Slice of Childhood/1972-1975

When Jimmy was little, he had a “bad attitude.” He used to tell momma, “I kick the T.V.”, “I wake up the baby” which was Missy. When he would misbehave momma would scold him and tell him, “I’m not going to take you to the store he would respond,

“Who cares?”

Whenever daddy would spank him he would say to him, “That didn’t hurt.” Then daddy would spank him even harder. I would shut my eyes. I hated to see any of my siblings get whipped. Momma used to say Jimmy was “trevesudo” which means he was “hard headed.” Maybe, momma really said, “atrevido” which means “daring”. I was only a kid when I heard these words.

Jimmy was always as tall as me, but three years younger. He was the sibling who looked “white”. His blood was as Mexican as mine. Our ancestors were from Mexico, years ago on daddy’s side they came over during the Mexican Revolution, on momma’s side, Comanche Indian and our Mexican ancestors were already in Texas when white settlers starting arriving in Texas at Mexico’s invitation in the 1820’s.

I was always the dark one it bothered me. Boi and Mo-Mo were olive skinned, and Missy was dark too, I didn’t know if it bothered her too. In Kindergarten a boy used to call me “Taco”. My grandmother from Sanger used to say I was “Prieta” which means dark in Spanish. I was dark that is true, but it is the way she said it, like it was a bad thing. I always wanted to be lighter, like my momma whose skin was olive. I used to be self-conscious about my skin color.

Adults always had to make an issue about skin color. Then we made a big deal about it too. It is the adults who made us hate our skin.

We used to play mush ball in the street, in front of the house. Yes, that is what kids did back then. We flew kites in March, we looked forward to that. Daddy would buy two kites and fly them with us in the field before the city made the Mosqueda Recreation Center.

One particular afternoon, we were playing in the street, an older kid on a ten speed ran Boi over. Boi must have been 8 or 9. The kid was at least 16 or 17. Boi stood on one of the makeshift bases, the kid was teasing him, like he wanted to hit him with the bicycle. When Boi moved out of the way, he hit him. Boi collapsed to the ground, I hollered, “Momma, Momma someone ran over Boi.”

Momma came running out with daddy. Daddy scooped Boi up and carried him to the cot he had in the garage. Boi was bleeding and bruised. Momma called the kid something. Momma was understandably upset her little son was battered with bruises from the bicycle.

Momma and daddy took Boi to Dr. Ponek, our doctor said Boi had a concussion. Dr. Ponek used to smoke when he would give us shots. Whenever we used to see him he had a cigarette in his hand.

When we got home there were a lot of black people in front of our house. Because of what momma had said. Our neighbor Jay had a shot gun. He stood beside us as they loomed seemingly to threaten our family. Jay was Margie’s third husband.

(left to right, Boi, Mo-Mo, me carrying Missy, and Jimmy.)

The family of the kid never apologized, the kid never apologized. There was tension, but we were all people, if only someone would have apologized, even momma for saying what she said. Someone should have said something.

Boi took weeks to heal.