Track 1995

I found my mother weeping silently at the kitchen bar. She was sitting on a stool with her legs nowhere near touching the ground. I looked up at her and watched a steady stream of tears was gently gliding down her face like a miniature brook. It wasn't unusual to see my mother cry. Although, typically because of a novella or some movie about a murdered man's spirit seeking justice with the help of a sassy psychic. However, the TV and VCR were off. The only noise was from the bulky JCV HiFi dual cassette stereo system pounding the air with the deep bass of Tejano music. The sanguine tempo contrasted with the atmosphere's vibes that complemented each other, like sea salt and caramel.

We lived in a cramped two-bedroom apartment in San Antonio. There was always chaos with my two brothers and my little sister hollering and running around like little ferrets. This would be followed by my dad barking from across the room, "Cállate lo sico!!!". I never really learned Spanish, but I understood it if you were yelling it at me. Later, el casa de Maskill became a bit more chaotic, with two more children joining the cast. You know how in documentaries they always have an expert on something unusually specific like "isotoner glove size expert." My mother would hold the title of "the feeling of the world's most excruciating diarrhea pain known in existence expert."

My mother was crafting something out of a gold wooden frame and vibrant synthetic flowers at the kitchen bar that encased a drawing of a beautiful woman in a long sleeve blouse. Her midriff was slightly exposed, and she wore bellbottom like pants. The woman was holding a microphone and appeared to be singing her heart out. You could actually hear the drawing. It's remarkable how you can capture something invisible like that. My mother was so creative in those days. She once helped me with a school project about Native Americans and drew a Comanche tribe with teepees, horses, and headdresses. I had gotten many compliments from the kids in the class. Of course, my mother got none of the credit. I didn't want the teacher to believe I'd slacked off and had her do it for me. Mrs. Kahl never caught my bluff.

My mother's expertise was creating portraits of imaginary people. I like to believe they were perhaps spirits of those just passing by, and my mother was the conduit. These drawings could talk and move and had stories. I imagined the singer had a beautiful voice and loved to perform for people, and had a heart of gold. Optimistic and hopeful for the future. I could see people crowding this woman reaching out and singing with her. I've seen my mother draw countless portraits, but none with this intensity. My mother was channeling something profound.

Music was acting as fuel for my mother's fire that was burning onto this portrait. Oh yes, I would come to know this passion well. I'd spent days writing poems, developing music, painting worlds, creating characters to help make sense of it all. Then, there were the endless nights spent hovering over a sheet of paper, filling it with thoughts and imagination that would not relent unless I let it out. It's in my blood. When I would see her draw, I'd rush to my room to grab a paper and pencil and draw next to her. Cartoons were my specialty. She taught me how to tear a small piece of drawing paper and gently rub the graphite lines to blur them out to make shadows. This technique would take my Ninja Turtle drawings to the next level.

The floral frame was still growing with whisps of silicone drifted from the hot glue gun. Latin music was filling up the room and provided company. These songs were familiar to me and would become part of the soundtrack to my childhood volume 1990s. Bar-B-Ques, birthday parties, the car rides to the store. These songs were a direct line to the past. A file locator for specific memories. A mental google search. This song was tied to the 1995 file—a time where I had no severe worries or obligations. The only stress was trying to get past level three of "Streets of Rage II."

"Why are you crying, Mama?" I asked out of genuine concern.

"Nothing Mijo…go get your backpack." Her soul sounded exhausted.

So, I went to my room and grabbed my black backpack with the red trim. I loved this backpack because it had a velociraptor on it. A movie about a dinosaur zoo gone horribly wrong had come out a couple of years prior but was still popular as hell, and I was obsessed! I wanted to be a paleontologist because of that movie. I wanted to be many things when I was younger, a zookeeper, archeologist, astronomer, just a general scientist. I would check out books about space, ancient Egypt, and science with an unusual amount of joy for a kid that age. Other elementary kids would shit their pants about a severely burned man who kills teens in their dreams or a killer clown that ate children. I was terrified of supermassive stars imploding, shooting their guts out into space. Then, the remaining carcass of the star becoming so dense that it rips a hole into nothingness! Thus, pulling anything and everything that comes near it, deep into its self-centered void, and stretching them into spaghetti noodles! Maybe, not even God knows where you go afterward—that and mummy curses.

"Go and get your shoes," my mother hollered from the other room. "And help your brothers with their shoes."

Being the oldest child meant I was the vice parent. I had the mundane tasks of helping my siblings get dressed, serving them cereal, walking them to school, changing diapers, keeping them wrangled. Even before I started school, I was responsible for my little brother. My mother would run to the corner store and forage for food while my father was out on the battleship. She had developed a secret knock to the tune of some 80s yacht music for when she got back. Like some bouncer who worked the backroom gambling door, I only answered to "the knock." You fuck up the knock, that's it. I gave no chances. Luckily, it never came to that.

My mother was looking over her work of art as if she were taking one last good look before she was to set it free and placed it in my backpack. The band on the radio was giving their all. The woman was harmonizing along with excellence.

"I'll be dreaaaaming of you toni…"

Then silence. My mother set down the remote, and the air suddenly felt heavy like swimming underwater.

"Vamanos, ninos! Go to the car," she said in her "I ain't fucking around" tone.

Oh, the Buick. It was a Maskill custom to purchase Buicks. We believed that they were reliable cars able to take a good beating and only required duct tape and some wire to fix most issues. We would find them ripe from used car lots that resembled a junkyard or sketchy mechanic shops. None of the cars we ever owned had a working AC and at least one window that wouldn't roll up. An easy fix, though; just some shower curtain lining and duct tape, and you were all set. Driving in the rain or in the middle of July tested your endurance. None the less, my folks would always go for the ol' trusty broken-down Buick any day. If you were looking for a car, my mother would tell you, "Nobre! Go to the man on Probant. El vende un carro, a Buick, for $1000". Can't argue with those prices. At least the weather was nice and fair. My brothers and I had no idea where our mother was taking us, but we piled in any way.

We arrived at this building off-Broadway. To this day, I've never seen a building as bright as that one. It practically burned your retinas in the sun. It was like starting at the havens right into the eyes of God. Along the walls, families were leaving gifts of flowers, posters, and balloons. The signs had drawings of flowers with messages that said, "We miss you" or "Como la flor." In the middle of it, all was white rectangular posterboard with hundreds of signatures of admirers.

My mother was taking photos. It was common to capture these moments in the family. On my mother's side, you'd often see someone taking pictures at wakes, like a gothic family reunion. At my mother's father's wake, I was the photographer. It was the last time I'd see my mother with her brothers and sister together.

My mother always had a strained relationship with her father. If you told her a year prior that she would be front row when they finally laid him to rest, she'd say you were full of shit. My grandfather had left scars on my mother's soul, deep ones. In the last few months of his life, he spoke to his oldest daughter of six. His seed bag to let his drunken frustrations out on. Only at his deathbed, when coming face to face with the eternal void, he'd ask for forgiveness, not from God, from my mother.

More people started to gather at the luminous building to show their reverence. My mother was still taking photos of everything. Leaving offerings at the steps and all along the walls. I handed her my dinosaur bag and pulled out the framed drawing along with a note. It was magnificent in the light. She took another long look at the picture as her eyes began to glaze. The flowers were vivid and bright, and the portrait was glorious. Then she leaned the frame against the railing and let go. There, it stayed with the others. A tribute to someone who she'll never get to meet. The voice of my childhood and better times.

My mother's pilgrimage had come to an end. She took one last photo, and we made our way back to the Buick. I never asked my mom who her heroes were or who she looked up to. I'm reminded that she's just a person too, with hopes and dreams like me. I'm older now than she was in April 1995. At that age, I was struggling with what the fuck I wanted out of life, heading in a downward spiral of self-loathing and pity at terminal velocity, straight into 30 years of existence. On the other hand, my mother was already 4 kids deep, doing her best to keep us alive with only my father's salary. Who was I to bitch?

As we drove off, the voice on the radio came back on.

"Mama, what is she saying?" I asked.

"She's saying 'like the flower you give me with love, it wilted.' She had to leave, and it pained her," she answered.

As we drove past the building, I looked up and did my best to read the sign.

"bow-tick-que?"

My mother corrected me, "Boutique. This was her Boutique. That was her dream."