Living with her family and her extended family probably helped my mother after the loss of her father. She told us many stories of her life in Mexico City. She often told the story of seeing her father after his death. Everyday she and her dog would meet him at the corner bus stop. After he died she would still see him get off the bus so everyday she and Bull would walk to the stop. The streets were always crowded so she would always spend time trying to find him as in her young mind he had become lost in the crowd.
She was always a strong student and as she got older played more sports and loved to challenge the boy’s teams to play her teams. She would recall, “ And you know what, we would beat them sometimes"!” She especially loved to beat those boys teams as her brother and cousins and close friends were on those teams. She and her sisters and cousins traveled the City on their own to events and adventures. One misadventure was a favorite but painful story.
She liked climbing trees and was good at it. One day when she was about twelve she was jumping down from a tree when she noticed a board on the ground with a nail in it, sticking straight up about two inches. She noticed too late and the nail went through her foot coming out the top just below her toes. in her telling of this story the point was always about not getting in trouble not the pain. So to not get in trouble, she pulled the nail out by herself and somehow got home. The house was always busy with two families, many animals and other family coming and going so no one noticed her injury and she did not share. But the injury became infected which resulted in tetanus causing her to suffer lockjaw. And still no one noticed. I was always amazed each time she told this part of the story and always asked how she ate food, with a straw she would say. And still no one noticed.