Mi Madre!

As religious and cultural traditions are pretty intermingled here, I am often not sure whether I am experiencing a Mexican or Catholic custom. Such was the case on Friday evening, when I went to Mass to see the Dormition of the Virgin Maria.

It was the eve of the Assumption of Maria, the day that celebrates Maria's` entrance into heaven. In Catholic teaching, there is debate as to whether it was her just soul that entered or if God raised up her whole body. For Mexicans, there is little doubt that she went cuerpo intact. Thus she is put to sleep the night before the Assumption (the Dormition) and she is raised up while sleeping.

As the Dormition was something new for Jess and me, we were pretty excited to go. However, right before Mass was to begin, we had to wait out a massive downpour. Once things settled down, I donned flip-flops, we both rolled up our pants legs and we waded through the streets of Santa Fe in order to see the Reina.

As so happens during major religious feasts, the atmosphere in Santa Fe was the opposite of what the cause of celebration would imply. The Feast of the Virgin of Guadalupe was full of chaos and revelry and Good Friday was an excuse to excessively eat and drink. On the day when one is meant to reflect on the purity and chastity of a woman, a dozen men stood in the market place street catcalling females.

``Fire,`` one man called to us, which was a cue for the rest to try and sing the lyrics of a song and fail, and instead slur ``Babies lights my fires.``

``If you`re going to speak in English, learn to speak it correctly,`` Jess shouted at them in perfect Spanish, allowing me to walk away smugly. (If I had tried to yell the same thing in Spanish, it would have come out like `When you speak English, tried talk correctly` and the effect would have been lost.)

We plodded past them and into a church gone dark--not because it was bedtime, but due to a power outage. Aside from a bed surrounded by apples and angel statues in front of the altar, Mass was typical. Afterward, Padre instructed various baptism classes to go to different rooms and neither Jess or I could figure out what big thing was going to happen--usually for these types of events the statue of the Virgin is paraded around town after Mass.

While I was changing out of my flip-flops in anticipation of going outside, Jess and our friends seemed to disappear on me. Now, I hadn`t heard any instructions, the church was dark, and lately I have been wearing pair of glasses with an outdated prescription as I`m awaiting a new shipment of contacts. Sensory-deprived, I stumbled out of church (the Friday nights I spent leaving bars in such a manner are a lifetime ago) and began looking for the Virgin. In the middle of the marketplace street, I stopped to telephone Jess but she didn`t pick up. Contemplating what to do, I looked up to encounter of the previously-mentioned drunk men who (not looking for a virgin) offered ``Drink, Guerita?``

Thus was the cue for the rest of the men to begin shouting at me. It reminded me of a cartoon scene whereby someone seemingly finds safety in a cave, only to see one set of yellow, glowing eyes , and than notices about 20 more wolves waiting to pounce on them.

``Baby, baby, I love you,`` they all screamed in English. I didn`t feel nervous but it was rather embarrassing to be in the middle of a big scene. It was like sitting outside at the parish--the dozen dogs that Padre keeps there always crawl all over me because Jess is nice to them and they smell her scent on me--and it attracts unwanted attention.

I hurried out of the marketplace and looked around a few blocks before heading back to the church. Apparently Jess had never left and the Virgin had only been taken off the altar. She was put in a special room, her garments were changed and she was laid in bed. A group of parishioners stayed up all night keeping vigil over the statue. I left early for my own personal dormition.

The next day, I woke up at five a.m. to the sound of fireworks. Jess and I headed back to church, where eight Virgin statues had been placed on the altar. Overnight, people had taken out their Virgin statues from roadside shrines, changed their clothes and brought them to church. For three hours various mariachi and rondella bands played to them in a crowded church. Outside, sweet bread and coffee was served. I don`t know if it`s common in other Catholic countries to give such attention to Virgin statues, but I do think Mattel would be highly successful were it to market a Virgin Maria Barbie in Mexico.

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Having witnessed the glorification of motherhood, it was only fitting that in the afternoon I experienced its pitfalls. After a long morning nap, I went to work at the convent, where residents, nuns and others where outside for Mass. I was upstairs visiting with the babies when Sister Estrella came to me with Carolina (half of a set of developmentally-delayed twins who can` t talk yet,) who was kicking and crying.

`` Here, if you want to take her somewhere you can,`` said Sister Estrella. ``Take her.``

``Oh...So, do you want me to take her to Mass?" I asked.

``Mass or wherever,`` Sister shrugged. ``Just take her somewhere.`` We each took a hand of Carolinas` and she jumped downstairs and outside.

(Some background-- a few weeks ago Carolina`s twin began attending daycare while Carolina remains at home, restless. Carolina can`t go because she is aggressive and overactive if she were to attend, the nuns are afraid that she would hurt the other children or be disruptive. On Friday, I asked Sister if Carolina could to the guardaria a few afternoons a week if I were accompany her. Sister Estrella had reservations about this, but did say I could probably take her out on walks or to the park. I hadn`t expected our outings to begin so quickly.)

Carolina sat through a minute of Mass before getting up to run around. I followed her closely, feeling as if I were being tested somehow. I took her a little further down the street, where a makeshift carnival was being set up and we looked at the games and rides.

Carolina was difficult-- she tugged and grabbed at games and toys. Even when I held her hand tightly, she would run up to strangers and wrap herself around them. I held her in my arms and she cried, squirmed and tried to climb onto strange woman. The only thing that made her calm and attentive was taking off my glasses and putting them on her face, which was unsafe for us both. Carolina is rather fair-skinned and as I clutched her and she wailed, people on the streets stared at us as if I were a really bad mother. I wondered how for the second time in less than 24 hours, I was part of another spectacle.

I wanted to bring her over to Sister Estrella and say ``Here, you can take her now,`` but I felt like it would be giving up to easily so I held on to her. It made me wonder what sort of mother I would be. With my own possessions, I am careless and tend to break and lose things and I have always worried I`d be like this with my own kids. However, being with Carolina made me think I`d be overprotective parent who would imagine harm at every corner. I wondered how she could be so fear less when there was so much danger awaiting her.

Eventually, Carolina got so fussy that I took her back to the convent grounds, and it was better because I could let her roam around. She found some sweet bread which she ate happily and slowly while sitting in my lap as we listened to choir music, rainfall and fireworks. That type of moment keeps motherhood in business.

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That evening, I attended Mass for the Feast of the Assumption, special because the bishop was there and Jessica`s children`s choir sang . At the end of Mass, Padre announced that a statue of the Virgin would be crowned eleven different times by people representing various community members. While representatives of nuns, church workers (Gallo did the honors in this group and drew the applause of a rock star) and families crowned the Virgin and said a few words, I watched nervously. Padre had mentioned something about either Jess or me participating in the Coronation of the Virgin, but I had figured Jess would handle it and it would take place during Sunday Mass.

However, Jess was way up in the choir loft and Padre saw me near the front of the church and asked me to crown the Virgin as a representative of missionaries. I have a certain amount of public speaking anxiety, so I was proud of myself for being able to muster up a few words in Spanish thanking the people for Santa Fe for their hospitality and for the presence of nuestra madre.

One of the nice things about this blog is that I was able to back at the blog entry I made at this time during Orientation. I wrote about how it was unusual for me to celebrate the Feast of the Assumption but that I anticipated doing even more out of the out of the ordinary things.

That has come to pass as I have found myself in unanticipated situations here. Though it may sound like I spend all my time struggling with small children and Spanish I have also witnessed a lot of cool things--this weekend for example was a huge celebration for the Assumption and I watched fireworks after Saturday Mass and Aztec dancers on Sunday. My difficult experiences here has been made easier because I have found some many people who have been loving and accepting.

Despite struggling to accept a different way of life and witnessing very sad situations, I still feel blessed to be here. I wrote last year that my goal was to make the most of things I didn`t expect. To a certain extent I have done that and I have to give myself credit for being able to take things that are (certainly in the case of small children) thrown at me. While day-to-day life presents a certain amount of stress, I hope that in the coming year I`ll be able to take what I`ve learned over the past year and better enjoy and appreciate the people around me.