head with her palms and fingertips and proceeded to thumb-squeegee each of my eyebrows at the same time—making sure them babies were properly plastered down. I always tried very hard to resist but with my head in a virtual vise all I ever accomplished was forcing my body to wriggle from the neck down. Both arms would flail violently, my feet sliding on the floor in full reverse gear during this operation. Then suddenly, a quick palm release when she was done and down I went—on my butt on the floor, with my mouth still making highly indignant sounds.
I know she always expected me to resist, but sometimes, if she decided that I had resisted a bit too much she would up the ante by threatening to lick my eyeballs with her tongue. Yes, you read that right, and I swear this is true. It was her sincere belief that if she slathered my eyeballs with her tongue, while holding my eyelids open with her patented death grip, any trash that may have been accidentally swept in would be scooped out—thereby precluding the need for flushing any flotsam out with costly and highly overrated medications like Visine.
Many years later I remain convinced that in a previous life she had to have been a most faithful and caring canine mommy.
Satisfied that I was now humanly presentable she announced that it was time to go. Stepping through the front door and into the bright sunshine we walked across our environmentally toxic yard and headed towards House Street. Dodging the black greasy oil stain that marked my dad’s parking spot on our grayish sandy front yard I asked my mom if she thought dad would be home when we’d finished getting holy.
“Humph! He’d better be home by tonight so he can be ready to go to work tomorrow! ” She growled. “But, we’ll see how he parks his car.”
Without ever having discussed this, my mom and I had devised a rating scale to judge his level of inebriation, whenever he got home, based on his car parking skills. (1) Front wheels straight, all doors and windows closed, and the parking brake set meant he’d come home fairly early and pretty sober. (2) Front wheels still turned far to the right or left, windows open and driver’s door not fully closed and latched, usually meant he’d quit drinking while he still knew who he was. (3) All windows down with driver’s door fully open, him still in the driver’s seat passed out, one leg hanging out, head thrown back over the backrest with mouth open, right wrist resting on the steering wheel and keys still in the ignition—usually meant my mom would not be finding any money on him. (4) Car missing: may need to ask Aunt Janie for bail money.
Today, there was no car in the yard.
Turning left at the front end of our yard we stepped onto the cracked and heaving sidewalk and began our quest for redemption and salvation.
I had no way of knowing that on that fateful day my long and painful experience with religion had only just begun.
Vini, Vidi, Dormio
Being that it was early Sunday morning there were very few people out and those few that were out were heading in the same direction. Since the church was pretty much walking distance from any house in our neighborhood no one drove his or her car to Mass. If they had there were no parking areas anyway, and leaving your car unattended in the narrow street was not advisable, unless you wished for your car to disappear.
Holding my hand tightly on our short journey my mother gingerly stepped over the large cracks in the sidewalk, mindful to avoid the cracks so as not to “break her mother’s back”. Crossing the last street bordering the church property she angled us off to the left and onto to the large concrete plaza area in front of the church.
Small groups of mostly women were scattered there, each quietly talking and occasionally glancing down at their shoes or primping up their shiny little pin curls. Our arrival caused a few of them to pause their whispers and shoot a few quick glances our way. Then, just as quickly, they would look down and flick away some pesky little clump of invisible lint they’d suddenly found on the front of their outfit.
With not much to say to anyone we drifted over to an unoccupied section of the plaza and waited. Not having an iPhone, or some such modern convenience to check for texts or emails, my mother instead busied herself by winding her already stressed out little wristwatch; the one that had not ever kept good time, but was adorned with a cheap, but shiny, Speidel Twist-O-Flex band.
The men, I noticed, were mostly bare headed, their thick black hair shining brightly from the freshly dabbed layers of Royal Crown hair pomade; a few wild cowlicks here and there resisting uniformity by standing tall and reaching for the sky. The rest wore a variety of sweat ringed cowboy hats perched high on their heads tilted jauntily at a rakish angle.
Their thin wiry brown skinned bodies, some with small sad low riding paunches, were loosely draped in various shades of well dated dusty gray or black suits; thickly cuffed pants not quite reaching the tops of their cracked black leather oxfords or rundown old cowboy boots. For some of these men, the ones who labored long hours working for the Southern Pacific Railroad laying ties, or for those others who spent blistering days tending to the cauldrons of boiling creosote that would eventually end up coating telephone poles or soothing dusty white shell roads, the wearing of Sunday clothing seemed tedious and uncomfortable. Hanger creases on trouser legs that had long forgotten their vertical pleats and the occasional faded underarm sweat ring on baggy jackets spoke to their lack of ever having visited a dry cleaning facility.
Socks? Well…optional for some, white cotton for most.
Because of my father’s reputation for drinking and fighting (he was a mean drunk), and his general unfriendliness toward anyone other than his close friends, we never had much to do with the neighborhood or the neighbors. Most of them, when running into us at Henry’s Store or just walking by our house, would glance briefly and even suspiciously and would quickly lower their heads and quicken their pace.
With no warning the two large wooden doors in front of the church suddenly began to open and the crowd became slightly more vocal. Slowly the people began to shuffle towards the open doors and quietly enter the church. Rather than moving with the crowd my mother instead guided me in the opposite direction to take a position at the very back of the group.
Waiting until everyone had gone through the door, my mother using her favorite hand-on-my-neck grip, guided me through the doors and into what looked like a large dark foyer. Continuing through a second set of very ornate doors I noticed that the old couple we’d been following had just finished dipping their fingers into a cool looking birdbath situated just inside those doors. I looked up to the ceiling to look for birds but saw none.
I was more than a little shocked when I heard the old lady in front of us mumble something and saw her wave her hand around her head and chest. She moved on, bent down on one knee and lowered her head before taking a seat on one of the big benches. I looked to my Mom for a hint but all she did was purse her lips and shrug.
In a show of courageous bravado my mother approached the birdbath, stuck her hand in and ceremoniously wiped her brow. With a few drops of water rolling down her face she gestured to me with her eyes and tilting head for me to do the same. Since I didn’t think I needed my face washed I only dipped three fingers in and scooped up some water. Obviously my Mom had not seen the old lady do the head/chest thing, so I thought I should do my best imitation of the act. All I succeeded in doing was having water drip down my forehead and into my eyes.
With my vision temporarily blurred by the slightly oily water I did an abbreviated chest rub and grabbed for my Mom’s dress to keep my balance. Hearing some lip smacking and tongue clicking around me I assumed that the group of pilgrims preceding us had not been too impressed with our actions, and certainly didn’t approve of my clinging, tripping and eye-rubbing.
My Mom’s neck grip pushed me forward into the cool and dark church and guided me toward the second to last bench on the left. She more or less shoved me in. Suddenly, the sound of more smacking and clicking! Apparently they’d noticed that we had neglected to duck walk a step or two before taking a seat. Too late! This church thing was pretty complicated and not going well at all. My mother, of course, was nonplussed and continued to maintain her air of supreme aloofness. We slid onto the smooth worn bench and prepared to become holy.
After a few minutes my eyes cleared and I looked up at my mother. I was shocked to see that somehow she’d forgotten to put her handkerchief back into her purse after wiping the water from her face. She was wearing it on top of her head! How did it get all the way up there? Was she trying to dry it out? No, I thought, not even my goofy Mom would do that. So, maintaining my own version of complete confidence, and knowing she’d thank me later for saving her embarrassment, I reached up behind her and snatched the cloth off her head. More clicking and smacking preceded a rather moderate left elbow smash to my right temple. She tore the cloth from my hand and placed it back on top of her head, all the while glaring at me and pursing her lips in that “…don’t ever do that again…” way. With her eyes she motioned to me to look around. As I looked back I noticed that all the women were still wearing their scarves and hats. Those that had neither had hitched up the Mexican style shawls that they’d been wearing on their shoulders up to their heads. Very interesting! Suddenly I understood: Mom was only trying to be fashionable…trying to fit in.
Curious now I tried to ask my mom why every female had her head covered inside of the church. But before I could even get two words out she shushed me and cautioned to be quiet and to pay attention. Um, pay attention to what? No one was saying anything, doing anything, and aside from the clicking and smacking behind me the place was like a tomb. Having heard enough of the lips and tongues I turned my head to see what the clickers and smackers looked like. It was then I noticed that the men in attendance were not wearing head coverings. Those that had worn hats outside now had placed them either on their laps or next to them on the bench. Mostly, though, they were sitting very still looking up toward the ceiling and speaking to themselves without making a sound.
In their brown calloused hands they each had a sting of beads that any Indian worth his wampum would be jealous of. The faster they mumbled the more the beads make a circular journey around their fingers. Glancing around to find more beads I noticed that some of the women were glaring at me and motioning me with waves of their hands to turn around. Apparently in church one must always face forward and never look back. Boy, I did I have a lot to learn.
Suddenly, and seemingly out of nowhere, an organ fired up. Ah finally, entertainment! Or, maybe someone was just dusting the keys. The song was mostly unrecognizable and slightly off key; cacophonies of muted and out of tune strains. Didn’t recognize it. My eye caught a movement at the front where there was a large stage dominated they a gigantic statue of a man on a cross in obvious agony. I knew enough to recognize that this was Jesus on the cross, but I had never seen Him quite this large or quite so graphic. He was looking skyward with blood dripping down his face from the crown of thorns and the wound in His side was gruesomely large, with even more blood pouring down the body. The statue was so life-like that it began to affect me in a really disturbing way so I quickly shifted my gaze to the walls where many colorful banners were hanging. That didn’t do me much good because the banners were all in what I now know was Latin. Just then some action began happening on the stage.
From stage right, a man in a large silk gown wearing a really nice looking red and gold bib floated out followed by four boys who I instantly recognized from the neighborhood. Now, two of these guys were named Teyo (short for Mateo) and Alberto, and were the meanest and nastiest thug-bullies I knew. To see them here, wearing fluffy white dresses and looking all holy was more that I could fathom! Worse, they were carrying lit candles, gold cups and were dangling… smoke on a rope!! Interesting!
My mother broke my concentration with a little elbow poke and whispered, “Mira, it’s a priest and those are his altar boys.”
I now believe that with that one sentence she had just about exhausted her entire knowledge base of “The Inner Workings of a Catholic Church”. Turning her gaze back to the front she crossed her arms triumphantly and put on her “I told you so” face.
After a few words spoken to a large book the priest had opened in front of him the altar boys retreated and disappeared from my sight line. What followed had to be the longest ceremony I had ever attended in my young life, mostly dominated by a lot of singsong language from the priest (no microphone), to which the congregation would respond en masse; a lot of standing, then sitting, then kneeling, then sitting again, more standing, over and over again. What really spooked me though was when the congregation began thumping on their chests in response to the sound of a small bell ringing.
After the entire church formed a line and marched up to the stage to have the priest drop something into their open mouths and then drink something from one gold cup that everyone else had drank from, the sermon began. By now the church had started to get a bit stuffy and in spite of the hardness of the benches we were sitting on, I began to drift off. Before long I had succumbed to my ever increasing yawning and dropped off into a deep dreamless slumber.
I vaguely recall my mother shaking me awake and pulling me by the shirt towards the big doors. Once outside she grabbed me by the hand and guided me in the direction of the sidewalk for the walk home. I could tell she was annoyed just by the way she was squeezing the life out of my arm and walking rapidly. Temporarily blinded by the sun the best I could do was keep up and try not to trip on the cracked pavement.
Slowly regaining my senses as we walked I finally asked my mother if we were now Catholics. She completely ignored me and didn’t say a word until we were home. Finally she simply said, “OK well, after the service I went up and asked the priest if he could get your father to stop drinking. He told me that first I needed to take lessons to become a Catholic so that my prayers would be answered faster. Until then he said all he could do was pray for our souls. He suggested that I come everyday and light a candle and pray to the Virgin Mary. Humph, It was a waste of time.”
“Did it cost us any money?” I asked.
“No. At least his advice was free.”
“Are we going back?”
“No, mijo. We just have to be strong—you and me.”
+++++++++
Many years later I often wondered what my life would’ve been like had my mother taken that priest’s advice and had become a full-fledged Catholic. I can’t help but think that my view of life in general probably would’ve been very different—not necessarily better, just different.
At that moment in my short life I believed that my experience with religion was surely over. But I was tragically wrong. In a few short months, and after agreeing to an offhanded invitation from a close friend, my life and the lives of my parents, would be radically changed forever. Soon we would be dipped, coated and deep crispy fried in the boiling oil of fiery radicalism otherwise known as the “Latin American League of Christian Churches”. The Pentecostal Religion was about to thunder down on us and sink its painful claws into our very souls. And before it was all said and done it would drag us through hideously dark labyrinths of hypocrisy, humiliation, and unimaginable spiritual pain. Not only would it mercilessly break my mother’s heart leaving her a confused and broken woman, it would also cruelly drag my father deep into a cesspool of bitter debauchery, far baser than a million bottles of whiskey could have ever done. And lastly, it took an innocent, bright-eyed imaginative boy, full of joy, hopes and dreams, and viciously pulled him headfirst into a nightmarish world of guilt, pity and self-loathing.
