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M Y S T O R Y

TABOOWITHSTEVE DENNIS

A TOUCHST ONE BOOK

PUBLISHED BY SIMON & SCHUSTER

FALLIN

UP


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Touchstone

A Division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

1230 Avenue of the Americas

New York, NY 10020

Copyright 2011 by Tab Magnetic, Inc.

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions

thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Touchstone Subsidiary

Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

All photos not otherwise credited are from the authors personal collection.

First Touchstone paperback edition October 2011

TOUCHSTONE and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

For information about special discounts for bulk purchases, please contact Simon & Schuster

Special Sales at 1-866-506-1949 or [email protected].

The Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau can bring authors to your live event.

For more information or to book an event contact the Simon & Schuster Speakers

Bureau at 1-866-248-3049 or visit our website at www.simonspeakers.com.

Designed by Ruth Lee-Mui

Manufactured in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

ISBN 978-1-4391-9206-1

ISBN 978-1-4391-9208-5 (pbk)

ISBN 978-1-4391-9209-2 (ebook)


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For Nannyor your love, in your memory.


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I one advances condently in the direction o ones

dreams, and endeavors to live the lie which one has

imagined, one will meet with a success unexpected

in common hours.

Henry David Thoreau


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Contents

Authors Note

PrefAce

chAPter oNe: LeAviNg Dog towN 1

chAPter two: DreAmiNg Big 14

chAPter three: BreAkiN out 24

chAPter four: strictLy tABoo 33

chAPter five: souL chiLDreN 42

chAPter six: misfits & mishAPs 55

chAPter seveN: fANtAsyLAND 71

chAPter eight: PizzA & PePsi 80

chAPter NiNe: heLLos, gooD-Byes 89

chAPter teN: gettiNg sigNeD 102

chAPter eLeveN: exPosure 113

chAPter tweLve: the LoNg roAD 122


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chAPter thirteeN: gettiNg wArPeD 142

chAPter fourteeN: chANge it uP 155

chAPter fifteeN: PeAs & Love 175

chAPter sixteeN: strAtosPheres 193

chAPter seveNteeN: hAzy DAys 211

chAPter eighteeN: moNkey BusiNess 228

chAPter NiNeteeN: ANgeLs & DemoNs 245

chAPter tweNty: the ePiPhANy 265

chAPter tweNty-oNe: the hAPPy ever After 283

chAPter tweNty-two: A DreAm withiN A DreAm 294

chAPter tweNty-three: the e.N.D. 309

AckNowLeDgmeNts 323


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Leaving Dog town

we all say were mists in the Black Eyed Peas, and I really was born one.

Ive oten imagined the looks on everyones aces when I arrived into

the world on July 14, 1975, shortly ater one oclock on a baking Los Angeles

aternoon. There I was waiting to burst onto lies stage as this eagerly awaited,

dark-skinned Mexican-American boy with Native American ancestry, and then I

arrived . . . as light-skinned as could be.

Oh look, hes as white as a coconut! were the rst words that greeted

my birth, spoken by my ather, Jimmy.

With parents who were both dark and with Shoshone blood running thick

on Moms side, this was not the shade o baby that had been ordered.

Uncle Louie, my moms brother, arrived in the room, took one look at me

and said: He looks like a long white rat!

Mom said she was just grateul I came out ast.

Im not saying I was a disappointment. Im just saying that I was breaking

the mold rom the moment I came out o the gate. It should, thereore, have come

as no surprise to anyone that a) I grew up eeling a bit o an outcast, and b) there

was a good chance Id ollow through and be a nonconormist. From day one, it

was clear that I wasnt going to ulll anyones expectations o me.

Nanny got it: she would later tell me that she knew I was going to be di-erent rom that rst minute. But in her accepting eyes, dierent in a good way.

I guess even then she could tell I wasnt going to be your average pea in a pod.


10/22

2

I was born at East Los Angeles Doctors Hospital, directly o Whittier

Boulevarda seemingly never-ending street that today is crammed with markets

and dollar stores but which was once a cruising capital or the young chavalos

in their low-riders on the Eastside in the 60s, as immortalized by a seven-piece

Chicano group called Thee Midniters. Not much came out o East L.A. back then

beyond their 1965 hit Whittier Boulevard, which led to them being reerred to as

the local Beatles, though I doubt John Lennon and Paul McCartney sweated it

too much.

At the baby shower a ew weeks beore my birth, my mom couldnt stop

dancing. She heard music and just had to start moving.

Laura!! everyone saidLaura was short or Aurorayoure going to

have the baby i youre not careul!

But I cant stop dancing. I need to dance! she told them.And she danced and danced, and everyone laughed, or about two hours

solid.

Mom says she knew I was going to be a handul then and there. Its good

to know that, even in the womb, I was injecting the Black Eyed Peas vibe, jumping

around, rocking it, getting everyone on their eet. Mom said it was like that or the

last three months o her pregnancy.

Thats why I like to think I started dancing even beore my lie truly began.

I also like to think that I gave Mom air warning.

I you met me in the street and you knew nothing about the Black Eyed

Peas and asked my name and where I was born, the reply could mislead you. Id

give you my birth name: Jaime Luis Gomez. Id tell you where I rst grew up: a

Mexican-American community in East L.A. That would probably surprise you, be-

cause you might, as many do, mistake me or an Asian. I I told you the projects I

grew up in and you knew the Eastside, Id catch that look in your eye and Id say,

yeah, thats rightthe neighborhood nicknamed ater a street gang called Dog

Town. These are the stamps o my identity, about as inormative as markings in a

passport. They tell you nothing about who I am or what my story is, and what it

urther explains to me, looking back, is why I never elt I belonged rom day one.

Dont get me wrong: no one is prouder than I am o my Mexican-American roots,

but these are merely my roots and national identity. This inormation doesnt com-

pletely dene me.

Mr. Callaham, my sophomore English teacher, once said every story

needs a good beginning, middle and end. I remember him saying that. It must have

been one o the ew times I was listening and not daydreaming my way throughclass.

The thing is, I didnt much like the story that was laid out or me: the La-

tino who should understand his place in the world stay loyal to the hood get a


11/22

real job and do the nine to ve thing. I didnt see a good beginning, middle or end

in that.

What youve got to understand is that in my community, there was the

story you were handed at birtha carbon copy o the one issued to everyone else

around you; a uture o limitations that asks the dreamer that dares to be dierent:

What makes you think youre so special? I think that I was born with something

o that Indian warrior spirit that Nanny talked about, providing me with a deance

that reused to respect pre-established boundaries. To me, youve got to be willing

to smash your way out o any ice block thats encased you. Youve got to be will-

ing to break out and be as original as you want to be, become the person you have

the potential to be, as opposed to being the person others expect youshould be.

It is about ripping up the hopeless story and rewriting the dreamers script. Some-

thing innate within me knew this rom being a boy.There is a quote that me and my homie and best riend David Lara oten

remind each other o: Those who abandoned their dreams will always discourage

the dreams o others.

I learned rom an early age that ew people tell you what is really possi-

ble, except or ree spirits like Nanny. Because, i you become the one who does

make it happen, then it reminds others o their own limitations and what they,

maybe, could have done, but didnt choose to. Find any tight community and then

nd the dreamer within itand therell always be a gang o naysayers pissing on

his or her parade.

That is why there is much more to me than where I come rom. Because

it is what was invisiblethe determination, the belie, the perseverancethat

shaped my story, and or those people who stonewalled me with doubt or never

believed where I was headed, only one silent reply ran through my mind: Oh, you

dont think so? Okay, just watch me.

My mom, Aurora Siuentes, and dad, Jimmy Gomez, met at a Mexican

market on the Eastside. Mom was out shopping with Nanny, Aurora senior, when

their paths crossed. It probably says a lot that I dont know much more about the

romantic part. Mom was a twenty-year-old student, securing qualications that

would ultimately get her a job as an ocial with the Los Angeles Unied School

District, and Dad was a twenty-three-year-old mechanic. Hed previously had a

relationship with a woman named Esther that produced a sonmy hal-brother

Eddie who is our years older than me. I dont know the details o that messy story

other than Eddie ended up staying with Dad.

Mom and Dad ell in love, got married and she was pregnant with me attwenty-two, but the honeymoon period didnt last long because, as Mom would

tell me, there were two sides to my ather. His better side was the kindhearted, a-

ectionate gentleman His bad side was the drinker and when this side kicked in


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4

the good-looking charmer ell away and exposed the fawed man. He wasnt a bad

man, but alcohol sadly changed him. He would later get his act together, but not

beore it was too late as ar as Mom was concerned.

Apparently, he perormed a drunken dance called the Pepe Stomp. Ba-

sically, it involved nothing more technical than him stomping his eet on the spot,

getting aster and aster. There was this one time when he lost his balance and ell

backward into the playpen that was set up or my arrival. He crashed into it and

was rolling around drunk. I wasnt even born yet and Mom was already worried or

my welare. The nal straw came during an argument when he picked up a bicycle

and threw it at her when she was ar into her pregnancy. The bike didnt hit her, but

almost fattened my hal-brother Eddie who stood there wailing over his near-miss

with this two-wheeled projectile. Mom was smart enough and strong enough to

get out soon ater.That is why I dont know my dad. He was at my birth and hovered around

the edges or a bit, but he was one o those dads on paper and by blood, not by

deed. He had next to nothing to do with raising me. Mom used to laugh that his

avorite song was Daddys Home by Shep & The Limelites. Not bad or an absent

dad.

I admire Mom or having the courage to make a new start and choose the

lie o a single parent. In many ways, it would have been easier to stay, but she took

the tougher choice and a part-time job in a toy store near downtown L.A. She was

no oreigner to hardship. In her childhood, home had once been a garage converted

into a makeshit studio, shared with Uncle Louie and Nanny.

Nannys name was Aurora Acosta when she married Luis Siuentes. I

know nothing more about Granddad other than that he was always suited and

booted, and he let her at an early stage o their marriage. I never have understood

why I was named ater the two most unreliable men in the lives o the two ladies

who raised me: Jaime and Luis. Maybe I was intended to be the improved version

o both men?

Mom always said I was handsome like your ather but I personally

thought he was on the ugly side, so I never thanked her or that. I had his nose,

ears and name, but the similarities ended there. Im tall, he is short. He is dark-

skinned, I am light. I have ambition, he did not.

Nanny remained on amicable terms with Granddad, but, back in her day,

a single mother o two standing on her own two eet was as good as marooned, so

it was a good thing she was a survivor.

Her rst priority was getting a roo over their heads, and she knew some

riends who had garage space.I dont have much money, but Ill rent it rom you, she oered.

And do what with it? they asked.


13/22

Turn it into a home, said Nanny. And so this spotno bigger than a

denwas where the amily lived or a bit, complete with heaters, urniture, and a

small portable television, and she made it as comortable as she could aord.

When it came to new clothes, Nanny made them out o whatever ab-

rics she could beg, borrow or nd. She struggled big-time to support her children,

but shed take no heroines credit. All that matters is amily, she once told me,

and the rest will take care o itsel.

I dont think she needed a man ater Granddad because there was only

one man she ever trusted ater thatand His name was God. The act that she

ultimately managed to buy her own home when her kids had grown up and moved

out speaks volumes or the aith she had, and the impossible situation she turned

around.

With that denition o what struggle really eels like, it is easy to see whyMom thought it was no big deal going it alone. But she wasnt alone. She had me.

And those next ve years were to be the happiest time we would share. It was just

me and her versus the rest o the world.

I could not see horizons as a child.

Everywhere I looked, there were walls, ences and gates hemming us in,

and the great concrete slab o L.A. County Jail stood six foors high and all ugly-

looking in the distance, about a mile down the road. I lived within a concrete jungle

within the concrete metropolis o Los Angeles; a part o the city that the tourist bu-

reau doesnt promote; a poor vicinity that is a world away rom Sunset Boulevard,

Melrose Avenue, Beverly Hills, and the beaches.

The neighborhoodel barriowas one o government tract housing built

in 1942 or low-income Mexican-American amilies. The projects, they called

it. The ocial name was the William Mead Housing Project, and it housed our

hundred ty cookie-cutters that stood back to back in bleak uniormity; two- and

three-story brick blocks painted tan-red with a thick white-painted band separat-

ing each foor. The number and color o the ront door were the only marks that set

each unit apart. I swear that even the palm trees and triangular washing lines were

in the same spot outside each block.

It was not a place where dreams were made, and lie was tough because

o all the unemployment, drugs, and crime. Peoples lives seemed as cookie-

cuttered as the housing units, and options were limited. But however bleak lie

seemed to the outsider, there was a strong sense o amily, community, and the

value o sticking together.

Home was a rst-foor corner unit at the end o one o the oblong blockso small-ass apartments. It was nothing more than a studio apartment with a grilled

ront door, and Mom and I were two out o an estimated 1,500 residents on site,


14/22

6

bounded by the county jail on one side and the Los Angeles River on the other.

The river ultimately ed into the Pacic Ocean at Long Beach, but thats the only

idyllic-sounding act I can bring rom the hood.

This rst home was a special place because it represented the world I

shared exclusively with Mom. The walls were all white and there was enough room

or one red foral-print soa that clashed with the yellow hard-backed chairs at the

round wooden dining table. We shared one bed and had one black-and-white tele-

vision set. The ront door opened onto a balcony that, when I was pretending to be

a soldier or warrior, became my look-out post on the world, under the spotlight o

the Caliornia sun.

Nanny Aurora was a constant visitor, coming over on the bus rom her

place in South Central L.A., and all three o us would sit outside on that balcony,

eating Nutty Buddy ice-cream drumsticks that she brought as a regular treat. Nota week passed without Nanny visiting, or else we got on the bus to visit her. The

mother-daughter bond was erce, and I, as the avorite son and grandson, was the

lucky kid who got all the love and attention in the middle.

One foor below the balcony, there was a worn and scorched patch o

grass. Scorched by the sun and worn by the wheels o my red Big Wheel bike. This

patch was both my playground and stage as Mom busied hersel upstairs, keeping

watch as she listened to her disco vinyl collection o the Bee Gees, Donna Sum-

mer, and Chic. She was a bit o a disco queen, and i ever I hear Chics Le Freak

or Lipps Inc.s Funkytown, it always sends me back to blazing hot days playing

outside my rst home.

I spent my earliest years running around kicking a ootball and riding my

Big Wheel on the surrounding paths, eet in the air, pretending to be CHiPS on

highway patrol. Mom oten sent me out in costume: as a warrior, a pirate, or a

bad-ass luchadora masked Mexican wrestler. She stued my shirt with pad-

ding and gave me a towel or a cape, and I pulled o some killer moves to win

the campeonatothe championshipby nailing key matches with imaginary

opponents. I was always pretending to be someone or something on that grassy

stage because there was no aording the hi-tech Atari console and its alluring

game cartridges.

I look back now and see how basic lie was, but we didnt grow up want-

ing or grasping or anything. We were the have-nots who didnt know what it was

to have. It was the same or all o the lower-income amilies, and we killed the

hours by playing ball and making our own un inside pretend worlds.

I played alone a lot o the time. I saw Eddie now and again, as Dad drited

in and out or the rst two years o my lie, ghting to be allowed back in, but al-ways coming up against Moms wise blockade.

As boys, there was one thing our young eyes couldnt miss: the monster-

sized grati on every wall I grew up reading the words DOGTOWN on the end o


15/22

each block, on stone walls and garages. These black-sprayed letters stood taller

than me, and this one phrase became the adopted name or the housing project.

I didnt grow up saying I lived at William Mead. I grew up saying I lived at Dog

Town, without rst knowing what it meant. Until one day, my curiosity got the bet-

ter o me as I walked back rom preschool, called Head-Start, with Mom.

What is Dog Town? I asked.

She stopped and made me take a good, hard look at a group o young

men hanging in the parking lot. Their car engines were idling with sunroos open

and music blaring; the distant sound o the Miracles, Smokey Robinson, and the

Originals.

These dudes leaned against the rear bumpers or sat on the hoods, smok-

ing. They wore plain tees or wie-beaters with perectly creased pants, and some

wore bandanas wrapped around their mouths like surgical masks. But i one thingstood out, it was their bald heads with necks covered in tattoos that also covered

their backs and arms. Now and again, youd see an older person sporting tattooed

teardrops running rom one eye. Like a crying clown. I didnt know until later in

lie that each tear equaled a lie taken, marking out these dudes as killers.

Those people over there, Mom started to explain, with her head next to

mine, her hands on both my shoulders. You must always steer clear, Jaime. Never

be in that area.

Another time she told me, That is not our lie . . . that is not us.

That was my introduction to the cholosMexican gangstersand the

street gang culture o L.A., issued as a steer-clear warning.

Dog Town is the name and calling card o one o the countless criminal

street gangs that give Los Angeles the unwanted label o gang capital o Amer-

ica. The slogans and grati are tagged everywhere to remind everyone whose tur

they are onnot to be conused with a stretch o beach in Venice known as skate-

boarders Dogtown. Each morning, I was conronted with this street-gang reminder

when I came out the ront door, walked down the center steps between units and

stepped into the courtyard. There, screaming in my ace rom another units gable-

end, was DOGTOWN.

Street legend says this gang name came into play in the 1940s, so called

because o an old dog pound in nearby Ann Street. Stray dogs used to run wild

and attack people, so a price was put on stray dogs heads, leading to the areas

teens capturing these snarling dogs and claiming the reward. But this also led to

amily pets being kidnapped or the bounty money, and these kids earned notori-

ety as local hoodlums. In response, they set up the Dog Town gang.

So the story goes.Things had progressed beyond prices on dogs heads by the time I was

a boy. Now, there was a price on peoples heads, and gang members were pack-

ing it with blades and guns I my childhood was an album cover youd paint the


16/22

8

picture o me in the oreground as a boy running around and getting grass stains

on my knees by playing ootball or riding my Big Wheel. But, in the background,

something sinister and dark was always going down.

Mom kept instilling her ear-loaded warnings because she knewmore

than I did at the timethat the law o averages said there was a 95% probability

that Id grow up to be a cholo, one o them. Each child in my community was so

susceptible, given lies disillusionment. Gang lie was in the DNA o the commu-

nity, and Mom eared those outside infuences.

Mom never let me orget what the lie o a cholo represented. Her con-

stant warnings must have seeped in on some level because I grew wary o these

people hanging around on the streets. It was like shed planted a bad dream in my

head with images o jails, people dying, and people crying.

My uncle Cate, Dads brother, was murdered, and my aunt Minnie, Dads

sister, was the rst person to die in the amily rom a drug overdose. Too much

heroin, I was told. One murder and one drug overdose, minus the gory detail, is the

sum total o my knowledge about the horrors that no one really spoke about.

Then there was my Aunt China. She wasnt a gangster but she had huge

respect in East L.A. neighborhoods because she was a stand-up, no-nonsense,

boisterous woman who took no shit rom anyone.

The name Gomez had an element o notoriety attached because o the

amilys toughness.

My impression is that Dad thought he was tougher than he was: there

was the image he had o himsel, and there was the sad truth exposed when he

was drinking. As a result, I grew up regarding him as a bit o a joke, to be honest.

What was no laughing matter was the Primera Flatz gang, which ruled the

hood. In its heyday, it had an estimated 350 members whod leave their calling

card on walls with the giant initials PF rom AV or Aliso Village. The one hundred

twentystrong Dog Town gang was one o its aliated subgroups, just two out

o around seven hundred twenty gangs and a total o 39,000 members spread

throughout the whole city, according to estimated gures issued by the LAPD

in 2007.

I would say about 60% o our hood was gangsters.

Street gangs in the 70s were not as organized as they are today. Back

then, there were a lot o tur battles, gang ghts and rumbles between members

armed with knives, chains and bats, and only the odd handgun. Today, the pro-

its and weapons have escalated into some serious shit, where the gangsters on

the streets are equipped with semi-automatic weapons and their bossestheMexican Maaare running empires rom inside prison.

These days, L.A.s judges are giving city attorneys the power to set cur-

ews and put gang members in jail i they are ound loitering in the streets or pos-


17/22

sessing weapons and tools or spraying grati. Dog Town was covered by one o

these injunctions in 2007 as part o a campaign to clean up the northeast o L.A.

But back in the day, gangs pretty much had the run o the streets with their own

orm o martial law. It was the law o the neighborhood that came rst, and ederal

laws came second. It was lawless in many ways, even i the cops would disagree.

Kids grew up learning to be streetwise rom an early age. The rst lessons in lie

were pretty simple: never rat anyone out, never snitch, and never backstab your

neighbor. Hold your head high, stare everyone down, stand your ground. Under-

stand that, and the neighborhood will have your back. Know where you belong,

and youll always be protected. Everyone looked ater everyone in a tribal sense,

and I think Mom elt both comortable and uncomortable within this environment.

She accepted that gangs were part o our community but she didnt want me get-

ting sucked in.I oten went to sleep hearing bedlam in the parking lot, and the sound o

sirens wailing. And there was always one ever-present but weird smell that hung in

the air. This scent o childhood was everywheremorning, noon and nightand I

now know that it was the constant clouds o smoked weed, wating out o homes.

That same heavy scent that wats around music estivals or backstage at concert

venues.

The whole gang scene was not my thing. I never was enticed by it.

Mom did everything in her power and limited income to keep our heads

above water. I wouldnt say that we lived below the poverty line, but we lived basic,

hand to mouth. I helped where I could, running up to the store with our weekly

ood stamps to get groceries, and, in the summer, lining up or the government-

issued summer lunches in the projects. For these lunches, each unit received a

weekly book o tickets. Each stub was good or one brown paper bag that con-

tained a sandwich, one carton o milk, a bag o potato chips, and an apple. It was

our government-issued gourmet meal, as ar as I was concerned.

Mom worked her ass o as a student and at the toy store, putting in as

many hours as possible to provide or us and aord the best toysat discount

or Christmas. She always wanted to better our lives, she said.

Discounted toys were a perk o her job, and she got me some incredible

stu. I remember the typewriter, the new bike, the CHiPS uniorm with helmet,

handcus, and police badge, the GI Joe, the telephone, the board games. You

name it, she got it. I saw how hard she worked and how I was the center o her

world. It sounds selsh, but, as a kid, thats all I wanted. It is because o her sel-

sacrices back then that I love her to death today.These toys kept me entertained a lot o the time. In act, I only really had

one playmate, and that was a sweet girl called Penny, the daughter o my babysit-

ter Lola who lived in the unit opposite Whenever Mom studied or worked Lola


18/22

10

took me under her wing. Ill never orget Pennys high-pitched voice and dark

pigtails. She stuck to me like glue.

JIMMY!!!! shed scream rom below the balcony, calling me to the

railing. You coming out to play?

Its air to say that she probably was my rst crush, because we were in-

separable or a spell. In our pretend worlds on that grassy stage, shed be the prin-

cess to my prince, or the parade girl in the wrestlers ring when I was theluchador.

Without Pennyand my sot toy dog Cletoit would have been a pretty lonely

childhood.

There was a man called Roadie who lived in the same block as Penny.

He was this big, heavy-set black man, a rare sight in our Mexican community, and

he was the kindest, gentlest soul. He hoarded baskets ull o candy. Thats why we

called him The Candyman.Whatever other deals might have been going down in the projects, there

was only one supplier that mattered, and that was Roadie with his candy and

Bazooka gum. Apparently, he bought candy in bulk, then sold it o to parents

and us kids or ten cents a bag, much cheaper than the stores. It was like having

Willy Wonka on our doorstep. You name it, he had it. I was too young to compre-

hend matters o race at the time, but it somehow registered with me that he was

dierent-looking. But he was like the riendliest o uncles, all smiles, warm and em-

bracing. At some level, that imprinted me with the message that all black people

were cool like Roadie.

His candy was almost as good as the chip-chips Mom made most

mornings or breakast. We used to invent names or dierent meals, and chip-

chips was the random label or her specialty: ried tortilla shells with eggs. When

I smelled that dish rying, Id race to the table and sit there, knie and ork at the

ready. I looked orward to these breakasts because it was the one time in the day

that I got to sit down with Mom and have her undivided attention. Then, at the

end o the day, shed always read me a bedtime story, holding me in her arms. Or,

sometimes, shed take my action gures or stued animals and make up voices in

their character, using role-play to wish me goodnight. The start o a day and the

end o a day were my happiest times, and there was nothing more comorting than

eeling the bed dip when she climbed into bed.

Moms here . . . I can sleep now, I would tell mysel.

Love you, Jaime, shed say, thinking I was asleep.

Lie was perect then. Nothing and no one could come between us.

At least, thats what my innocence told me.

Shortly beore my sixth birthday, this man called El Amigo walked into

our lie, and he picked up my world in both hands and turned it upside down.

I was too young to gure that Mom maybe needed attention and love


19/22

rom a source other than me, so I never saw this thunderbolt coming. I suspect she

elt guilty, too, because when Julio Arevalo walked through the door, she played

down his importance by always using the el amigo reerencenothing more than

a riend.

So El Amigo is a riend, I accepted at rst. Okay.

Wow, hes here a lot for a friend, I thought over the coming weeks.

Oh, now youre going out at night with him more and more, I soon real-

ized.

Mom never used the word boyriend or bothered to have one o those

mother-son chats that explained everything. He just walked into our lie and was

invited to stay, and I was let to gure out the rest.

It was all very black and white to me: I wanted to be with Mom but this

strange man, who seemed a bit weird and alse around me, had stolen time andattention that was mine.

Then everyone started mentioning how happy Mom looked.

So, okay, this man makes her happy, I thought.

She was smiling. She was laughing.

Thats a good thing, I thought.

But I still stared at Julio and wished hed disappear into a cloud o smoke.

I imagined having magic powers that would zap him away, and return things to

how they used to be.

Julio worked in the airplane manuacturing industry. Julio helps build

planes! Mom said, as i that would impress me. It didnt.

He was your average-looking dude: slim, with big black hair and matching

moustache. I can see him now, slouched in that armchair, cracking open a beer.

I guess he tried his best with me, playing at the role o surrogate dad, but

I wasnt eeling it. I was resistant or a long time. I just looked at him and thought:

Who is this guy? Hes not my dad. Hes not my uncle. So whys he here?

It didnt take long beore dramatic changes happened.

Nanny started arriving in the late aternoon to be babysitter or the eve-

ning. Then the announcement was made that we were moving in with Nanny, and

that is when we let Dog Town. We let behind the projects and moved the ew

miles to South Central L.A. I said good-bye to Penny and Roadie, and was trans-

planted to what elt like a whole new world.

At rst, I thought it was meant to be a temporary stay, but as things

turned out, South Central became my home rom the ages o ve to seven. And

even ater then, I would still return to Nannys and spend three months living with

her every summer, without ail.In moving to South Central, I went rom a 100% Mexican-American com-

munity to one that was mixed, where Mexican-Americans were the minority. It was

70% Arican-American 30% Mexican I was vaguely aware o this dierence rom


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12

visiting Nanny, but it was only through living there that I ully appreciated what that

meant. One very good thing was that it was in South Central L.A. that my ears rst

started hearing the distant sounds o hip-hop. And it seemed ideal that I was now

living with my two avorite ladies. But then Mom started to spend more time stay-

ing over at Julios place in South Gate. That meant ewer shared breakasts and

ewer bedtime stories.

Then I saw suitcases being packedMoms, not mine.

Then she let or Mexico on a vacation. What she didnt say was how long

shed be gone. When she let, the wrench hit me as an ache. Nanny tried to reas-

sure me.

Its just you and me now! she said. Well have un together!

Mom disappeared to Julios hometown o Morelia, the capital o the state

o Michoacn to visit his amily. Each hour she was gone elt like a day, and eachday elt like a week. By the end o week one, I was crying mysel to sleep. I guess

these inexplicable absences always eel like a catastrophe when youre a kid; and

hours always seem longer in childhood than they ever do in adulthood. But this

wrench was understandable: she had never beore traveled outside the United

States and we had never beore been separated. With Mom gone rom my side, it

honestly elt like the end o the world, especially because I elt that this new man in

her lie was supplanting me.

In the end, she was only gone about three weeks, but that is a lietime

when you are a kid. Her eventual return was treated as no big deal, and things

soon returned to as they were beore she let.

Until she sat me down and told me she was pregnant.

As she broke this news, with Nanny looking on, I pretended to listen, but

all I was thinking was You want another kid? Why? Whats wrong with me?

At that age, I guess you really do think the world revolves around you, and

I think every child is jealous o anyone cutting in on him and his mother. It steals at-

tention. As I saw it, in comes this guy and stands between me and Mom, and now

Ive got to contend with another one o me arriving on the scene? I I couldnt have

Eddie as a brother, I didnt want anyone else.

Mom seemed to spend most o the pregnancy bedridden at Nannys. It

really took a toll on her body, and she was constantly weak and atigued. I kept

asking why this thing in her stomach was making her so sick. There was always

some adult explanation, but all I could ocus on was her cries and groans. Id sit on

the edge o her bed, unable to leave her side, willing her to get better.

Her misery ended when my new sister, Celeste, was nally born on No-

vember 15, 1981. I was seven years old.Our sibling relations didnt get o to the best o starts when I took my

rst look at her, wrapped in a bundle in Moms arms in the hospital, and observed:

Why is our baby so ugly?


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Jaime! Thats your sistershes beautiul! Mom laughed.

But, Mom! Shes ugly . . . cant you get another one?

I will never orget that sharp dig o jealousy, and I think thats when I

started sticking even closer to Nanny.

Please understand, no one worked harder, or gave me more love, than

Mom. But these big changes in our lie were tough or me. And this was my rst

hard lesson: that when things are going great, it wont last, that when someone

loves you, they can leave without youdont count on them always being there.

These were the mental imprints.

But even at a young age, I had a fair or keeping it positive. And one very

positive outcome o these otherwise unhappy changes was being with Nanny the

single person most responsible or redirecting the course o my lie.


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