The Color of My Words

Wash Day was the day I’d get Mami all to myself. For me it was the best day of the week. Unless it rained. Then I’d have to keep on sharing Mami with everyone, especially Papi, who sat on the porch and never moved. Mami had no time to pat her hair down, let alone share private thoughts the way we did on wash day.

At the river’s edge, I’d tell Mami all the special things I had thought about during the week. If I wrote a new poem, I would recite it to her while we dipped our hands into the cool water. It was just me and her and the river. No other hands, no other ears.
Mami was the only person who knew I wanted to write books when I grew up. I knew it was a strange thing to want to do, because we sure didn’t know any writers around here. In fact, Papi told me that in the República Dominicana, only the President could write books.

I think it’s true. I went to the librería and I saw a lot of books by President Balaguer. I told Mami this during one wash day. We were pounding the clothes with rocks, and I gripped mine hard as I beat the dirt out of Papi’s overalls and my brother Guario’s waiter uniforms.

Mami didn’t say anything. She just kept turning her sheet over and over as she pounded away. Finally she looked up and said, “Ana Rosa, there always has to be a first person to do something.”

I think Mami was telling me that there was no reason why I couldn’t try to be the first writer who wasn’t President of our Island. Either that or she was hinting that I should run for President, and then if I won I could write what I wanted.

Sometimes Mami’s words are a puzzle. I have to spin them around and around in my head as if I am doing a mental merengue. Sooner or later I figure out the dance, but sometimes I wish she would just say what she means straight out.

Papi might sound as if he is talking in a puzzle, but I always know exactly what he means. Like when I asked him if I could have a notebook just for writing my poems in. He said, “Muchacha, your head is getting bigger than your hat.”