The Vigils

November 13, 2003 | 10:14pm

My Latino cousins are a lot like broiled turkeys. They’re always really brown and accompanied with a white potato salad. Honestly, most of my "brown and proud" Chicano cousins are partnered with pasty white women, it makes no sense. Every time I see them—which is usually at food based holiday gatherings—they have more and more offspring.
When assembled for such gatherings, my extended family can consume an unlimited number of beer cases. Anything in stock or brought will be finished and eventually, an uncle will leave (drunk) to obtain more. But of these aunts, uncles, and cousins, none impacted my daily life like the Vigils.

I knew the Vigils (pronounced vee-heels) when they were a five-person family unit. Here’s the roster in chronological order of consumption:

Father: George
Mother: Veronica
Eldest son: Anthony
Youngest son: Ernie
Only Daughter: George-Anne

George is a veteran from some unspecified war that ended before my time. He has four fingers on his left hand. Local legend has it that he sawed if off while under the influence of Dos Equis, but such family rumors can never be corroborated. He’s usually drunk and I never talk to him except in mandatory greeting situations at the yearly turkey and menudo feasts. His arcane fading tattoos, limping walk and Tekeza slur used to scare the be-Jesus out of me so I apologize for not finding out where his little piggy really went.

Veronica is a smoker—always has been, always will be. When I was younger, she would make me kiss her cheek and the stench of tabacco always made me gag. I learned early on that I’d be shaken and yelled at if I dry heaved in her general direction, so to this day I just don’t breathe around her. She was also the first person I met who had her front gums permanently died black from cigarette smoke. Aunt Veronica has this wicked smile though, which I love, but this fascination for clowns, which I hate. The moo-moo was her trademark, and I never saw her in anything else.

On a particularly Marlboro eye-burning afternoon, my aunt Veronica led me up to her room to take a nap. She was baby sitting me while the rest of my village was excitedly busy in Santa Fe. It was commodity day. I think she was pissed off too, because commodity day celebrations were some of her favorite pastimes. And having a husband in the army got her hooked on the metallic sterile packaging and vacuum-sealed meals that although looked the same, could be either "peanut butter" or "steak and potatoes." My personal preference was the white cereal boxes with black labels that read rice flakes or corn flakes, they looked and tasted exactly the same.

But like I said, my eyes were burning and I couldn’t see in the smoky house. I used that as an excuse to take a nap on the second floor away from the smoke. She led me up as I rubbed my eyes with my fists. I quickly fell asleep. When I awoke, I was surrounded by hundreds of porcelain clowns staring at me!

I started screaming in fear and was disciplined for either being a loud little faggot or for hating clowns. I wanted to go home but everyone else was getting free commodities from the government and I was under the assumption that they wouldn’t return until I developed emphysema. I was also traumatized because I then knew who was buying those tacky dolls and plates advertised in USA Weekly and Parade Magazine stuffed into the Sunday paper.

Anthony, the eldest son was also the tallest. I never understood him. Once, for a practical joke, he dressed up as a bear. Now, in my community, we hunt bears and hang them up in our porches. We display our kills with pride. Well, at least I saw people do that, I never hung animals upside down in front of my house. When Anthony dressed up as a bear, my uncles of course took out their shot guns and hunted him down. They ran him up the hill by my house. Everyone was yelling, "Go inside, there’s a bear!"

You may be asking, "Why didn’t he just take off the mask?" Good question, all I can say is that when a bear waves his hands at you making the complicated sign that he really isn’t a bear but your cousin, it looks a whole lot like a bear is just waving its hands at you. But like I said, I never understood him.

Ernie and George-Anne win the award I like to call "Why didn’t I think of that?" During solar eclipses, the students at Tesuque Elementary would run outside. And under the careful supervision of our teachers, attempt to see the eclipse using a contraption on the ground made of foil, a 3x5 notecard, and a hole punch. I had no idea how it was supposed to work, but we were assured it was a safe and practical way to view the harsh sun. One time, after school finished, my brothers and I made the contraption and took it outside hoping to see the reflection in the foil. We couldn’t see anything and we felt stupid. Then, George-Anne staggered up to us violently leaning in one direction and then the other, blinking continuously, eyes wide-open eyes. She carried binoculars with sunglasses attached to the end and said, "Hey guys! Did you see the eclipse?"