Texas State Historical Association - My Texas

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One Year of My Life

I had to adjust quickly to my foster home. Living in shared accommodation with children from all walks of life came as a shock. Mother had used quality silverware daily; these forks were going green (the good service was for special occasions). I had to share personal items, which I hated doing. The others shared with me, too, and slowly I accepted what I couldn't change. Lucia used to say, "You think you're better than anyone else here, don't you? Well, you're not!" "I am," I thought. Some other boarders might be indifferent or too young to care, but I knew that I was better than my circumstances! She implied that people like her family were our betters. I resented this belittling tactic. My situation was flawed, but I was not inferior.

The Welfare Department provided a stipend for clothes and entertainment. Besides buying clothes, I spent my allowance on movies, lipstick, and banana splits.

The Montalvos were very sociable people. I attended my first dance with them at the local church hall. Lucia took me to Sears and bought me two beautiful after-five dresses, one in pale violet, the other in bright red. I wore seamed stockings and got my first pair of patent-leather high heels. Mother had made most of my school dresses, and given me some of hers. These were my very own brand-new grown-up clothes. "Don't dance with that boy standing over there, he's drinking heavily," Lucia coached me. Or "I'm watching you!" she'd say menacingly to my overly tactile dancing partner.

I made up for the previous restrictions on my youth and delighted in my newly discovered power on the dance floor. I accepted one boy's dance invitation but went off with another one who reached me first.

I feared being alone with a boy. Lucia suggested I date, and instructed me on proper behaviour, in other words, to say "NO" to sex, but I didn't date much.

She continued quizzing me about life with Mother, checking and double-checking replies. I think she accepted that I was a "good girl," but she never took anything for granted.

I began to teach catechism after school on Lucia's veranda. One day I suffered a severe stomach ache, couldn't teach my class, and didn't finish my dinner. This annoyed Lucia; she took it as a personal affront if we didn't wipe our plates clean.

A couple of days later I left science class suffering severe cramps. On my way home I met Lucia in her little green car, driving in the opposite direction. Always suspicious, she made me accompany her on her errands.

Though I was technically a virgin, that evening Dr. Childress, the surgeon, removed an ectopic pregnancy, at Dolly Vinsant Hospital. I was kept ignorant of all the facts at the time. Lucia said I had had an ovarian cyst, and continued to warn me about men and their sexual propensities.

Meanwhile, Mother taught her children to reply, "She's dead," "I don't have a sister," or "She's crazy" to inquiries made about my disappearance. Her husband continued driving by our house, craning his neck, seeking me out. Lucia informed my mother of this.

A young woman who'd also been at the orphanage with me in Brownsville joined our family at Lucia's. She had been interned with the nuns in Laredo and had recently graduated from the Ursuline Academy. When we were children, she crept up from behind covering my mouth and nose with her hands as I struggled to breathe. Based on our shared past, I didn't trust her.

Lucia insisted on equanimity, but we were never close. When my birthstone ring vanished I couldn't help but be suspicious.

I continued attending high school, half-heartedly. Friends spoke of becoming nurses, teachers, or secretaries, but I didn't have a clue what to do next and I was afraid of everything. Lucia got me some weekend baby-sitting work, and occasionally some house-cleaning, but I felt as if I was just an overly developed brainless lump. Like most teenagers, I felt sorry for myself and totally misunderstood.

In my case there might have been some truth in that. I still loved reading and wanted "something," but I had no one to help me find my direction. I was lost in foreign territory.

Lucia's advice was practical, but I couldn't see my life through her eyes, and I wasn't a Montalvo. She studied people and always told us not to judge by looks, but she preferred light skin and fine features. Lucia once discouraged me from dating one boy because it was rumoured his mother had slept with a Negro. I wasn't serious about him, but her theory was that you didn't date someone you wouldn't want to fall in love with.

We girls were watched carefully. San Benito was a very small town; the locals kept an eye out for us and reported anything untoward to Lucia. Uncle Fred made things clear: he didn't want a stream of young men knocking on our door.

No one pressured me, but I felt a subtle urging for me to make life choices I was little prepared for.

Uncle Fred yelled at Noe Guererro when he came to serenade me, and growled verbal abuse at a shy ranchero who used to speed by our house in his light blue pickup. Guillermo Jimenez, a good dancer, sped by too fast to get blasted by Uncle Fred.

Lucia also chaperoned us at the dances held at the air force base in Harlingen. There I met a well-mannered airman. At twenty, Lucia thought he was too old for me. I was sixteen. Girls my age or younger were married with parental approval. Edward persisted, and eventually I accepted his marriage proposal. Lucia had successfully married off another of her girls.

Alma Iris Ramirez
Adelaide, South Australia
Published: January 23, 2006