You Don't Know Marta

Now I might as well be honest and tell you right now that I'm prejudiced. I think San Antonio is the absolute center of the universe — el mero mero ombligo — which doesn't make me too popular livin in Austin. Now most folks get up to Austin an say, "Isn't Austin just great?! " and "Don't you love it here?!" but these San Antonians just shrug their prejudiced shoulders an say, "Well, it isn't San Antonio, but. . . ."

Well now, Ernie and I moved to Austin right after we got married (that is, we moved to the San Antonio side of Austin) and we hadn't been there long enough for the cilantro to bloom when someone at work invited him to a tardeada. Said a tardeada was an annual function to gather together the leaders of the Chicano community — a time to relax, drink beer, eat fajitas, let their hair down, an jus talk. They wanted a chance to bring together all the leaders of the Mexican-American community and let great ideas be born.

Now when he said that, I immediately thought of Marta Cotera. Marta is one of the few people I know who stays awake nights jus plotting how to help people. Ernie has a favorite saying about Marta — he says if Marta stepped outside the city limits, the average IQ of the city of Austin would drop by 15 points. Now you knowin about all those university professors an high-tech researchers in Austin (not to mention some of the smartest political fananglers you ever saw in that Good Ole Boys Club they call the capital) you might think that was a slight exaggeration, but then you don't know Marta.

Y'know, Marta an I had plotted many a community project together, an I can vouch that we'd no sooner be sketching out the final objectives to one project than she'd be thinking up four other spinoff projects as well, an plannin40 ways to get funding and implementation for all five. She jus doesn't stop. Mas viva que una vi bora, an goin faster'n the speed of light, on a slow day. Well, so Ernie turns to me'n says, "Whaddya think? Should we go?" An both of us bein' the shy retiring type who never get involved in Chicano community affairs, we're both out the door before the comal is even cool.

We drove up to the place (a real pretty clubhouse-type place up in Zilker Park, with a nice view and the breeze blowing cool an perfect for a tardeada on a summer evening) an got out of the car, following the mariachis to the door. Right away we knew something was wrong.

Now there was Marta's husband Juan, standing with a group of five or six men, and behind them was another group of eight or nine men. Off to their right was a group of nine or ten men, to their left a group of eight or nine men, an then maybe 60 men off on the plaza section. Now that comes to a total of 94 men (at a rough count) an every single one of them (or at least 93) starin at me like I was the scourge of the earth. Also, starin at Ernie like he was a cross between Aaron Burr and the assassin of Pancho Villa. Now these weren't strangers, mind you — among those 93 were a good 30 that were well-beknownst to us — Andrés, who teaches at the university, Ramon, another famous bilingual educator — why even good ole Gonzalo — model Mexican American politician an would-be Texas Monthly coverboy, an every single one of'm scared to death to say hi or even move an eyelid at us!

Yeah I said 93. Number 94 was Arnulfo. Now they don't call Arnulfo Arnulfo for nothin. His face jus brightened when he saw Ernie an me (two of his favorite people) and totally unselfconsciously, he came over an shook our hands — both of us — like we were real human beings or somethin! Now I know this is hard to believe, that in the middle of that bunch of squinty-eyed thorns there would be an ole cactus flower like Arnulfo, but there he was, big as day, smilin so bright an purty, an pumpin out his handshake like he didn't see the thousand eyes glued to our leperous presence. (Now, I can't say for certain, cause you do know that Arnulfo wears real thick glasses, an maybe it was just because of that, or maybe it was the glasses he always wears on his soul that gives him a different sight from everyone else.) At any rate, we spent 20 minutes talkin to Arnulfo (cause he jus wouldn't let us go, y'know) an then we decided we really felt like goin on home.

Well later on, when I ran into Andrés, he made a point of tellin me he "agreed" with us (whatever that meant) and how they'd been told that MABPWA (that's the Mexican American Business and Professional Women's Association) had been planning to crash the tardeada, and warned that anyone caught speaking to any woman there wouldn't be invited back the next year. Or ever again.

An Ole Gilbert (of Gilbert's Office Supply and the Mexican Chamber of Commerce), seein as how we jus hadn't known any better, came around to invite Ernie the next year and to explain how they were planning to host "something for the ladies sometime — a dinner or something, y'know, so they can be involved too." An Ernie jus smiled an said, "Well, you just let us know when you do, and we'll both be there." An then we took that fancy engraved invitation to the "All-Male Tardeada, No women, No Anglos allowed" an jus put it at the bottom of our stack of bills paid. We'd already been to one tardeada, an if you think all the leaders were there, then you jus don't know Marta.

Author's note: Among the Mehinaku Indians of Brazil, as also in scattered tribal societies across Africa, South America, and Oceania, exists the concept of a "Men's House" — a gathering place off-limits to women, where the sacred flutes are played, and men, in loud and boisterous behavior, show sexual aggression and hostility toward women, tease men who spend too much time at home or who act weak and "woman-like," share sexual and scatalogical jokes of a patterned thematic nature, and stroke each other's egos, affirming their masculinity through the fact of their presence at the Men's House and of their valor in excluding and threatening women who might wander near the all-male sacred place.