Letters by Jasmin Salas

Letters 

Jasmin Salas

I couldn’t sleep the night my mother passed away. My sisters and I laid in our shared bed, covering our entire bodies with the expanse of blanket that our Ama had made, and now left to us. I pretended there were valleys and hills made from the multiple strands of fading brown yarn, my fingers tracing them gently, a giantess in an empty, open land. The heavy blanket felt so intrinsically woven together, it seemed as if the patterns of brown, red, and yellow would never come undone from one another. The silent air hung over me like a deadly weight, my breaths becoming laborious and shallow as I felt my face become hot with tears again. We were now miles and miles from our home, an old stucco house where we shared a wall with our neighbors, and where our family was last together. The ranch was all we had now. Sprawling and vast was this land around us; a rich field of beans, cabbage, and chili peppers that kept us fed, with a flock of bleating sheep and skinny dogs, now our only other company besides one another. I could hear my grandmother snoring from her room past the narrow hallway, cold and cracked mosaic tiles between us, her cross from palm Sunday adorning the creaky wooden door. My best friend and favorite sister, Alexis, was in a deep sleep, her emanating warmth comforting me far more than anyone’s empty words that night.  How could she sleep in a moment like this? I thought. I understood, too, we had all been exhausted from Mama’s sickness. Each in our own regretful way. 

Turning over indignantly, I nestled closer to Ana, who laid on the opposite side. The eldest of the girls, I felt safest around Ana. She had our mother’s long black hair that she had taught her to keep in the same simple braid she twisted and tied every morning, and her dark skin that did not resemble mine. But she did not have that natural, calming fragrance of my mother and she could not hold me with the warmth of a mother, little did she truly want any of that. I was disappointed to find that she slept silently, too, she was far too preoccupied with anxieties of her impending marriage to feel the permanence of Mama’s death. Perhaps she even felt a sense of relief, I wondered with suspicion, since now she was free from her born-duty of a bedside nurse to our mother. She had told me and Alexis of Ama’s death late that afternoon, clearly and without emotion, just as she had kept us informed of the sickness, too. Always, we prayed at night and at church for our Mama to heal, to the virgin saint. Despite our efforts, Ama’s health only became overwhelming, the foul smell of decay leaking into every distant conversation with her. I don’t think I slept that night. I must have fainted. My eyes and cheeks were tender, burning from the ceaseless sobbing, far after our candles wore down, nothing left but dull, melty nubs of burnt wax that would light no longer. 

El Rancho La Estrella was only a few hours walk from the paved streets and decorated cathedrals of Aguascalientes, although we rarely left the perimeter of the farm’s prickly barbed-wire fences that kept us pinned inside. It was Summer and we had been tasked with the busy work of the land. What else did we have? When we were not working to collect water, cook the meals, or clear the animals’ messes, we were resting or gossiping about Ana’s pretendientes. Our grandmother called us at once from the corral, our warm, damp bodies squeezing into the tiny kitchen. Together, we continued as one, breathing, sleeping, cooking, and grieving. I pummeled chili peppers, lime, onion, and avocado with the molcajete while Alexis helped Abuelita at the comal, the place I burned myself over and over again, until Abuelita sent me away from it forever. Ana prepared the large kitchen table with clay dishes for the evening meal as the rest of us set down hot round dishes and pans, emitting tiny clouds of steam each time we would dip our spoons in for a serving. Our grandfather was not yet back from his work in the fields off the ranch, and we patiently waited to begin. 

It had only been one week since our Ama’s death, when we had made the long trip to the cemetery, miles and miles away, where we laid her to rest. There was not the ceremony of a grand procession, because Ama had no brothers or cousins to carry her. Hours after the cemetery workers finally laid her casket in the ground, they returned to carry me away from that mound I had planted myself on. Grief had seized my body and mind, I could only lay upon that earth and wish to crumble into the soil to be with my Ama. It seemed like a lie that I would be apart from her from that moment on, it was a dream that would not end. When they were finally able to peel my body from the dirt, I hung limply, the sadness had taken from me everything that I had. 

My abuela took me in her arms, hushing me like an infant. 

“You must pray, Celeste,” she whispered to me like she was revealing a secret, but one I didn’t want to hear. “Your Mama is with God.” I shut my eyes, allowing her to rock me as she recited her prayers, not saying what was spilling from my heart. He had taken my mother, and I could not bring myself to reckon Him, for there was no purpose or blessing in this absence. I could not pray, so I wept. 

Once my sisters were asleep, even Alexis, I pulled the small bundle of letters from our sparse trove of belongings. I flipped through them mindlessly, seeing his curving letters that meant nothing to me. The last letter, dated 10 August, 1962, was two years ago, and was the shortest of them all. It had no more information than the last time I had inspected it, but even so, I closely analyzed each letter, each false word of promise. I thought of my father who had written these letters long ago, who once sold pan dulce on the side street of our little village, the rich, passing visitors who would ask his name before departing in a buggy that outranked the most valuable of what few luxuries there were in Villa Hidalgo. While he shaved ice for the children, pouring colorful juice that he pressed from his own fruits and vegetables, I would challenge them in their starched, stuffy dresses to a race along the rain gutter that lined the cobblestone path in front of his store. My leather sandals would be scuffed and filthy, but I would always win, my father handing me a raspado covered in grape juice, my favorite, he knew. 

“We will live in a castle someday,” he said to us, stirring our imaginations, dressing us in lace and ribbons with polished, expensive shoes in his ethereal fairy tales, unlike any of the dull patterns and burlap clothes that our Ama would scrounge up or sew back together for us. “You will see, just be patient.” Ana, believing she had outgrown these stories, would laugh at us, but still eyed our father when he would begin in his dramatic voice with the grand, illuminative hand gestures. Our mother would listen, too, shaking her head to hide her faint smile as she worked on a piece of clothing with her needle. She knew how often he thought of taking her and their family to the United States, for you could see on his face the desire for more, the hunger of one that was not satiated. He envied the travelers passing through their little town, the tall, mestizo men with pocket-watches and cleanly tailored suits. When he spoke of them, she heard the admiration in his voice and wondered about this devotion so deeply etched within his being.

“They tell me there are jobs there,” He argued with Ama, “We could have our own home, instead of living under someone else’s thumb!”

“But this is our home,” my Ama resisted him with her gentle voice. “We could not all leave at once.” In my childhood, I had never seen my Mama challenge my Papa - his word was absolute, we did not think of going against the grain, much less did we want the burns and wounds of his fury. We had seen the sad and poor women that left their homes with bruises, a worn rebozo to cover the purple shadows covering their elbows and the softest, fleshy parts of their arms. We did not see Mama as one of them, nor as one of the desolate and abandoned widows praying and clutching their rosaries together. They had no one to love them, unlike our Ama. It was not until long after his departure that I recalled those horrid nightmares, where my father would take the shape of a belligerent and hateful beast. After the rampages, we tended to the litter of our belongings and household items scattered and broken on the floor. He would suddenly transform the next day, regarding Ama as if she were made of glass, speaking softly to her with his bewitching words of promise. My sisters and I huddled closely in our bed, fearing our Papa and praying for our Ama, but mostly afraid for our love for our Papa. 

When we first received the wax-stamped letters, my sisters and I would happily shout and bunch up like a flower bud, Ana reading the neat, wide lines aloud to us carefully as our Mama listened in. Our Papa would tell us more stories about his trip, how his brother’s friends had property in California and we would soon live in a rich and opportunistic land, where we could marry and settle down with our own wealthy husbands and keep our own homes. Ama would frown when we demanded Ana to read it again, urging us to settle down because our loud voices were giving her a headache. We continued like this, hanging upon each of the letters with false hope that it would only be another month until we could see our Papa again. 

“Mama would scold us if she could,” Alexis spoke quietly as we were lying awake late one night, many days’ worth of neglected work awaiting us at dawn, but I could not sleep. “She would chastise us for wasting so many linens upon her deathbed. What are these for? I’m in heaven!” Alexis raised her tone slightly to imitate Ama, her attempt to draw me out of my stupor. 

“She has not left my mind once,” I admitted truthfully, her death and Papa had been plaguing my thoughts. Every morning we faced her death again, the hollow of her sudden absence widening. “We have the letters from Apa, and I know that he is gone. But Ama…” I covered my eyes from Alexis as a sob escaped my throat. 

“She is still here, Celeste,” Alexis comforted me, moving rogue strands of hair from my eyes as I sniffed and tried to halt my tears. I said nothing. There was a silence for a very long moment, until I thought my sister had fallen asleep and I began to drift off. 

“Celeste,” she whispered again, rousing me from my near-sleep. “I have been having dreams about Mama.” I tried to make out the details of her face, our father’s wide nose we shared and the birthmark-scar on her eyebrow, but it was far too dark in our windowless room. 

“What happens in them?” The dreams I was having of our mother, too, had been blotted from my mind, my heart too heavy to draw them out. A pang struck me as memories came back in bursts. She had felt so alive and so within my reach, her gentle, fragile fingers catching the little knots in my hair. I could not take it for her to be ripped away, again. So I shut the door in my mind. But my love for my Ama swelled and consumed me, larger than the grief that I came to embody, the lingering, thin memories of that dreamscape traipsing back in slowly, and then all at once. 

“I can’t ever see her face,” she said. I saw my mother’s braids swaying. “But she tells me she loves me and wants to see me again.” I felt my face warm, imagining my mother with her needle and a square of fabric. Our sick Ama, laying on her deathbed, helpless. “Remember what she would say to us before we would sleep? To pray to God for Apa?” I could no longer pretend to guard my tears. They flowed freely. 

“When I pray, I hear her and I can feel her near me,” my sister explained. “She can hear me.” I said nothing. “You should try it.” 

Alexis grasped at my hand under the blanket, resting a wooden, beaded cross on my palm. I felt immediately that it was our mother’s rosario, as my sister had taken a hold over it since our mother’s death. Truthfully, I did not want to hear her advice of prayer, nor understand what God’s purpose was. How could He? And how could my sister? I wanted to angrily refuse and to tell my sister off for her silly oraciones. But I began to hear my Mama’s voice, the soothing, melodic words that she whispered at Sunday Mass, urging me, pray for your brothers and sisters. Pray for your father.   

Dear Papa, 

It has been many years since we have seen your face, yet I can’t find any longing for ending this separation. I know, wherever you are now, we are better off without you. 

When I was still your child, you told us that our family would live happily one day, and it made me happy. I imagined that someday you would not hurt us the way that you always have, that Ama would kiss you and see love in your eyes again. This was all a lie. 

What you love, I found, is not our family. Ama was wrong, too, it seems. She thought you were in love with riches, seeing coins where rocks were. Do you remember, just before you left, when I asked you about God and what he had in store for me? You said, it was not for God to tell me, but a secret I had to find for myself. Is that what you are doing now, Papa? 

It has been over two years since your last letter, your absence speaking more truth than any of your bedtime stories. I wish, Papa, you could see how strong Mama has made us. How strong she was, until the very end. 

Goodbye Papa, 

Celeste 

-V-

Works Cited

Folan, William J., and Phil C. Weigand. "Fictive Widowhood In Rural And Urban Mexico". 

Anthropologica, vol 10, no. 1, 1968, p. 119. JSTOR, doi:10.2307/25604762.

Kelly, Patricia Fernandez. "Death In Mexican Folk Culture". American Quarterly, vol 26, no. 5, 

1974, p. 516. JSTOR, doi:10.2307/2711888.

Paz, Octavio. The Labyrinth Of Solitude. Grove Press, 1961.

 Honey barked 

A covered window, darkness 

Fitting itself under the doors. 

unknown danger, monsters afoot

devouring the wind from our trees, 

Having lunch, among the leaves

our hero appears, stolen from dreams, 

beloved warrior, fur of honey gold 

she runs like light 

screaming at the fright 

The night’s silence gutted, 

an atom cut in two, Imploding 

in a big bang across the dead house. 

Our hero at last, victorious, 

Her hubris

Starving us of sleep

The champion returns,

 To lie at my feet 

I lift the cover for her, 

A warm cinnamon roll under sheets. 

Santa Monica

 I plant myself firmly in the hot sand and it accepts me lovingly, my feet sinking easily into the shapeless abundance. I eventually hit the damp, cool layer of sand, which is the perfect consistency for sandcastles. If it’s warm today I don’t notice, yards away from us someone’s umbrella takes flight. We are only steps away from a busy arcade and the cascade of merchants selling magic crystals, personalized bracelets, shell jewelry boxes, and free prayer books. Sea waves and foam gather at the base of the pier, where the crashing isn’t as violent. Further out on the wooden mass there is a yellow roller coaster and the ferris wheel, just underneath are several massive beams that jut into the ocean floor. I imagine swimming under there for a split second, dodging those enormous blackened toothpicks covered in algae. 

You had made the critical mistake of forgetting a bathing suit, opting instead to navigate the summer boardwalk in Santa Monica. It was bustling with workers, tourists with pristine sunglasses and large cameras, locals on fixed gear bikes, a performer beating down on a plastic drum, and a visiting high school choir. Their collective ruckus was almost enough to drown out the sea. You walk past the merchants and the fishermen, reaching the end of the dock. It is noisy here, too, but in powerful gusts of wind and the waves tossing back and forth. Directly ahead is the horizon, a perfect line splitting the sky and the ocean. You wonder how far could it go, when does it become land again? 

Santa Monica pier sits atop the Pacific Ocean, an explosion of activity above the endless sea. Walking down the dock I remember when I was small enough to still fit on the rides, customizable license plates, and my high school circle of friends. Entering the arcade, it is a lucky draw if you find an operable machine. Many children are turned away, the last of their allowance eaten. Seagulls fly above and march around the food court in the middle of the pier, awaiting their share of french fries, chips, and dropped hot dogs. A street performer with no discernible skill carries a radio on his shoulder, pop music from the 2000’s blaring. From the pier you can see swimmers fighting back the current, and far off boats in the distance.

Article Sample for Financial Planning & Holiday Savings

  As we get closer to the end of the year and the holidays demand a bit more space in our budgets, it is important to put away our savings when we can and take advantage of bargain sales that will keep us on top of our finances at all times. While maintaining exactly where your money goes, you can also find new streams of passive income that will cost you nothing but your time with these three lifestyle & finance apps!

1. Etsy 

This marketplace website and application connects you to merchants all around the globe. As a virtual hub, this platform is widely popular for selling and trading crafty, vintage items, handmade artwork, and quality, secondhand clothing. Recycling pre-loved clothing is beneficial for the earth and your pocketbook, all while freeing up space in your closet. With the secondhand market, you can give yourself more freedom in your budget and make extra cash that can be put towards your holiday gift fund or investment portfolio! 

2. Receiptjar (AU) and Fetch (US)

Using only the camera of your cell phone and paper receipts, you can earn rewards that can then be redeemed for gift cards or pocket money through these applications! By collecting your receipt for market research, ReceiptJar pays forward a percentage towards your next purchase. For the frugal and wary shoppers, points are redeemable at Woolworths, Coles, Aldi, and Bunnings, to name a few, allowing you to save money on essentials without clipping coupons or filling out surveys. Don’t toss your receipts! 

3. Truebill 

If you have an endless supply of monthly subscriptions eating away at your bank account, you can set a budget and track exactly where your paycheck goes using Truebill. You can navigate and maintain your recurring expenses through the application since it connects directly to your account. It also conveniently provides the necessary contact information to cancel any unnecessary subscriptions so you can stay on top of your budget and in control of your finances! This application allows you to prioritize what you truly need in your life, and repurpose your money into a savings account or loan repayment.

It is important as we go throughout our busy lives that we pay close attention to where our money is going at all times, as this is our precious time and energy that may easily be repurposed! While we invest and utilize our cash flow in ways that will benefit our wellbeing, at times we may need a hand to get control of our budgets in an impactful way. By taking advantage of the tools we have at our immediate use, we can successfully build up our finances and create a future for ourselves that reflects the efforts we have invested into it!

Sample of Business Writing / Recommendation Report for a Large Business

 As part of my degree, I felt it fundamental to take on business-oriented writing as well as creative writing. The following is a link to a final project that I completed as per my Business Writing course, which establishes a business proposal I personally find very important. While this project was truly meant to teach us the proper form, research, and etiquette of writing for a Recommendation Report in address to a business or corporation, I personally found it very rewarding to find a real-life solution to a real-life problem. 

I took on my own place of employment in this project, carefully observing what I noticed were recurring and potentially problematic issues on a greater scale within the corporation. As a "green business," is it not within our best interest to truly live these values, and implement them within business practice, rather than parade these notions in marketing schemes and social media content for an increase in business flow? 

Below you may find a theoretical solution to a unique issue in further detail.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Lupp_Psq5USgKwGbZIE6fp7CNGKSS9rFxrADZI6VGjc/edit?usp=sharing

My Internship with SugarMammaTV

Over the course of my second to last semester of college, I participated in a virtual internship with a Sydney-based company named SugarMammaTV, as well as their companion business titled SASS Financial. 

My experiences working directly with Canna Campbell and her social media manager, Kristina, was enlightening, enriching, and truly a lot of fun. Never before had I been given the chance to perform writing duties for such a public audience, nor had I been given the experience of expanding my skillset with digital programs meant to diversify one's outreach through social media. While I was more than familiar with the use of Instagram and Facebook to perform community outreach and connect with potential readers / viewers, the concept of the creation of social media stories and videos was completely beyond my scope of understanding. 

Through my internship, I gained valuable life experience in cultural diversity and awareness, while extending beyond my degree in English by learning Adobe Premiere and Canva editing software. These are the skills that shall set me and my work apart, and I cannot be more grateful for the endurance that I was able to realize I had in me, but also for the simple chance to demonstrate these skills in a professional working environment. COVID-19 has left many opportunities seemingly desolate, however, online there is an entire world awaiting us. It only needs us to firmly grasp it, to understand that we must go further, push ourselves and what we believe we can do. 

The following are the articles that I contributed to SugarMammaTV, although I have omitted a number of Instagram stories, community outreach commentary, and video editing that was also a fundamental aspect of my development as part of my internship. 

 https://sugarmamma.tv/3-hacks-to-stop-procrastinating-and-start-achieving/ 

https://sugarmamma.tv/financing-with-compassion/

https://sugarmamma.tv/staying-sustainable-and-on-top-of-your-finances/

Wave to the Neighbors by Comet Sans

    Every morning at 5 o’clock, the train bellows and chugs a mile away from my home, crossing under the concrete bridge that I drive across daily to get to work. I often walk across this very bridge, looking over my neighborhood and into the cul-de-sac where my dog explores and sniffs the expanse of the street. Street lights outline the circular road and illuminate a crowding of vintage cars down below, nodding at the town’s greater reliance upon vehicles to maintain a close community. As dozens of freight-trains ship across the goods that we rely upon to survive, the future that the founders must have envisioned, an interconnected system with citizens happily straddling the line between metropolis and rural landscape, seems so tangible. Norwalk, California was named for the strategic acquisition of a railroad stop in the 1870’s, the “North walk” only hinting at what transportation would come to represent for the town.

    Just 17 miles from the second most populated city in the country, the artistic mecca of the pacific coast, my hometown has three major freeways running down through it, like arteries on a heart. We exist in a state of constant movement, dubbed the title of “gateway city,” we are only one in a chain-link fence that serves as the waypoint between Orange and Los Angeles County. By a grand stroke of irony, several interchanges and sections of freeway have been in an irreversible state of flux, in which construction hasn’t halted or made any progress in upwards of six years. The poorest citizens come to bear the brunt of these projects as multitudes of homes are seized for freeway expansion projects that are left incomplete in exchange for abysmal compensation and the total loss of memories, safety, and peace of mind. Norwalk’s neighboring city of Downey currently plans to expand a major freeway by seizing more than 200 homes from the Northern side of the community, which is largely made up of working-class, Latino families. The Southern side of town is largely made up of higher value homes and is left untouched by the project. While our town is highly regarded for an unparalleled system of transportation that makes Los Angeles city-life possible, a commendation of questionable claim for our ability to connect multiple communities with ease, the ethics of eminent domain remain questionable at best and inhumane at worst. Not only do these projects impact the local quality of life, it also represents a greater distrust between the people and the town as our needs are held second to the priority of transportation. The cacophony of major highways constantly undergoing construction with lack of a centralizing business or open public area doesn’t suggest interconnectivity or even resemble a community. Instead, Norwalk and the neighboring cities are often left in a confuddled state of disarray and dissolution. Our city, by design, is an in-between that you merely pass through. Thus, we stand still.

    As a kid I was often at a loss for stories about the local region. Erected at a crossroads in my town is a silhouette statue of Native Americans, a male figure pointing into the distance with a sign affixed above him, labeled “El Camino Real.” A Native woman holding a child’s hand follows closely behind him, and a wagon is beside them. This was the depth of my knowledge of the Native tribe that was here long ago, a vague outline of an idealized representation. In the fourth grade, we visited the San Juan Capistrano mission as a class and were taught about Catholicism and how it was spread by a very important Father Serra. We then were instructed to build individual church missions with miniature crosses made out of toothpicks, and write creative essays on how the Natives adapted to life on the mission. According to our teachers, the Spaniards were educating the Natives, teaching them the ways of God, and providing them with food and shelter. It even seemed like fun to live on a mission, I thought, and learning how to read. What they did not inform us about was the Shoshone tribe that was exploited for mission labor, and the depth of their loss after populations dwindled due to disease. Once living in built villages along the San Gabriel and Rio Hondo rivers, I imagine the Shoshonean soaking up their bounty of resources and living idyllically, living off of honey, berries, and the rabbits that still roam around the local Wilderness Park. Even this, I have found, is a simplistic view with the bias of history intertwined with it. It is a continual effort to uncover what has been buried, either by the purpose of erasure or under the test of time.

    Like many others within the past year, the repetition and endless slog of work and life met me every morning and tucked me in bed at night, and soon became so overwhelming that it seemed to leach into every chore, hobby, and person around me. What was once a month’s break from socializing and life responsibilities became a new reality, in which avoidance of others was now paramount to my bodily health, but destructive in every other manner. Out of desperation for connection and clarity, I did what any other writer or creative would do: I took my dog out for a walk. We opted to take to the streets when the sun is still down, traveling the perimeter of my neighborhood with a pair of airpods and a pepper spray. When we get to the top of the bridge we are both shivering and in a sweat, but eager to see the view. From here I can point out my place of work, my home, and off into the distance I can point out my junior high school. In the morning when I drive across, it is usually bustling with pedestrians on their way to school or work who must dodge the bikers that trail behind them in a similar rush. When I walk here, though, it is always quiet and we are unbothered. Part way on the bridge, there is a cemented staircase leading downward hidden in a grassy slope, at the bottom a fence blocks access to the railroad tracks. You can almost see my house from the top of the bridge here: our flood lights illuminate the dark corner, with a red exterior and succulents adorning the walkway. Looking down into the cul-de-sac, like a fishbowl, you can see the home of my older brother’s best friend, Nico, and his work truck sitting aside a collection of gleaming vintage cars. Across from him there is an older man that sits outside to enjoy the sun, at times with his infant granddaughter in tow. I don’t aim to stare, but their familiar embrace and her gleeful shrieks strike a sense of love into me that is just as forgotten as it is comforting.

    From the top of the bridge, a broken street light illuminates the black wires outlining the neighborhood, an electric trough to keep us all safe inside our neat, cookie-cutter homes. In the summer, the power always goes out when it’s the warmest time of the day. I have never seen any workers come out, but me and my little sister still cheer for them when the lights turn back on. On the block ahead of mine lives Mister Gill, the chaperone of several of my elementary school field trips. I don’t think he remembers me, so I never say hello. Just down from him is one of my childhood acquaintances and several more familiar-faced neighbors I haven’t spoken to in several years. While on our walks, my dog and I became experts at dodging obstacles, like it’s one of my video games: 1+ point for sprinkler systems, 2+ points for rogue cats, and 3+ points for people. At times they regard my dog kindly, to which I hardly ever respond. It’s safer like this, I remind myself, at least for the time being. Instead, I make friends with the enormous cactus that is just down the street from my home. I know, just by looking at it, it is the oldest of all other living things nearby. I raise my phone and snap a picture, attempting to immortalize its silhouette on my social media but the creation is far too majestic to be caught on film. Its arms are enormous and spindly, jutting into the air chaotically, but support their own weight as if by magic ropes. It tells me that we might be able to grow, against all odds, in defiance of gravity. Since we always go out in the dark, the cool air fills up the space that the summer heat revels in, but in wildfire season, smog and smoke have started to rob us of moon-lit walks and breaths of fresh air. I nearly want to apologize to the cactus for what conditions it must face, bearing the heavy burden of outliving us on this Earth.

    The house across from mine is now vacant, the family moving away to Tennessee or Arkansas or South Dakota. Service vans stopped by daily for weeks: first, there was a hearse, then a demolition team that spent hours pulverizing the wooden cabinets, drawers, and counters in their kitchen with heavy iron mallets. A tree-clearing service was next, and lastly, a trash collection bin. The following weeks were pin-droppingly silent. Their sons' loud, purple truck with painted orange flames across the doors no longer blared violently down the road, and their red-headed daughter no longer could be seen scoring soccer goals in their front yard. There are no new residents yet, and no one has come to look at the house. I kick the rocks layering the dirt around the sidewalk outside their house and recall their grandfather smiling at me, saying “every dog needs to stop at that tree.” I didn’t reply to him, but only laughed shyly at the time.

    It was not until my neighbors moved away that I would regret not speaking to them, and not offering my condolences for their loss. It dawned on me that I was ignorant of my surroundings and those existing in it, my knowledge of the Shoshone tribe turning out to be much like my ignorance of my neighbors: a distinct unawareness of their names, their desires, their roles in life, with a distant and shallow appreciation of them as people. While I had resented my hometown for the oppressive landscape built without a hint of creative expression or cultural significance, I had also built a wall between myself and the people living here with me. To advance beyond our current reality, at the bare minimum we must accept what has taken place and empower ourselves to create a new one. Instead of being a mere observer on these walks, I think next time I will try to wave at the neighbors.

C.S.