Dad's salary as an ambulance driver was barely enough to cover family expenses and Mom worried a lot about that. She wanted us to have a home of our own so she decided to look for part time work. Answering an ad in the newspaper she found a weekend job housecleaning and baby sitting and a routine got started. On Saturday mornings we’d all get in the car and drive Mom to the Freed home, her new place of employment and in the afternoon we’d drive back to pick her up. Like Dad's job it wasn’t that far from our house, maybe three miles, but in terms of life style it was a million miles away.
The Freeds were established Albuquerque merchants who owned a downtown store. Their home, located in a middle class suburb, had manicured green lawns and a garage. The tree lined street was paved and in the center was a landscaped island. The neighborhood was part of the city's new uptown district and an oasis of beauty compared to where we lived.
East San Jose was at the bottom of the economic ladder. Yards weren’t landscaped although some of our neighbors grew flowers and vegetable gardens. Since Phillip and I rarely saw lawns or garages they were a source of wonder to us. Until we were much older we were convinced that only Anglos could have them.
One Saturday afternoon Dad realized with a start that it was late. He needed to take off immediately to pick up Mom but Phillip and I were so deeply involved in playing we didn’t want to stop.
“Where are we going, Dad?” Phillip asked, thinking he could stall or even prevent us from having to leave.
“Never mind. We’re going, get in the car,” Dad told him. He thought issuing an order was enough to get us moving but it wasn’t and since whatever my older brother did I did too, neither of us budged.
“But I want to know where we’re going,” Phillip repeated, not bothering to look up.
Dad didn't handle stress well and he wasn't accustomed to spending whole days with us like Mom. Her ability to accommodate us was part of being our mother and her instinctive need was to keep us calm and happy, things Dad never worried about.
His voice and level of irritation started rising. “Get in the car!" he ordered.
“But I want to know where….” Dad was in a hurry. There wasn't time to explain his actions to this little upstart and he didn’t want to, either. He grabbed Phillip who managed to slither out of his grasp. When my brother slid under our parents’ bed I followed. With our backs pressed against the wall we could see the top of Dad’s balding head as he felt blindly around for us. Then large hands clamped onto our legs and we were dragged out. Phillip squirmed loose again but Dad had a firm grip on my leg, or so he thought. I wriggled free and ran for it. Dad grabbed Phillip again but when he tried catching me Phillip got loose. We made it to the front door and bolted outside. To us, this was an exciting game but Dad viewed it as an exasperating struggle.
Phillip was the key to getting both of us in the car so Dad ran after him. They disappeared around the side of the house. A minute later Dad reappeared, out of breath and panting but with Phillip tucked tightly under an arm. He was plunked down, still struggling, on the front seat. I got into the car on my own and climbed over them to the backseat.
“Malcriaos!” Brats! Dad growled as he got the car started.
Phillip was upset. He struggled to free himself but there was no way with Dad’s meaty hand gripping his spindly leg.
“I don’t wanna go! I don’t wanna go!” Phillip's yelling got me yelling, too. “I don’t wanna go,” came my high pitched echo from the backseat.
Dad backed the car out of the yard in a series of sharp jerks. “If you don’t shut up,” he warned us angrily, “I’m gonna take both a you to the reservation and trade you to the Indians for a pig.” He looked so upset we believed him.
Hearing that Phillip began sobbing hysterically. He grabbed Dad’s arm and shook it, begging him not to take us to the reservation. For a few blocks I leaned out of the car crying, then I started jumping up and down on the back seat, crying harder. We started hiccupping between wails. To people we drove past in our convertible we must’ve sounded and looked like a mad house on wheels. We sobbed the entire way to the Freed's house and not once during the trip did Dad take the time to explain that he was joking. It probably would have calmed us down but it wasn’t in his character to back off. After a few more minutes of our wailing Dad completely lost it.
“THAT'S IT!” he yelled. “We’re going to the reservation right now!”
The decibel level of our screams and hollers increased as Dad threatened. Phillip started kicking the car door-Dad yanked him back. In our minds we really thought this was the end, our last time with Dad. We'd never see him or Mom again. “Maybe I’ll get two pigs, I don’t know.” he said sounding disgusted.
While I was crying hysterically I also began wondering where a pig could be kept at our house. Our grandparents in Grants kept a pig but the pen was at the end of a long backyard. In Belen, Uncle Pete sometimes raised a pig. Its pen was also well away from the house, so it could be done, I thought. With us gone there just might be enough room in our small yard for a pig. I envisioned Dad hard at work building a pen.
Trading kids for pigs seemed like a real possibility since there were Indian reservations Dad could easily drive to. We passed them on our frequent trips to visit his family in Grants. Traveling west from Albuquerque on Route 66 Dad would point them out. “That’s Acoma. That’s Laguna. See the Indians?
Often we did see Indians, sitting in the back of pickup trucks with blankets wrapped around them or on the side of the road selling bread and pottery. Sometimes they could be seen far off in the hills herding sheep or cattle on horseback. Corrals and pens dotted the reservation landscape. From there it was only a short drive to Grandma’s home. I wondered what would she think, Dad showing up with a pig instead of us?
It was late when we arrived at the Freed home. Mom was standing outside waiting for us and she looked tired. When she got to the car she was shocked to see us crying and hysterical. “What’s wrong with the boys?"
Dad gave a helpless shrug. “I don’t know! They just keep crying.”
“He wants to take us…. Indian ….reser va tion...pig!" Phillip sobbed.
"Pig!" I echoed from the back.
As soon as Mom sat down in the front seat Phillip threw his arms around her neck and wouldn’t let go. She struggled to free herself from Phillip’s tight grasp so she could breathe.
“It’s all right, son,“ Mom said, trying to quiet him down. “It’s okay, we’re going home.” She spoke accusingly to Dad. "What did you say to them?"
“Nothing! They didn’t want to come. I had a hard time getting them into the car, that’s all.” Dad defended himself all the way home.
Now that Mom was with us I began calming down. I was sure she would never allow Dad to trade us for a pig but Phillip remained concerned about our fate. Even after we arrived home he held on to Mom so tightly she had to carry him inside.
Dad wiped my tears away with his hands before lifting me out of the backseat. As we walked to the house I wondered if my father really wanted a pig or whether he’d been joking all along.
"You’re getting a pig?”
“I might!”
“How'll he get home?”
“I'll put him in the back seat with you,” Dad said with characteristic exaggeration. That was a relief, it meant we weren't going to be traded.
“Can I hold him?”
“Yeah, you can hold him."
“Where’ll he live?”
“I'll build a pen."
“Like at Grandma's?”
“Yeah, just like that.”
“Where?”
“Probably by the tree.”
“Can I help?”
While I was talking I was thinking, ‘Boy, oh boy, a pig!’ I could hardly wait.
“Yeah,” Dad said in a low voice, apparently not wanting to be overheard, “but don’t tell your mama we’re gonna get a pig.”
“Why?” I whispered.
“Because it’s a surprise.”
When we reached the door Dad used his thumb to press the tip of my nose back a little to make a snout. He smiled at my silly look. “Oink,” he said.
With the palm of my hand I did the same to him.
“Pig,” I answered and we both laughed.
Dad never did trade us for a pig but he liked to make us think he could. Eventually Phillip and I learned to take all his teasing in stride. Years later I came to understand that underlying this episode was my father’s rural sense of humor as well as traditions and stories he’d grown up with. Dad's Navajo grandmother was a Comanche captive traded for a horse to a cibolero—a buffalo hunter, on the great plains. Unable to say where she was from the young woman remained in Sena and married her rescuer, Dad’s grandfather.
According to family lore, a great aunt was carried off by Indians when she was a child. Years later the captive was located at one of the pueblos. Married and with children of her own, she refused the chance to return to her original family; to see her they had to go to the pueblo. This was part of frontier life in New Mexico, a time in the not too distant past when human beings really had been exchanged for livestock and necessities.
That evening Mom heated water on the stove and when it was warm she poured it in the metal tub for our bath. Phillip was first. She scrubbed him down and washed his hair, ears and face and then rinsed him with clean water. Dad turned on the radio and we listened to our favorite Saturday night programs. After Phillip was dry and ready for bed Mom gave me my bath. In the warm water the alarming experience of nearly being traded for a pig faded. Clean and sleepy, I crawled into the small bed Phillip and I shared.
That night I had a dream, one I have not forgotten. Actually, it wasn’t a dream but a metaphysical appearance. I was visited by a tall man with dark hair down to his shoulders. He had a forceful presence, yet the look on his face was gentle and serene. His huge, translucent wings enveloped me. Thou Art. Accept who you are and what you are, he said although no words were spoken. His spirit filled me with happiness and revealed to me what I already possessed but did not understand. This guardian spirit, I realized, had come to bring a message of hope. His visit left me with a permanent sense of being cared for and protected.
I awoke early. The room was still dark but outside our kitchen window I could see streaks of deep red and gold lighting up the early morning sky. In this moment between night and day a feeling came over me of blessedness, a sensation I internalized and could recall when needed from then on. Quietly I left the warm bed and climbed onto a kitchen chair to look at the horizon. In the west the morning star was shining brightly.
From her bed Mom spoke softly. "What are you doing, hito?"
I pointed outside. "A star."
"It's early. Go back to sleep," she whispered. I looked at the sky one more time before climbing off the chair and going to bed. The vision of the dream and its message stayed with me and I couldn't sleep.
It was a new day. Although the morning star was no longer visible I knew that it was there. Like the morning star the spiritual guardian in my dream remains a bright presence in my memory. The sense of a spirit watching over me and his gift of self confidence changed my personality for the better from then on. My fears of daily life, I now understood, could be overcome by relying on my inner strength. I could not control my parents’ arguments or the chaos that was a part of our lives, but I could survive them because I had a purpose to fulfill in my life.
Within the next few months it was to become clear Thou Art would have an additional significance and define my path to becoming an artist. The full meaning of those words would be revealed by another spiritual guide, one not of dreams, but an older member of my mother's family.