[Critique Group 2] My Piece for August 29th

[Abbie Taylor]

Alice's poem last month about her canoeing adventure in Mexico inspired 
me to dust off an old creative nonfiction piece I wrote several years 
ago about a trip my father and I took to Mexico.

***

Montezuma’s Revenge

“This is a dump,” said Dad, as I gazed around our hotel room in 
Hermosio, Mexico. With my limited vision, I spied two double beds, no 
telephone or television set, and no other furniture. I peered into the 
bathroom, no bigger than a closet, with a sink, toilet, and shower.

With no air conditioning in the summer heat, sweat trickled under my 
armpits and accumulated on my brow. According to Dad’s guidebook, this 
hotel had rooms with a view of a courtyard. Our room had a view of 
nothing I could see.

At twelve years old, I was too excited to care. In June of 1973 after 
almost a year of studying Spanish, Dad and I had finally realized our 
dream of taking a trip to Mexico. After traveling most of the day by bus 
from Tucson to Nogales, Arizona, and then from Nogales to Hermosio by 
train, I was glad to be here. Although it was after midnight, I was far 
from tired. “I’m hungry,” I said. “Let’s find a restaurant.”

“You bet,” said Dad. He consulted his guidebook.

We took a taxi to a restaurant where I enjoyed my first meal in Mexico: 
cheese enchiladas with rice and beans. Afterward, we returned to our 
sweltering room and tried to get some sleep. A couple of hours later, 
after tossing and turning, our bodies drenched in sweat, Dad said, “I 
can’t stand this anymore. Let’s get the hell out of here.”

I climbed out of bed and consulted my Braille watch. It was four o’clock 
in the morning. “Should I get dressed?” I asked.

“No, just put on your thongs, and let’s go.” He wore nothing but boxer 
shorts.

I put on my thongs and went in the bathroom. When I came out, I was 
relieved to find that Dad had put on a shirt. My nightgown clung to me, 
as we carried our suitcases down the stairs to the ground floor. In the 
deserted lobby, Dad left the room key on the counter.

It wasn’t much cooler outside. When we found a cab, Dad told the driver 
in English, “Too hot. Can’t sleep.”

I said in Spanish that we needed to go to a different hotel because we 
were hot.

The place where we were taken not only had air conditioning in the rooms 
but an elevator. After we checked in, Dad, knowing I was thirsty, said 
to the clerk, “CocaCola?”

“No, /agua/,” answered the clerk.

Because we knew not to drink the water, Dad said, “No.”

I said, “/No gracias/.”

I noticed little about the room except it was cool. I collapsed between 
the crisp bed sheets and went right to sleep. When I woke in the 
morning, the room appeared no different from hotel rooms in the United 
States. Two double beds were flanked by a night stand, and a couple of 
armchairs and a small table stood in one corner. A television set was 
mounted on the wall, and a telephone sat on the night stand. According 
to my watch, it was nine o’clock.

Dad was sitting in one of the chairs, studying the guidebook. “Good 
morning, honey,” he said. “Why don’t you get dressed, and we’ll get some 
breakfast? There’s a restaurant here in the hotel.”

The bathroom was huge, containing a vast tub with a shower, a toilet, 
and a sink with a long counter. I brushed my teeth, trying not to 
swallow the water. In the restaurant, we ordered an American breakfast 
of pancakes and sausage. Dad suggested we take the bus to Guaymas, near 
the sea. “It’ll be cooler there,” he said. “You can swim in the ocean.”

“That’s great,” I said. In the hotel’s air conditioned comfort, my 
spirits had lifted, and I was looking forward to the Mexican experience.

We took a taxi to the bus station. On the way, our English speaking 
driver, upon learning we were from the United States, took us on a 
scenic tour of the city. At the bus station, Dad bought two tickets to 
Guaymas. We met a woman from the United States, and she and Dad carried 
on a conversation in English until our bus was ready to leave.

It was about a three-hour trip from Hermosio to Guaymas. When we arrived 
in mid-afternoon, we took another taxi to a motel overlooking the beach. 
On the way, I spotted a hill and pointed it out to Dad in Spanish. The 
driver chuckled as if I’d never seen a hill before. What he didn’t 
realize was that I was thrilled at any opportunity to use the Spanish 
I’d learned over the past year.

The motel was another recommended by Dad’s guide book. We were given a 
bungalow with a cement porch and a screen door. It faced the ocean, and 
the beach was only a few steps away. The room contained two double beds 
with a night stand in between and a table and two armchairs. An 
adjoining bathroom contained a toilet, sink, and shower, not as grand as 
the bathroom I used that morning in Hermosio.

A telephone sat on the night stand. It had no dial or buttons. “How do 
you make a call on this phone?” I asked.

“When you pick up the phone, an operator at the front desk answers, and 
you give her the number,” Dad said.

We hit the crowded beach right away. My excitement was soon dampened by 
the drenching ocean waves that nearly knocked me down and the awful, 
salty taste of the water. Since I wasn’t much of a swimmer, I stayed in 
the shallow water and tried to walk next to the shore. Rocks hurt my 
feet, and waves slowed my progress. As Dad swam into deeper water, I 
longed for the swimming pool in our neighbor’s back yard in Tucson.

I spotted a dock and a stretch of calm water nearby. When Dad returned 
to shore, I asked why we couldn’t swim there.

“Because that’s where ships go,” he answered. It wasn’t fair that ships 
got calm water while swimmers got waves, but I said nothing.

That night, Dad suggested we eat at another restaurant recommended by 
the guide book. When he told the cab driver in Spanish where we wanted 
to go, he said the restaurant no longer existed. He suggested another 
place that specialized in seafood, and we went there. I didn’t like 
fish, but I said nothing.

Dad ordered lobster for both of us. He removed the meat, buttered it, 
and put it in my mouth. It was awfully rich, but I managed to get it 
down. I wondered what Mother and my younger brother Andy were having for 
dinner. I pictured spaghetti, lasagna, meat loaf, macaroni and cheese. I 
considered closing my eyes, clicking my heels together three times, and 
saying, “There’s no place like home.” That wouldn’t have worked, and Dad 
would have only gotten mad.

The next morning, we took another obligatory swim in the ocean before 
eating another American breakfast of pancakes and sausages. Afterward, 
Dad found someone to take us out in a motorboat. The seats were 
comfortable, and the trip was uneventful except for one point when 
seaweed got caught in the engine, causing it to stall. The boat man, who 
spoke some English, explained the situation and managed to restart the 
motor. The water was calm, and I didn’t get sick, yet.

When we returned to the dock, I said, “/Gracias/.”

“Oh no, don’t thank him yet,” said Dad, a note of alarm in his voice. “I 
haven’t paid him.” The man chuckled.

After Dad settled the score and we were walking away, I asked, “Why 
shouldn’t I have thanked him before you paid him?”

“If Mexicans think you’re not going to pay them, they’ll take you to 
jail, and a Mexican prison is worse than anything you can imagine.”

“They wouldn’t put me in jail, too, would they?”

“Oh yes, you’d be in there with me.”

“They wouldn’t just send me home?”

“No.”

At that point, I decided I’d had about enough of Mexico. “Let’s go 
home,” said Dad, as if reading my thoughts. “We don’t have much money left.”

We returned to our bungalow to find that the cleaning lady had taken our 
towels and not brought clean ones. I took a shower and dried myself with 
one of Dad’s shirts. Dad picked up the phone and asked the operator in 
Spanish how much it would cost to place a long distance call to Tucson. 
He hung up a moment later saying, “It’s too expensive.”

That night, we ate dinner at the motel. My stomach hurt, and I made a 
couple of trips to the restroom where I succumbed to diarrhea. After 
dinner, we checked out of the motel and took a taxi downtown to the bus 
station. The bus for Nogales wouldn’t leave for several hours. Dad 
rented a locker for our luggage.

We walked around downtown Guaymas. Most of the shops were closed, but we 
stopped so Dad could look in the windows. My stomach still hurt, and my 
bowels threatened to disgorge more diarrhea.

“Did you drink the water?” asked Dad.

“No,” I answered.

At a drugstore, Dad found someone who spoke English to help make a 
collect call home from a pay phone. “Can I talk to Mom?” I asked after 
he spoke to her for a few minutes.

He handed me the phone and whispered, “Don’t tell her you’re sic. She’ll 
worry.”

“Hi Mom.”

“Hi sweetie.”

It was so good to hear her voice. I wanted to cry but managed to stay 
dry-eyed, as I said, “We had a good time, but I miss you, and I can’t 
wait to come home. I love you.”

“I love you too, honey.”

The drugstore had no restroom so we found a restaurant, and the hostess 
was nice enough to let me use the bathroom. Afterward, we sat at a 
corner table, and Dad ordered me a Coke. It wasn’t the first time I 
drank a Coke in Mexico from a glass with ice made from water we 
shouldn’t have been drinking. I took a few swallows and made another 
trip to the bathroom, this time to throw up.

I made several more such trips. By the time we returned to the bus 
station a few hours later, I was weak and nauseated. I collapsed on a 
bench while Dad retrieved our luggage. The bus arrived, but it was full. 
There wouldn’t be another bus until morning.

I stretched lengthwise on the hard bench with no pillow. At least I 
wasn’t in a Mexican prison, I thought, as I moaned and bent my knees to 
my chest in an attempt to alleviate the nausea. “Do you have to throw up 
again?” Dad asked.

“No, I just feel sick.”

I dozed, woke to hear others around me, and realized they were talking 
about me when someone said “doctor” in Spanish.

I rallied. “No, I don’t need a doctor,” I said in Spanish. “I just want 
to go home.”

“Maybe we’d better see about a train,” said Dad in English.

I didn’t want to move, but I hauled myself off the bench and walked with 
Dad to a waiting taxi. At the train station, we were told that the next 
train would leave for Nogales at dawn. Dad and I camped out on the 
sidewalk next to the track. The cool air was refreshing, and I slept 
through the rest of the night.

The unmistakable ding ding ding of the approaching train’s bell woke us. 
We stood, and I could see the sky growing light. “Is this our train?” I 
asked Dad.

“Yes,” he answered. I watched the train come to a complete stop in front 
of us. I stumbled on board, fell into a seat, and went right back to sleep.

When I opened my eyes, it was broad daylight. According to my watch, it 
was eleven in the morning. I was thirsty but didn’t feel sick. I 
breathed air into my mouth and licked my parched lips. I looked around 
for Dad but didn’t see him. The seat next to me was empty. I wished he 
would bring me a Coke. I dozed for a while and woke to find him next to 
me. “We’re pulling into Nogales,” he said.

“Can I have a Coke?”

“We’ll see,” he said with a sigh.

My legs felt like led. Dad didn’t have enough money for a taxi so we 
left the train station on foot and found a bus stop about half a block 
away. The bus was full, but we got on and stood near the front, grasping 
a pole, as it lurched down the road. It stopped several times. People 
got off, and more got on. When a couple of seats opened up, Dad pulled 
me to them, and I let my legs come out from under me.

We got off the bus downtown and started strolling. “Where are we going?” 
I asked.

“We’re going to the bus station, and we’ll take the bus home, but first, 
I told your mother I’d get her a pot, but I don’t think I have enough 
money.”

My shorts and t-shirt clung to me in the sultry afternoon heat. We 
stepped into a shop where a fan stirred the tepid air, bringing little 
relief. As we stood in front of a row of pots, Dad said, “These are more 
expensive than I thought they would be.”

While he weighed his options, I shifted my weight from one foot to the 
other, as sweat poured down my brow and leaked from under my armpits. 
Finally, I said in Spanish, “I’m very hot.”

“All right!” he yelled, grabbing me by the wrist and pulling me out of 
the shop.

“I thought you wanted to get a pot,” I said, as he hurried me down the 
street.

After a couple of blocks, Dad said, “Here’s the port of entry. We’re in 
the U.S.”

The bus station wasn’t much farther, and to my relief, a bus for Tucson 
was getting ready to leave with room for two more people. Dad bought the 
tickets, and we got on board. I sank onto a seat and closed my eyes. The 
next thing I knew, Dad was touching my shoulder and saying, “We’re in 
Tucson.”

In the bus station, he bought me a Coke from the machine. I sipped from 
the bottle slowly, feeling the cool, refreshing taste in my mouth, 
throat, and stomach, hoping it wouldn’t come up. Dad called Mother from 
a pay phone.

They arrived, my younger brother Andy, with his usual four-year-old 
exuberance, and Mother, with her immediate concern when she saw me. 
“Honey, don’t you feel well?” she asked, placing a hand on my forehead.

“She threw up and had diarrhea last night,” said Dad.

“Oh sweetie,” Mother said, holding me. “You didn’t drink the water, did 
you?”

“No,” I said, burying my face in her chest, breathing in her reassuring 
scent. At home, after a little of Mother’s chicken soup from a can, I 
was glad to finally slip between the cool, clean sheets of my bed, 
saying to myself, “There’s no place like /mi casa.”/

THE END

-- 
Abbie Johnson Taylor, Author http://abbiescorner.wordpress.com
http://www.abbiejohnsontaylor.com
abbie at mysero.net
Order my new memoir at http://www.abbiejohnsontaylor.com/memoir.htm

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