There he sits, “Hector the Hummer” as I’ve come to call him. It’s obvious this little rascal has weathered many seasons, he looks a bit shop worn, almost rag-tag. I don’t have the slightest idea as to how he got the bump on his head but it sure is noticeable. He looks like me in the morning after the pillow has worked over my hair. Unlike most of the Hummers that come to my feeder, his wings have that “split ends” look, they don’t fit snuggly against his body.
Wendell Glazer watched the dog as it strolled across his lawn then noticed it had watered one of the tires on his new Lexus, his jaws tightened. “I no sooner have the darn thing washed and it either rains or some stray lifts its leg on it.”
“Don’t forget to go grocery shopping Wendell; do you have the list I gave you?”
He didn’t reply, but just nodded and headed out to the car; next stop was the car dealership.
“Thirty-thousand miles already Mr. Glazer, you and the wife must be hitting the road a lot, fortunately this unit gets great gas mileage.
It had been a very restless night for Felipe Calderone, the excitement of the coming day had robbed him of the sleep he knew would be needed in the morning. He had packed and unpacked so many times he had forgotten what he had packed so he checked his list once more. Rubber boots, extra shirts, pants, socks, handkerchief’s and his personal items. His mother had given him the rosary beads she had given his father on his first shrimping trip. “Please keep these close to you my precious one; it will make me feel much better while you are gone.”
“I will mother, it’s a promise.”
Maria Luisa Delgado was born in a small adobe Casa a few kilometers north of San Felipe in the farming community of San Telmo. The population was about 3500, most lived in and around the central plaza, an earthen square in the middle of the town.
It was a dreary afternoon when she arrived, raining, cold and very windy. She loudly protested the event, crying and kicking as she began her life in San Telmo. After a few days and some very tender loving care her protesting ceased and she settled into a daily life of eating, sleeping and being rocked to sleep by her father and tucked into bed by her mother, life was getting much better.
There are no names for days, well days as we know them anyway. Nor are there months of the year in the life of “The Cart Lady as she is known in the town where she aimlessly wanders the streets. There are just times when it’s light and then it gets dark, it’s just an endless unnoticed cycle that knows nothing of boredom. There is also no sense of time in this woman’s life, she has no appointments nor deadlines. For her, she is always where she should be, wherever that might be. It’s a quiet oblivion. She isn’t worried about her clothing, no fashion statements here. Mixed patterns, tears, missing buttons, it doesn’t get her attention. To her clothing is for warmth or to be shed as summer settles in and fires up the sandy streets.