Under The Mesquite

Lupita recalls her childhood in Mexico. Her mother, pregnant with her fifth child, craves nopales en salsa, a cactus dish. To make the dish, Mami needs to cross a busy road, through a wire fence to access the cacti. Lupita recalls the faith the children had in their mother as they seized their chance to cross the road, the admiration they felt as Mami opened the wire fence for them.

In another memory of her life in Mexico, Lupita recalls missing her father (Papi) while he worked on the other side of the border in the United States. She shares that it was her father who inspired her interest as a writer and encouraged her talent for words. Lupita recalls tracing words in her father’s notebook with his guiding hand, preparing for the new words they would learn when they moved to the United States. As a child, Lupita is afraid of moving to the US, worried that there will be no flowers to play with. Her father assures her that they’ll plant flowers in their new home, then he places the notebook in a case so important that it holds the family’s green cards.