Given the old world mores of a family steeped in Spanish culture, Marina drew the unlucky lot as the oldest daughter. Her place was to help raise the youngest children and then care for her parents in their old age. For a number of years her father forbade her to go out and work in order to assist Rosalee with the household. Only by petition from Pelan and Louise did Jonas allow Marina to go and get an education and find work as a book keeper. This decision was also forced by the disastrous event of an industrial accident that left Jonas severely injured and unable to work. With the loss of his income the family fell from the middle class into poverty that forced them out of a large home and into a mud brick hovel with dirt floors. Over the years my mother and most of her siblings escaped these circumstances by emigrating to the US where they started new lives.
My father Charles Wendell Bates met Marina in Guatemala in the early 1950s through a mutual friend from his days in the military service. The details of that evolving connection are lost, but I know Marina did not readily accept Charles’s overtures, and he had to make more than a couple of car rides down to Guatemala from the US to get her attention.
Second only to being my mother, being an American citizen was something Mom cherished more than anything else. She remained to her last days thankful to have had the opportunity to come to this land, and its biggest cheerleader.
The flip, and unfortunate, side of her sense of being a new American was her rejection of her Spanish heritage. So hardline was she about being an American, she discouraged me from speaking Spanish at an early age. The bilingual skill was lost, yet strangely, I could always understand what she was saying in momentary lapses into her mother tongue.
Mom taught herself English. She did a very good job but she struggled with pronunciation and the meaning of words in the English lexicon, both literal and figurative. It was a source of aggravation and humor for Dad and me. If you’ve ever seen some of the old I Love Lucy shows to hear Ricky Ricardo’s mangled English, or today’s Modern Family with Sophia Vergara and listen to her slaughter the language you’ll get what Marina’s communication skills were like. Dad and I never joked with Mom about it because it was a source of embarrassment and frustration for her, but she did improve over the years.
Mom’s confusion with the figurative and literal meaning of words was one reason she never called me by my first name: Roger. It was given to me by my Dad. Marina loved Germanic and Scandinavian cultures so she gave me the name Erik. As she was wont to do periodically, she was perusing the dictionary one night and saw the definition and image of the Jolly Roger, which was the black flag with skull and cross bones flown by pirate ships. I did not witness this event, but she told me about her discovery years later. Dad confirmed her total indignation and irate reaction to the fact her son should be named after pirates. Dad never got to explain, I didn’t try, and everybody went along with Erik.
Through the years of my childhood and adolescence my mother was my prosecutor, judge, and high executioner. Dad was usually my unpaid defense attorney. If you know anything about the Latino culture you know that corporeal punishment is integral to growing up. All children of Latino parents learn this at a very early age. The comedian George Lopez has a great stand up routine where he talks about memories of his mother’s stern discipline. Those of us in the know understand the irony of being expected to take the upcoming punishment, but being asked with tight lips and crazy eyes “Why joo cry-en. Hm? Why?” I recall a few times running around the yard with my mother chasing me and yelling “Benga aqui!” (Come here!) Marina had this quick open hand left: Smack! If she was particularly aggrieved at some transgression of mine she would follow up a big round house right hand slap. The left would stun, but the right hand wollop would fall upon my hapless person like Thor’s hammer, WOP!, and leave my ears ringing.
Not until my grade school years did I realize that the hammer was never really used to full effect on me. But I did witness the infliction of Marina’s nuclear option on others one day in the third grade of an elementary institution. The word institution is intentional. In the first week as a new student I saw several fights on the playground, a couple of beat downs in the boy’s lavatory, and a massive donnybrook in the lunch hall. I remember standing in the court yard during recess one particular day and overhearing some kids bemoan the fact there hadn’t been a fight all week! I was convinced I died in my sleep and went to hell.
Several of the older boys in the sixth grade had been kept back more than once. One very large boy of ominous notoriety had a gang around him. He had sideburns. I no longer recall what I did to offend him but he and his buddies had me surrounded as I was walking home one day and were preparing to give me a beat down. Before they could commence, Marina simply appeared. My sense of relief was like an ocean washing over me. She picked out the big thug first, and walked right up into his face. Marina was only 5 feet tall and this kid stood over her. In her fractured English she started yelling: “So! Joo gon to hxurt my boy?! Smack! WOP! He went stumbling and staggering back, too shocked into stupefaction to do or say anything. Marina stepped over to thugs #2 and #3 standing together with mouths agape. “Joo too, peece of trrash!” Smack! WOP! Smack! WOP! The fourth guy in the group scattered before she could wheel on him. In one of her more imperious tones she commanded the boys to depart: “Go hxome now!” And they did, muttering and swearing in hushed tones to each other, and looking over their shoulders. I never had any trouble from those guys after that. I often thought about the fact my mother showed up at precisely the right time.
Mom possessed some sort of prescience, and maybe that can be said of all mothers who are deeply attuned to their children. But several times in my life she either made me aware of something before hand or simply undertook some anticipatory action to head off a problem. I rarely, if ever, was able to hide illicit behavior from her as a kid. Well before I had any knowledge or inkling, she “called” the birth of my four daughters. Though she got the sex of my first grandchild wrong she did call the timing very closely.
Marina had an uncanny technical aptitude that I think she got from her father. She taught herself home electrical wiring by reading books from the library. With the same guidance I received from my dad on home plumbing projects she was also able to repair copper plumbing with solder, flux and a blow torch.
One aspect of modern life so crucial to independence is learning how to drive a car. This is one of the things Marina never learned how to do. It didn’t stop her from going places and doing things she needed to do. She simply improvised to become an avid bicyclist. I recall when I was in high school asking my dad why mom hadn’t learned how to drive. He replied with wide eyes “Son, don’t ever let your mother drive a car..” Apparently he had attempted to teach Mom back in the day in California. Something occurred on Van Nuys Boulevard, I don’t know what exactly, but it scared the life out of him. Mom’s only recollection was Dad yelling at her non-stop.
Anyway, I insisted that he teach her out of fairness; I was to receive my license very shortly. He begged to defer but I was relentless. He gave in. So, we all jumped into the family jalopy one day shortly thereafter. The first objective was to get out of the drive way. Now in all fairness, the lay of the land in our yard was challenging. Our house was built on a slope, and the driveway descended from street level down the slope on one side of the house to wrap around and meet the garage that was built under the first floor. Driving the car up and out of the yard meant a three point turn in the narrow slot that defined the width of the driveway… in only 25 feet of level plane.
Twenty minutes of valiant effort and histrionics later I emerged from the car with my father not far behind. He was ashen faced and looked at me with the “I told you so” look. Bushes were flattened, the garage door was caved in and there were deep furrows in the dirt where tires had been spun to smoking ruin. We never brought the subject up again, and Mom never asked.
By the time I was ready to graduate from high school Marina took stock of the trajectory of her life and decided to pin all her hopes and aspirations on me. She made sacrifices that I would only learn to appreciate as a grown man with years of acquired wisdom. When I was a boy of about 8 years old Marina had the chance to break away from my father to find the personal freedom she so desperately longed for, but stayed with her marriage to give me the whole family I desired. She sold the diamond engagement ring my father personally designed, with two heart shaped rubies on either side, so that we could put some money down for the first year of my college studies.
Marina was not one to mingle, socialize, or allow people to get close to her. And this included her sisters and brother. I would say Marina had less than three close friends for her whole life. The only person she called friend other than me was a wonderful lady by the name of Cathy. Cathy was Marina’s care giver for the last two years of her life while she lived in a nursing facility after a stroke. I watched in amazement one day as my mother allowed Cathy to touch her head and lovingly stroke her beautiful silver hair with a comb. It was a very tender and revealing moment.
At some point in life a person who believes there is a higher power, and judgment for a life lived correctly or otherwise, will take stock of what they have done; good, bad or indifferent. Marina came to that place not long before she passed. The beginning of the conversation is not important, but at one point I asked her “no one can predict when the Lord will take us, but isn’t it better to expect a better place?” To this she quietly replied in reflection “que esperanza?” (what hope?). I asked why she felt that way and Marina replied, “I could have been more charitable to others”. It was a moment of complete honesty and regret, and I found it very painful. Yet I know Marina gave more to others than she gave herself credit, and that there is a place for her in eternal happiness and comfort. For that I am glad.
February 29, 1920 - April 16, 2012
Thank you Mom.
