"Be afraid. Be very afraid… of your sweet Mexican grandmother’s house," by Ricardo Gamboa

An exploration of fear a la Neo-Futurists, “(un)afraid” required I explore the sources of my own fears. Some of them recent and irrational and others, understandably deeply rooted. Some fears of my early years surprisingly led me to my grandmother, my father’s mom.

The notion of the benevolent matriarch in Latin American culture is widely known and documented in some of the culture’s seminal literary works such as Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s “One Hundred Years of Solitude.” Latin American matriarchs are symbols of compassion, perseverance, and wisdom. My grandmother, Clementina Gonzalez Gamboa, is no exception.
She is an amazing woman who has survived the hardships most immigrants endure, raised ten children on Chicago’s gritty Southside, and has been a figure of warmth for me and my over thirty cousins. She hasn’t lost any skill with the nostalgic practices of our family: Making pozole for birthdays, tamales at Christmas, and feeding you the minute you walk into her home. She is small, rotund, and adorable—like a brown hobbit. If I could, I would love to just pick her up and put her in the man-bag I wear to work and feed her Jell-O. I mean, c’mon…

Don’chu jus’ wanna put her in your murse and feed her Jell-O?

Me and my cousins loved going to her house and hated leaving. We would pretend to be asleep and when that failed we would throw ridiculous temper tantrums. Mine were among the worst: I would cry, scream and tell my parents how much I hate them until one of them said, “C’mon kid, get up or I’m gonna kick your ass.” An ultimatum which usually resulted in me getting my brown ass kicked and dragged to the car back home.

What’s funny is although my grandmother’s house was an urban sanctuary no doubt, when I think about some of the first times I’ve felt afraid, it was there in that house…. I blame her—I mean it’s not her fault. It’s cultural. I have talked to a lot of other Mexican kids with the same cuddly Hobbit-like Mexican grandmother’s and all of them agree—Mexican abuelas have some freaky ass taste! F’real…. During the nights my temper tantrums were successful and I was able to sleep over, when it was time to go to bed, I would start regretting that shit all crazy because that house… That house became freakier than a mutha’fucka. Like if her house at night was walking down the same side of the street as me, I would cross as fast as I can to the other side of the street away from that bitch like it was a two headed rapist. You see, my grandmother, like many Mexican grandmother’s never question the freaky factor of their decorative choices. So populating her home were things like this:

Crucifixes all up in the bedrooms:

Religious paintings in bathrooms looming over the toilet making you pee all over the seat after midnight:

And throughout the 80’s, a handful of porcelain cats staring at you, staring at them lit only by the moonlight:

And other irrelevant porcelain figurines:

                        

And, something I could never understand, random Happy Meal toys on furniture:

Imagine any of these things staring down a four year old you past midnight. I know my grandmother never meant any harm with any of this. It wasn't until I was 16 that she renovated her house and all figurines became porcelain cows--cow canister, cow salt and pepper shakers, etc. She misses the ranch she grew up on. However, the crucifixes and cautionary paintings are still there, everywhere. They still freak me out. And if I were working in the Marketing Department for the Catholic Church I would suggest they revisit those bloody depictions if they want to increase their waning attendance. Seriously, if I have a choice to spend my Sunday having brunch with an alcohol of my choosing or staring at The Savior pinned up all crazy to the cross in agonizing pain and all bloody, guess what I'm gonna pick... Guess...

If my grandmother were to read this she would tell me, "Dios te va a castigar!" Translated: "God is going to punish you!" Every kid with a brown cuddly Hobbit-like Mexican grandmother knows that line too. I don't know about them, but that doesn't scare me anymore.