short essay

My Mother’s Hands

My Mother’s Hands

Originally published in La Liga Zine, Fall 2016. Published on Yeiry.com for legacy.

“Tan bonitas eran mis manos,” my Mom says when she looks at her hands. Once slender fingers ending in long hard nails with the power to instill the fear of God into me, now have become mangled rope knots from all those years of squeezing plastic meat in a freezer.

Doctor said it was arthritis. That the sub arctic temperatures shriveled her joints and the lubricant melted away like a modern day glacier. Her thumb permanently set at the angle where she would place expiration labels on food packages. The thumbnail hardened with the 14 years of precise movement in degrees below zero. The urgent capitalistic demands for production only furthered the conveyer belt of never ending lunchable packages, thin slice roast beef and smoked turkey. To this day, I still can’t eat cold cuts without thinking of how that freezer fucked up her body.

And even with soft marbles of swelling between her knuckles, she shows love by making things by hand. My Mom creates new life from old fabric with her sewing machine, whose motor is my most soothing lullaby.  

My hot pink prom dress
My sister’s gothic prom dress
The kitchen curtains with chicken fabric
King size bed spreads and tablecloths
Pillows with my private childhood nickname that I won’t say out loud
Dresses for the chihuahuas (yes, multiples)
A nightgown for her co-worker’s elderly mother-in-law
My favorite Halloween vest from 5th grade
Aprons for her sister-in-law in El Salvador
Burial dress for her closest cousin to be buried in
Crocheted hats in every shade of color the human eye can perceive
Embroidered cross shoulder purses
My school uniform
Her work uniform

tape measure along red textiles held by strong hands

Gif Courtesy of Yeiry Guevara

“Parecen manos de albañil” she jokes as the swelling usurp sore connective tissues.
— Yeiry Guevara

“¿Qué quieres que te haga?” she always asks me when she shows me new fabrics. The open endedness of that question. That, for this moment, she allows me to dream of anything I ever wanted. To fill my wardrobe with seams that know every inch of my body. With clothing pieces that fit me perfectly and fills in all the cracks of my confidence. Her sewing embraces my curves. You help me feel like my body is normal. That my body is beautiful. She would spend her last dollar on that specific zipper for our dresses. To manifest our vision of the piece. So I walk into that prom with the confidence of Dolly Parton and her coat of many colors. 

“Tu mama está en la máquina. ¿Quién la quita de ahí?” my dad tells me when I call the home phone. My mother is constantly makes things for other people. People she hasn’t met yet like her not-yet-born granddaughter. Always thinking beyond herself. Showing me that anything is possible with enough perspective and patience. Challenging herself to learn something new. Hammering belts buckles. Adjusting 48” waistbands. Creasing pleats on shiny fabric.

“Yo te lo hago” she waves at any two dimensional inspiration. She didn’t need a pattern to know how pieces and shapes fit together. I often think about the type of spatial reasoning, high end engineering brain that she has to create and assemble 3D forms without a guide.

These hands also find the shattered pieces of my spirit and thus heal with a simple “mija de mi alma y de mi tormento, mi reina”. She holds my face and my shoulders drop and my muscles exhale. She reads my distress so clearly like her favorite bible verse from a tattered songbook that crossed the border with her. I’m safe here.

These hands that have grinded masa on a metate before she even learned how to read.
These hands que son demasiada pesadas pero todavía siguen trabajando, haciendo la lucha para el pan de cada dia.
These hands that served as a tender midwife for our chihuahua and 4 newborn puppies.
These hands that have fed so many children that weren’t hers.
These hands that hold my faith in this life and beyond.
These hands that have eradicated my nausea, heartaches and panic attacks in the night.

“Parecen manos de albañil” she jokes as the swelling usurp sore connective tissues.

I wonder if the joints hurt.
I wonder if she can make tamales for this Christmas.
I wonder if I can learn the movement of her hands before time and the inflammation completely takes over her manual dexterity.

If the wisdom and tenderness swirling in her fingerprints will be passed on to my brute heavy hands, which are still learning the balance of how to be gentle enough to express the deepest affection and tough enough to surpass the struggles of the world.

Mami, deme fuerzas.

Gif Courtesy of Yeiry Guevara

Gif Courtesy of Yeiry Guevara

Platos Fuertes de Tia Lena

Tuve la linda oportunidad de pasar un fin de semana con mi familia en Memphis, Tennessee en los fines de enero 2018. De tantos Tios y Tias que tengo, son pocas las memorias de infancia que tengo con ellos. Cómo muchos de nosotros salvadoreños que somos de familias grandes, la triste realidad es que el tiempo y la distancia desafortunadamente hacen las familias más pequeñas. Mi Tia Lena ha sido la Tia con quien tengo muchísimas memorias de esa época feliz de niñez. Ella es la hermana mayor de mi papá y llegaron al mismo tiempo a este país. Crecieron sus hijos juntos y rodeados con mucho amor.

Los caminos de las vida nos tocaron diferente rumbos, pero a pesar de la millas de distancia en geografía, siempre seguimos unidos. El amor entre familia corre profundamente en la legacía de estos hermanitos. 

Mi Tia Lena ha sido una fuente de inspiración, fé y amor para mi desarrollo. Tuve la hermosa oportunidad de pláticar con ella, aprender su sabiduría y comer un cachimbo de chicharrones y tortillas hechas a mano. Ademas de ser tan sabia, mi Tia es un maravilla en la cocina. Ella le pone tanto cariño en cada cucharada que sirve. La comida tiene un sabroso toque a la experiencia, como de un chile que no se puede comprar. Cuando estábamos en la cocina, me quedaba admirada a su facilidez con el aceite caliente, con su agilidad en cómo palmeaba las tortillas para hechar al comal. Me ponía a pensar de cuantas tortillas había hecho en su vida, de todos los buches que se han llenado con sus tortillas. Nuestras pláticas empezaban en la cocina. La cocina siempre ha representado un espacio sagrado en el hogar, adonde las mujeres pueden compartir y aprender de una a otra en un ambiente sano y salvo. 

Unas de las pasadas que cuenta mi papá es cuando pasaron tiempos duros en Honduras, antes de la guerra de 1969 cuando muchos Salvadoreños vivían y trabajaban en Honduras. Mi Tia Lena, apenas de la edad de 13 años, ya podía hacer un almuerzo para su hermanos con sólo 10 centavos. Lena compraba 2 centavos de chacaras (unos guineos/plátanos gordos). Después con los 8 centavos de sobra, compraba asientos (los pedacitos de chicharrones de puerco, bien fritos que sobran en el aceite) y huaraches (un tipo de pan dulce) para comer con un cafecito. Ella también era buena para pescar chacalines en la quebrada, para que su hermanitos no comieran la tortilla sola. 

Mi Tia Lena demuestra su amor y cariño atravez de su comida. Cada tortilla hecha a mano, cada quesadilla horneada, lleva la tradiciones de su madre, su abuela y todas las mujeres valientes de nuestra familia. Me sentí chiflada con tanta sabrosura en mi visita con Tia que decidí dedicar éste ensayo a la maravilla que es ella, de lo que representa su comida y las fuerzas que ella demuestra en su ser.

Cuando sea grande, quiero ser como mi Tia Lena. 

Toda La Sabrosura

Mami Made

Mami Made is the sewing craft line I run with my Mom. Mami has sewn all her life. She learned  this necessary life skill while growing up in the rural countryside of El Salvador.  Her mother taught her to stitch as well as the insightful tactic of looking at fragmented pieces then making something out of it.  I write in further detail about Mami's handmade magic in My Mother's Hands.

The idea behind Mami Made was that Mami has always made beautiful practical things for me. After a night of listening to the purr of her sewing machine, my light bulb blinked on:  why not share her craft with the world? She thrives in the process of creating something from thread and fabric. My sister is an Art Therapist so the process of making art to heal runs in the family. Mami glows when she gives that item to its new owner. Mami Made is a way to nurture my Mother's creative spirit and share her craft.  

Below is a visual appreciation of the love that Mami stitches in each of her craft. Whether she's making my prom dress, a princess dress for her granddaughter, a vintage style cocktail dress to fit all my curves, Mami pours her humble love in every inch.

Thanks again to Remezcla for showcasing Mami Made

Unlearning My Sex Shame & Other Kinks

“Si vienes con una pata más larga que la otra, mejor ni vengas / if you come home knocked up, don’t even bother coming home,” my mother’s reaction when she found out that I held hands with Coco, my high school boyfriend. He was quiet, white and the first boy to actually ask me out. Naturally, my tomboy dweeb self was over the Coco moon. The one time I actually let him walk me to the public school bus, my Mom picked me up by surprise and caught me Coco-handed. She held her anger the whole drive home back to our immigrant, working-class barrio. The sex-shame volcano exploded once we got home.

Nada de Naranjas

Unlearning is 

a real team effort

a work in progress

She obviously thought the worst: that I’m going to get pregnant, that I’ll drop out of school, that I’ll ruin my whole life if I am in the back of Coco’s Volvo, fogging up the windows. That all their hard work would be trashed if I were to get knocked up. I get it. Statistically, I know I was the candidate for teenage pregnancy: poor, first-generation, working class, brown, Catholic in a red state. Also, being first-generation, I have to learn everything the hard way, trial-by-fire. Clearly, sex was one lesson I couldn’t learn hands on. I could understand the anger but I also was accused of something I didn’t do, much less even knew the mechanics of it.

In reality, I was book-loving dork who read the dictionary and newspaper for fun. I was super shy and only had a handful of friends. I wore wide legged jeans and baggy shirts to hide my lumpy growing body. I made my own jewelry and begged my tired parents to take me to the library every weekend. Pro-Hoe Yeiry wouldn’t even make an appearance until after college!

From that tirade, my mother instilled the fear of pregnancy without explaining sex to me. I was left with so many questions.

  • Is my virginity the only significant part of my identity?
  • Why does my hymen determine the integrity and honor of my family?
  • Does wanting to learn and explore my body make me a Puta?
  • Why is being a puta or santa my only options to exist in the world?

There was no Google God to pray to about this issue. All I had was a Catholicism rigidness and a very literal encyclopedia that had medical illustrations under the term “anatomy”. I’m a 16 year old living in Texas, with an abstinence-only education that barely even mentioned a maxi pad. I’m a stranger in my lumpy soft body. I don’t even know the texture of my hair. I have no idea where a tampon goes. But only married women are allowed to wear tampons, right? All I know is that I’m totally alone in this and I’m “supposed” to know things that no one had explained to me.

I internalized and hardened with the sex-loathing lava that exploded all over me. How was I to get pregnant if I didn’t even know what pieces went together? How was I to make sense of things when extreme hypotheticals were thrown at me? It was not a conversation. I had no choice but to obey some archaic belief where my hymen ties the family together. Let’s not break any of it.

Coco broke up with me over the phone during Christmas. He didn’t give a specific reason and just said it was best if we didn’t see each other. I agreed only because I was so confused that he didn’t like me anymore. I never shared with him the shit I got because he was white and he wouldn’t understand. Plus, there is only so much emotional intimacy a 16 year old can hold.

It took 15 years after that explosion to finally make peace with my body.

It took 15 years after that explosion to finally make peace with my body. There was not one road but a series of steps and tumbles that led to my sexual education. I learned more about myself through every relationship and one-night-stands. I healed from the emotional abuse I endured in my 20’s. I learned the cavernous chambers of sexual identity and pleasure. Finally, hands-on learning I can understand!

Unlearning is a real team effort. My older sister’s sex-positive attitude was a light at the end of the cervix. Years of therapy has given me the voice to speak up. A community of feminist peers with their support and communal learning, provided the space to learn and exchange. I have a great gyno who answers all the questions I have. I read books, pamphlets, brochures. I even got the courage to grab fistfuls of free NYC condoms. Anything to further my knowledge. I experimented and learned and laughed, all while shedding my internalized sex-shame one clothing layer at a time.

Unlearning is a work in progress. I still get shy about the topic with my Mom, although now she’s trying to be more open about it since I’m obviously an adult. I’m learning more about my body over time and how to listen to it. How to respond to it and to know what feels good or not. Owning my pleasure meant listening to my body. To be patient with my body. To be accepting of the wisdom it’s telling me; not to reject it because of some other external factor (i.e.: this partner won’t like me if I say this or this is what I’m “supposed” to do).

I am also assertive and vocal of continuous consent, very important for all parties involved. I no longer carry the extra weight of worrying what others will think or say just because I am living my truth. I own every inch of my body and it’s a daily affirmation I make to keep this peace. This body is not for a future spouse, or for childrearing or a trophy for someone’s stupid honor: it’s all my own, no one else’s. Managing my anxiety has also provided me the mental clarity to be present. To enjoy the moment and frankly, to breathe. I am able to be present in the moment, be aware of myself and to accept peace in myself.

No one tells you this about sex: it’s okay to take your time. In this hypersexed/youth-obsessed culture, sex can be weird. Sex can be complicated. The most important part about this sexual education is you: your comfort, your consent, your pleasure, your health, your safety. I don’t have the answers but I’m still learning to not feel any shame or guilt for any piece of me. Solo cuidate / take care of yourself in the process (condoms, birth control, abstinence, whatever works for you). Light up all the candles to the Google Gods and do research to learn.

Sexual education does not mean a direct pregnancy/life-sentence.

It’s a fucking conversation.