Christopher Woods
Piñata
I did not know my way around the part of town where Pancho lived. I couldn’t remember ever going there. Now, I was. It was good that Pancho had made a map for me. Still, Donna and I got lost. We passed a park where families had gathered around picnic tables. We could hear salsa music blaring from car radios. Beyond the picnic tables, men were playing soccer in a wide field.
We came bearing gifts. Donna had helped me select a birthday present for Pancho’s granddaughter, Belinda. Maybe it was odd, selecting a gift for someone I had never seen or met. I knew her only from a photograph Pancho had showed me at work, at the mail order house where we drove the trucks.
Donna said my knowing Belinda or not made little difference. We bought Belinda several coloring books and wrapped them in bright clown paper. Donna said that most any child Belinda’s age would appreciate a coloring book. I hoped she was correct about that. I wanted to do the right thing. It was, after all, the first time Pancho had invited us to his house.
“I’d be honored if you could make it, Rivera,” he told me earlier.
Calling me Rivera was Pancho’s way of offering a compliment. He nicknamed me Rivera after the famous Mexican painter. I was an evening painter, doing it when I could, and I had not yet sold a painting. So when I received my new name, I thought it was a hopeful thing for my own painting.
Finally we found Pancho’s house. Red and white crepe paper streamers hung from trees. A large group of children stood in the yard. It looked like they were playing “Red Rover,” but that was a game I only dimly remembered from my own childhood.
Women stood talking in circles, while the men hovered around a barbecue grill in the driveway. The air around the men was heavy with smoke, and the smell of grilled chicken and beef drifted to us, still in our car in the street.
As we got out of the car, I saw Pancho running toward us. He seemed very happy to see us, which made me feel good about coming. But something seemed different about Pancho. He was too animated, perhaps, waving his arms about and hugging us. I realized he was drunk. Often at work I would smell stale booze on his breath, but he was always sober there. Now, it was different.
“I knew you would come,” he said. “I knew you would come.”
We followed Pancho across the yard to the house. He took us in the front door. The pastel wallpapered room was small, and it seemed filled with many things. There were shelves lined with glass-blown boats, animals and flowers. China vases were filled with dried flowers, all kinds. On the wall were paintings of Jesus and some other saints I didn’t know. Votive candles, all colors, flickered on a table by the couch.
What intrigued me most was a very large cabinet with glass doors and lit shelves. The inside of that cabinet sparkled like sunlight on ice. I imagined the cabinet housed some kind of crystal collection, but its effect was like that of an altar.
Pancho excused himself and left Donna and me alone for a moment. When he returned, it was with a short older woman with dark hair and a big smile. He introduced us to his wife, Carmelita. Then, as Pancho continued to talk, to ramble really about our friendship at work, I watched as Carmelita’s smile began to fade.
She was, no doubt, disappointed that he was drunk. After a few moments, he realized she was staring at him. He seemed embarrassed.
“Come see the gourds, Rivera,” he said. “Carmelita is an artist too,” he added, smiling broadly.
While Carmelita took Donna on a tour of the house, I followed Pancho out to the garage. Outside, I could hear the children playing. The gourds were kept in the garage. They were on a shelf above the washing machine.
I had never seen gourds like that. There were maybe fifteen of them, all handpainted in various colorful designs. They were all sizes and shapes. Some were painted with geometrical designs, while others were painted to resemble animals.
“Carmelita painted them all,” Pancho said, waving his arm expansively.
“They’re beautiful,” I said. “And so different. But Pancho, no one will see them in the garage. Why don’t you keep them in the house?”
For a moment, Pancho didn’t answer. He was looking at the gourds, almost longingly. He picked up one gourd, held it a moment, turning it over and over in his hands. Then he put it back on the shelf with the others.
“Carmelita painted these in Morelia, before we came here,” he said. “She doesn’t paint them anymore. Now, we have Baccarat. You know the stuff? Crystal? We buy a piece as often as we can. Here, Rivera, people like Baccarat. They don’t care about gourds.”
He talked some more. He explained how, in Morelia, men would gather the gourds in fields. They then would take them home to their wives, who painted them. The painted gourds became household decorations, and sometimes gifts. Pancho said that Carmelita’s gourds were the most beautiful in all of Morelia. Other women came to watch her paint. She taught herself to paint, Pancho announced with pride.
As Pancho continued to talk, I looked out into the driveway. Men, drinking, were still gathered in the smoke from the grill. Then a young boy brought us some beers. I sipped at mine, but noticed how Pancho gulped his down. It was then that Donna and Carmelita joined us again. Seeing the beer in Pancho’s hand, Carmelita’s eyes darkened. He looked away. For a moment no one spoke. Then, seeming to brighten again, Pancho said he would take me on a tour of the house. We were off quickly, leaving Carmelita and Donna behind to look at the gourds. Once in the kitchen, Pancho got himself another beer.
“I knew you would come, Rivera,” he said again.
“We would have been here sooner if we hadn’t gotten lost.”
Carmelita came into the kitchen to check pots and pans on the stove. She saw Pancho’s fresh beer but didn’t say anything.
“It’s time for the piñata,” she announced.
“So, go on,” Pancho said, waving her away. “We’re talking in here. We can watch from the window.”
Without another word, Carmelita was gone again. Pancho and I took our beers into the living room and stood looking out the picture window. The children in the yard stood in a line. The women were organizing them, pulling a short girl to the front of the line, sending a tall boy to the rear. The shortest children would have first chances to break the piñata.
“That’s my Belinda,” Pancho told me, pointing to a girl in a white lace dress.
The piñata was a red and white donkey with a back bridle. It hung from a rope pulley that dangled from an oak tree branch. An older boy held the end of the rope. If he pulled it, the donkey rose in the air. If he allowed the rope to slacken, the donkey would swoop low, just missing the ground.
The first girl, who was very young and blindfolded, held up a baseball bat. When she thought the donkey came close, she swung at it wildly, missing it altogether. One by one the other children took a turn. The older boy played the rope like a song. Excitement was building. The children screamed with pleasure.
“These games,” Pancho said. “We should leave these games back in Morelia,” he added, and I noticed he was slurring his words. He made a small, helpless kind of gesture with his hand.
“What do you mean, Pancho?”
He didn’t answer. He moved away from the window and looked into that shining cabinet I had seen when I first came into his house. I stayed where I was, by the window. A tall girl hit the donkey’s side. Bits of red and white paper fur drifted to the ground. Reluctantly, I moved away from the window to join Pancho.
“Tell me, Rivera, what do you think of this stuff? This Baccarat.” He was staring at the shining crystal now. I imagined there was a small fortune of it in that cabinet. I said nothing.
“Carmelita loves it, so we keep buying it,” he said. “The neighbors come to look at it. But you know what? It doesn’t mean a thing,” Pancho added, and he tapped on the glass door with his fingers. I thought I noticed that he clenched his fist for a few seconds.
“What doesn’t?” I asked.
“Things, Rivera. Things. Sometimes I wish I had stayed in Morelia.”
I knew what he was talking about. I had often felt the same way, how what is truly important gets lost in the sea of inconsequential things. What was important? Expensive crystal? Probably not. But these days, it was a hard thing to know, what really mattered. And without knowing, we continue to wade through the junk and the years.
“You could go back if you really want to,” I told him, though I didn’t know if he could.
“No, no,” he muttered. “But it’s strange. When I was young, I dreamed about coming here. Now, I only want to go home again.”
I knew what he meant. I felt the same, but in a different way. But before I could tell him this, and explain my own disappointments, there was a great cry from the yard. We turned and looked out the window. Belinda was hitting the piñata. We watched the donkey’s side explode, releasing candy and trinkets that flew through the air. Children scrambled to catch the treasure.