Spilled Milk, Broken Vases… “The Sting of a Child’s Memory” part 2

And to prove that he, indeed, was Lord of his castle and Master over his simple-minded and fearful subjects, he would arrive home with drinking compadres, demanding Canela cook-up a meal—like she were one of his maids, and not the Señora of her own home, for what it was worth. That would usually mean scrounging-up their measly leftovers and giving away their food—their last piece of meat, couple of tortillas and rice and beans. Fearful for her children, desperate to protect them, she would run to hide or throw away his reserved stash of booze, in hopes that they wouldn’t have much to drink.

Canela, at these uncertain times—trembling and fearful—would clasp her hands together, raise them high towards heaven, and with tears in her eyes would earnestly pray, appealing to God that Oracio might find someone else, a more tolerant woman—perhaps one with a more sinful past and therefore more deserving of this preview of hell—and to mercifully and finally abandon her and the children for good.

Dulcenia, too, would pray, on her knees, in the secret corner of her room, asking God that her Papá would not come home—at all!—pleading to God that He would allow something very bad to happen to him, something that would prevent his ever coming home again. Then he would never again shame them, or beat and bruise their Mamá—beating her as if she were an animal, humiliating her with insults, as was his habit to do, blatantly before family and friends. And then they would finally be free from the daily terrors—an unhappy and uncertain life.

But then, later, in her innocent child’s heart, guilt would wash over her, and she would silently weep, and ask God’s forgiveness, forgiveness for the hatred she felt growing in her heart like a seed, and the harm she so desperately wished would pour, like an avalanche, upon her Papá; a man impotent to love, and void of natural affection; empty to the core.

And since Dulcenia, his only daughter, couldn’t hide her obvious fear and well-grounded revulsion of him, and because at his approach she would cringe and cry and push his arms away, refusing his love and affection, he would later take it out on Canela, cursing and accusing her of saying things against him. That, rather than take responsibility for his own doing.

The things that Canela had to put up with…for too long…. The outright abuses: the lies, the cheating, the beatings, the mind control; the being made to feel less than human—that no one should ever have to.

Oracio would one day realize that Canela was the only good thing he could have had in his miserable life, but certainly much too late to be sorry. Blessings are gifts from God, and too often they are disregarded and thrown back at God’s face. Because of his self-seeking, self-indulgent, and self-centered life, his heart was hardened. His last days were lived as an empty soul, blindly stumbling through life aimlessly; and all efforts to have a meaningful existence simply landed him face down, in a pool of mud.