She helped with the chores, and learned how to cook, wash clean and keep her eye on her brothers and sisters. My mom didn’t mind helping, but she eventually wanted to become someone, to obtain an education. My grandma didn’t believe in that, she wanted my mom to learn to become a good wife and later find a husband. Around the age of sixteen, my mom was advised that she should start looking for a suitor, so she could get married around the age of eighteen, twenty at the latest. My mom had other ideas, she believed in becoming more than someone’s wife. Being a wife should be a choice, not the only option. When she turned eighteen she saw that she wasn’t going to get an education, so she went to the convent and asked to become a nun. This way she would obtain the education she wanted, and become a teacher. This made her parents proud and was an acceptable option.
After dead-heading the roses, Sister Helena led me to see the animal pens. They had goats they used for milk and chickens for eggs. She also showed me the vegetable garden where they grew some of the food. Then she took me down a hallway that was a little darker, it was at the edge of the far rear courtyard. I saw what looked like a row of tiny cells, they looked like jail cells. I asked sister Helena what that was, it looked interesting. Sister said that these were the cells where nuns come sometimes when they feel they need atonement. They would seclude themselves in the cell for a few days and pray. They also flogged themselves to achieve atonement. Once they felt they had done enough to make things right, they would come back out and join the others. They would be there in seclusion usually for no more than three days. They could eat bread and water, but had no visitor. The nuns just dropped off food once in a while, and checked on them. They were not to be talked to or interrupted in their prayers and meditation.
I asked if my mom had been there too. She said yes, she had. The image in my mind was strange, and a little morbid. I somehow in the dark recesses of my mind, I thought I would like to watch a nun do this; it seemed so mystical, dark, and highly secretive.
After this long talk, I asked Sister Helena why or how I happened to come into the picture with my mom. I explained to her that my mom had told me that I had been adopted from a hospital that had been left by my mother at the hospital and I was very ill. I was just left there to be taken care of, that she had found me there, and asked to adopt me.
Sister Helena then told me that when my mom was sent to live in different convents, they moved her around, and that it’s normal. She studied hard, she obtained her PhD and became a teacher. After she had obtained her degree, she was placed in a school in Tijuana, Mexico, that is where the order needed her. Back here, they all heard that she had been an great teacher, and was loved by all her students as well as other teachers.
Something went wrong there apparently. My mom was removed quick and sent to Honduras. The school was sold or lost, in short, the school was taken from the order by the government. Sister Helena said she lost contact with my mom then. She was gone for a couple of years, and when she returned she visited her family briefly, and then she requested to be placed back in Tijuana. She explained that she was familiar with the people and the area; but the order refused to place her back in the place she had fallen in love with. It was not clear if that was the reason why she left the order. She left the order during that time, and moved to Tijuana on her own. Her students were now professionals, they helped her find a house and establish herself. They also helped her build her own school.
Sister Helena only found out I existed, when my family told her my mom had a daughter. They said I was adopted and my mom had passed away. They said that they couldn’t take care of me, so they were bringing me here. Sister Helena said she didn’t understand why having a family, they would leave me here, but she was nobody to question their wishes. She said they were happy to have me here.
Katie’s Journal Entry
No now here I am, writing in the evenings while the day winds down and I have a little time.
The weeks seem to be going by fast. We have been getting up early to do chores. The laundry has to be washed by hand, it has to be done and hung to dry by 7 am. After we are done with all that, we have prayer and breakfast. Us older girls have to take most of the chores, because the younger ones are too little to do that much. The little ones have a few toys to play with, nothing like all the toys I had when I was at home with my mom. I know, I was spoiled and had so much. The girls had a jump rope made of yellow plastic rope, a set of jacks, and Elena had one doll. And of course, there is plenty of paper and crayons to draw with. I especially love going to see the farm animals at the animal pens, sometimes I am allowed to feed them. The rose garden is beautiful to walk through in the evenings, I keep thinking I am walking the same gardens that my mom used to walk through when she was young. I went back and walked past the cells imagining what it was like for the nuns to seclude themselves. The cells were quite eerie and somehow they held an irresistible attraction.
Katie’s Journal Entry
I was out in the rose garden with Rosie, we were drawing and just talking. Then we heard a loud bang and then laughter. We went across the yard to the end, near the showers; I saw a ball rolling by near the shower stalls, and ran to pick it up. Rosie said, “It’s the boys again, just throw it back”. I went up to the fence and climbed up the vine covered fence despite Rosie’s protests, then I asked her for the ball and she gave it to me as I sat on top of the fence. I saw the boys, there were three, one of them immediately caught my eye, he was taller, scruffy brown hair and blue eyes. He was covered in dirt, which made me giggle. He came up to me as I handed him down the ball. He said “thanks” grabbed it, smiled at me for a moment, then ran off to join the other boys. They continued playing as I watched. Then I felt Rosie pull my pant leg, her voice was becoming more desperate, “Come down off of there; you are going to get us in terrible trouble, please!” I got down and told her, “The nuns are busy, they won’t know”. I figured, what could go worse for me? I am already at the last pit stop, but I felt concern for Rosie though; she’s nice I shouldn’t get her in trouble.
Katie’s Journal Entry
That tall boy seems to have figured out what times I come take a shower at night. I used to shower late, when nobody was left around.; he seems to have had the same habit. I knew it was him because I had climbed onto the fence again, to take a look. That first time I saw him, he was coming out of the shower with a towel wrapped around his waist, and his hair all a mess. So I went to the fence last night and whispered to him, just saying hi, I asked his name and said I had noticed he showered at the same time I usually did. He said his name was Alex, and we talked for a moment. He has parents, but they brought him here to go to school. He used to go home for the Holidays, but in the summer his parents go on a cruise and he stays here. They told him it was for his own best interest; that his education should come first. He was 17 like me, and his family was from Riverside originally. I was so excited to find out he spoke English, and understood so many things other people out here had no idea of. Like malls, Kit-Kats, and ice-cream at Thrifty’s after school. Those little hings we took for granted years ago, and now sorely miss. Even TV shows, we have no TV allowed here either, the only time we can watch is Sunday evenings, and the nuns pick the channel. That means we watched the variety show, where people try out their singing and talent. I didn’t miss TV that much, but it used to be nice to watch the Dukes of Hazard, or the Love Boat on a nice quiet evening with my mom.
Katie’s Journal Entry
I have started developing an attachment to this boy. Alex heard all my stories during our late visits this summer. He has heard my secrets, my dreams, and he shared his, I understood him too well. We had many things in common, and I totally got him. He didn’t call me stupid, he didn’t tell me I was bad, he accepted me for who I was, and that was such a relief. We seemed
