Here is the previous entry to this diary series in which I told of coming face to face with an oily, sleek dark iron monster that appeared to be stretched out on top of the slope and railroad tracks where Jesse and I had played earlier in the day. I told of it belching fire from it`s belly and spewing smoke out of it`s nostrils up into the black night. As scared as I was looking up towards the monster, that fear was minimal compared to the nightmare I faced with open eyes as my aunt Elvira appeared out of the darkness, grabbed my hair and pulled me into her house to beat me senseless and terrorize me until I could escape into the night. If you missed part 4 you may want to read it and then follow me below the jump to continue this series
As I allow myself and my memory to continue forth writing my life`s story as an adult today, there is no other chapter in the child`s life that explodes more into a raging, painful and remorseful sense of guilt for my inability to defend myself from the true monster that was my aunt Elvira on this particular night. Her memory haunts me as I remember laying in the same corner where she had me sit while she fed her children as I starved that morning when my grandmother left me in her care. However, on this night, with as much hunger I felt, I see myself with blood running down the left side of my face and a ringing sound in my head. The pounding she rained down on me as I curled into a fetal position punctured my ear drum and to this day the consequences remain. This chapter in my life is troubling but I am of the opinion that things happen for a reason. As much soul searching and inventories I have undertaken of my life I am still baffled.
It is no mystery that a child, any child`s inner defense mechanism granted to him or her at birth is to cry, scream or raise hell when scared or in pain. It is not necessary to write the blow by blow pounding that I was enduring that night at the hands of my tormentor, but I was screaming in pain. Because my aunt`s house had electricity the loud commotion and my screaming had Jesse`s parents up against their fence looking into my aunts screened room where she has terrorizing me. When my aunt realized that she was being watched, she paused, kick me and turned off the lights, and walked into her bedroom. There was a sound of a door closing so I later assumed she had gone to sleep.
Dizziness and feeling light headed I reached the door and slid down the steps. I walked slowly across my grandmother`s yard and went around to the front of the house and walked under the High porch. This porch had caught my attention when I first entered the yard through the gate of the tall white fence. It was so high I needed not to stoop to go under. Cobwebs greeted my aching ear with an eerie feeling causing pain to shoot through my whole body. I already knew this was going to be my secret hiding place. There was a huge Texas blue moon that night and I chose a spot on the ground near the edge of the porch. I found a soft place, got on my knees and let my aching body drop to the ground. A glimmer, faintly ray of moon light that appeared to flicker came under the porch. I was on my back adjusting my body for some sleep if I could. A few feet away amid the stench I smelled coming from the wet ground I noticed the glow of two yellow eyes. A meekly sounding growl told me it was a dog. It did not charge and I did not feel threatened, so I think I slept.
Thumping sounds of someone walking on the floor in the room above the spot where I laid woke me up. Soon I saw my grandmother and Amelia walk down the steps. They walked to the front gate and were out of my view. The ray of moon light under the porch was also gone so I figured it was morning. I was too afraid to come out from under that porch. The dog came over and started licking the side of my face and I pushed it away trying not to aggravate it into biting. Then I saw Jesse walking slowly up the steps apparently on his way to the door trying to find me as he did earlier the day before. I called out to him and he came down. He peeked under the porch and a wide grin formed all over his face.
Jesse took me to Raul`s mother when he saw the blood on my face and coming out of my ear. Raul`s house was on the opposite side of the street to my grandma`s on Comal Street. After my wound had been cleaned Jesse took me to hide across the Alazan Creek up on a hill among homeless and displaced people living in empty boarded houses as squatters. It is at this point that Jesse told me about my grandfather. The reason that he slept during the day was because he worked the night shift as a "Night Watchman" on the same train company that I had seen high on that slope of the railroad tracks. He told me that my grandfather was a Garotero using a Garote to beat desperate homeless people who jumped on trains to move from one point to another looking for work or better conditions elsewhere. A Garote is a hard wood or metal club similar in some ways to those used by jealous police officers to beat civilians. In other words, my grandfather was a paid goon by the railroad to keep Hobos and so called Tramps from hitch hiking free rides on trains. My grandfather was a very large man and it was obvious that he was given many perks by the railroad for his ability to run on top of freight trains beating off Hobo free loaders as they were called. My grandfather` s perks included free housing with all the necessary utilities paid. So the Ghetto community saw my grandmother`s family as being well off, or rich which was untrue. My grandfather was merely part of the brutal oppression that corporations like the railroad used in those days against the poor and defenseless.
When we reached the place where I would become another homeless and displaced
casualty, I encountered entire families living in despair. Some sitting around bond
fires cooking meager meals to feed their young ones. Men and women were in a circle sharing some sort of liquor bottle and laughing as Jesse and I approached. It
is here that I would have to search for a way to survive on my own. I was trapped
right in the middle of a wave of destruction and suffering that was the Great Depression.