Our family at my house celebrating last Christmas--we were a total of 26!
Whenever I think times are tough, I like to remember what our first Christmas in this country was like. My sisters Beatriz, Silvia and I had arrived in Miami as refugees from Cuba on March 29, 1961, under what later became known as Operation Pedro Pan. After a couple of weeks in a refugee camp we were sent to Albuquerque, New Mexico, to live with American foster families and I was separated from my two sisters.
A few days after we reached Albuquerque, the ill-fated Bay of Pigs invasion began, breaking all communications with the island. For a month we had no idea of whether our parents and family in Cuba were alive, or if we would ever see them again. After a month, calls were resumed and much to our relief, we learned that none in our family had been arrested and taken away, though there had been mass arrests throughout the island during that Week of Terror.
My mother and youngest sister Cecilia arrived in Miami at the end of August, leaving my father behind. For three months my mother looked for work and just as it seemed hopeless, a teacher at St. Vincent's Academy, where Bea and Silvia attended school, became too ill to finish the school term. My mother was hired as a susbtitute teacher and Catholic Charities sent two one-way plane tickets for her and Cecilia. They arrived in Alburquerque at the end of November, and moved into a tiny casita near Old Town that the local agency had found for them.
Catholic Charities had paid the rent for two months, but unfortunately they had expected my mother to arrive earlier and by the end of November, the second month's rent was almost used up. Mom had to pay December's rent and utilities with her first paycheck, leaving us with next to nothing to live on. Bea, Silvia and I were so anxious to be reunited with them we moved in right away.
It was hard for the five of us to fit in the ramshackle house we nicknamed "el gallinero" (the chicken coop). Silvia and I shared a double bed in the converted porch, so small there was just enough room to turn around between an armoire and the bed. Bea and Cecilia shared another double bed in a slightly larger back bedroom, and my mother slept in the fold-out couch in the living room. The house had only one heat vent located between the living and dining area while ice formed inside the windows of the rest. The bathroom had a broken window pane that let the icy air in, and there was no place to store most of our things. It was a huge step down compared to our comfortable, well-ordered house in Cuba.
Albuquerque's historic Old Town was a few blocks away so we could could walk down to see the old plaza and San Felipe Neri Church decorated with the traditional New Mexican luminarias. We looked at the beautiful displays in the windows, knowing we couldn't afford a single present, not even a string of lights, much less a tree.
Putting creativity to use, I made some silly drawings for my sisters as Christmas presents. And, applying my recently-learned sewing skills to a found scrap of fabric and a bit of black lace, I made a tiny coin purse for my mom. This little gift would turn out to be iconic--my mother kept it with her always. Many years later, she told me the irony was that at the time she had not so much as a dime to put in it.
In fact, had it not been for the kindness of our friends, there would have been no Christmas dinner or much food on the table those two weeks of Christmas break. The Davis family, Greek immigrants who helped us greatly during those days, gave us a Christmas basket full of staples and a small turkey, and the family of my classmate Pat Duran invited us to share their feast on Christmas day. But as the week before classes were to resume came to a close, the larder grew empty--we were down to the wire.
Mom thought to search her suitcase, hoping that perhaps she might find she'd dropped a quarter or two in there. There, in a pocket of the suitcase, was a twenty-dollar bill! She had forgotten that one of her friends in Miami had insisted on her taking the money just before she left for Albuquerque, in case of an emergency. Nena Segura, for that was the lady's name, to this day, is blessed in our family--her sacrifice, for she must have been having as hard a time as we, saved us.
It's been forty-eight years since that memorable Christmas but it's still very close to my heart.
