PiÑata Mayhem

Edit: For some reason when writing directly into Vocal, it won’t let me type a lower-case ñ. So I apologize for that, but there is comedic value in it. I just figured out how to solve the problem, but I’m going to leave it in anyway.

As a Mexican that lives on the Texas Border I grew up going to a fair share of piÑatas. That's how we have birthdays for kids down here. Throw a piÑata. What follows is the grisly spectacle of brutality and horror that happens as children dismember a piÑata. It begins innocently enough. A child is given a stick and a blindfold, sometimes a parent spins him around and then he awkwardly tries to swipe at Barney the Dinosaur, or whoever, for a few minutes. During this time a song is sung, "Dale dale dale, no pierdas el pino...". Oh it sounds happy...as long as you're not a piÑata. Anyway let's say this first kid missed all the time...let's say he was a little kid with bad motor skills and poor hand-eye coordination.

Let's say they give the stick to a bigger kid. There's always one of these guys, the guy who takes the blindfold off in the middle of the song and starts swiping at the piÑata hard...over and over...a booming crush as one of Mickey Mouse's (or whoever's) limbs are severed off with a mighty blow...and the parents have to pull him away before he smashes the whole thing and ruins it for everyone. One arm down. Three limbs and a head to go.

Now at this time, I neglected to bring up the guy who holds the rope the piÑata is hanging from. Usually an uncle...or one of the bigger cousins. His job is to constantly make the paper Ma-chey cartoon character fly up and down so as to make it difficult to knock off limbs. Of course when the tiny three year old girl shows up to have a few swings, he makes it easy for her and just lets it sit there. Everyone is bored at this...except for the aunt whose singing.

Then maybe they let grandma have a go at it (I think I’m British sometimes. You’ll get used to it.) And maybe the Uncle harbors some resentment so he makes the piñata dance…hard. Grandma misses a lot and she isn’t even wearing a blindfold…actually no one wears the blindfold most of the time…but then she lands a crushing blow to the torso spilling candied cartoon organs onto the floor. And the kids and spinster aunts run in like vultures, scavenge what they can, consume sugary and spicy treats awaiting the next scene of ephigeal torture.

Now, there's more to this...but I want to fast forward to the grisly grand finale. At this point, the body of Spider-Man (or whoever) is missing all its limbs and you can see the wire mesh and newspaper guts strewn about. He is a visible man...and the candy entrails have been knocked out of him and heartily consumed. But it isn't over.

The uncle lets go of the rope. The aunt stops singing...and now it’s a free for all. Like wolves or hyenas the more blood-thirsty children descend on the body of Thanos (or whoever) and rip his head off, pull out the paper viscera and leave nothing but the skeletal grid of wires that kept it together. Some kids go as far as to dismantle that as well. Or they wear the head as a hat. Imagine a bunch of kids reenacting the Red Wedding from Game of Thrones…

The moral of the story is "Never mess with Mexican kids."