She showed up once a month or so, arriving in a battle scarred, rattletrap pickup truck almost as old as she was. She was a crone in faded overalls and laceless, toeless Keds, a bent and brittle straw hat perched on her head and an ancient, hot-spotted chihuahua tucked under her arm. She limped her way to the counter and gave us a wicked, almost lascivious grin that displayed her missing and niccotine stained teeth and when she spoke it was in a whispery, suggestive cackle. Tamales? she asked, cocking her head and narrowing her mucous filled, opaque eyes at us, Fresh tamales today? One of us usually nodded and she would limp her way back to the truck and return with an armload of hot tamales, wrapped in aged newspaper. Five for five dollars, she croaked and laid them on the counter while the chihuahua growled and bared his neglected, diseased teeth at us. She snatched the bills and crumpled them in one crooked, crippled hand then jammed them into a torn denim pocket and shuffled toward the door. The chihuahua gave a nasty, farewell bark as she climbed back into the pickup and then she was gone in a roar of exhausted muffler and a cloud of blue-black smoke. We never knew her name or where she came from and we never, ever allowed ourselves to think of what might be involved in the actual tamale making process.
Sister Mary Evelyn also stopped in once a month, a stocky, little nun in full habit, selling homemade baked goods for the benefit of an abused women's shelter. Brownies, pecan pies, breads and cakes and every flavor of cookie, meticulously prepared by the sisters and carefully wrapped for sale were transported in boxes in the back of an old station wagon. Sister knew an easy mark when she met one and accepted our money with a hushed thank you and a quiet blessing before gliding out to the old car to make her next stop. She was clearly a gentle soul but her eyes were sharp when engaged on her rounds and she discreetly counted every bill before giving us her thanks. That someone might actually try to shortchange a nun was an unsettling thought and we often gave her more than what she asked. Being in the good graces of a bride of Christ could certainly do no harm, we thought, and her's was a just, christian and very underfunded cause.
Peddlers, with their games and coloring books and stuffed animals, were thrown out with contempt and threats of the police. They were greedy and sleazy and their products were cheap and trashy. They smiled like carnival carnies and looked like shabby out of work car salesmen, they were brazen, loud and overly good natured, like Bible salesmen from the 30's. We showed them the door and were not kind about it. Sister Mary Evelyn probably would have disapproved of our treatment of them but the old tamales crone might have just as quickly put a curse on them. What would happen, we sometimes wondered, if all of them should arrive at the same time.
Nuns, crones and peddlers - sometimes life is like the lyrics of a bad country song.
Sister Mary Evelyn also stopped in once a month, a stocky, little nun in full habit, selling homemade baked goods for the benefit of an abused women's shelter. Brownies, pecan pies, breads and cakes and every flavor of cookie, meticulously prepared by the sisters and carefully wrapped for sale were transported in boxes in the back of an old station wagon. Sister knew an easy mark when she met one and accepted our money with a hushed thank you and a quiet blessing before gliding out to the old car to make her next stop. She was clearly a gentle soul but her eyes were sharp when engaged on her rounds and she discreetly counted every bill before giving us her thanks. That someone might actually try to shortchange a nun was an unsettling thought and we often gave her more than what she asked. Being in the good graces of a bride of Christ could certainly do no harm, we thought, and her's was a just, christian and very underfunded cause.
Peddlers, with their games and coloring books and stuffed animals, were thrown out with contempt and threats of the police. They were greedy and sleazy and their products were cheap and trashy. They smiled like carnival carnies and looked like shabby out of work car salesmen, they were brazen, loud and overly good natured, like Bible salesmen from the 30's. We showed them the door and were not kind about it. Sister Mary Evelyn probably would have disapproved of our treatment of them but the old tamales crone might have just as quickly put a curse on them. What would happen, we sometimes wondered, if all of them should arrive at the same time.
Nuns, crones and peddlers - sometimes life is like the lyrics of a bad country song.
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