He Calls Her Grandma

I can´t imagine how many souls her withered and fragile hands have touched. Although I see the steadiness has gone from them, their usefulness remains. She carves off a piece of the sour unripened mango. I would still require a cutting board to achieve the simple yet fine pieces. However, she trusts in her years of experience.

Camilo crawls up onto her concrete table that seems like it is meant to be in a park with chess pieces upon it.  As May Tao passes him the strip of mango, he notices her sun-kissed arms and points to the freckles with a concerned voice, ¨Hurt.¨ I reassure him that she is okay, she is not hurt, well, at least the spots don´t hurt. And she traces his finger up her wrinkled hand pointing to all the darkened spots. She doesn´t understand his concern and points to his pudgy peachy arm and tells him he doesn´t have any. Camilo repeats, ¨Bo mee.¨

Camilo is reminded with by a grunt that he holds a piece of mango. He chews it and spits it into my hand. May Tao laughs and her smile seems to wrap around her whole face as if to hold all the well worn skin together. She stands and announces she will search for a treat. When she steps into her home, Camilo explores the patio. He moves her foot high benches and inspects the concrete food pit. With the opening of the screen door, he rushes back reminding May Tao that she must put her shoes on. She nods and bats his hands away to so she can put the flip-flops in the correct order before sliding them on. She adjusts her traditional skirt, tied at the hip, and takes a seat.

The woven cylindrical basket comes to sight and Camilo shouts, ¨Kao!¨ Our daily visits to this house are the reason he only knows how to say rice in the Lao language and possibly the reason he has a cute pot belly. As his eager hands reach to open the basket, she pushes them away without a word and pulls out his true surprise.

Her left hands hold the special banana leaves that house his Lao bologna. She takes out her knife and cuts off a small piece, places it in her hand, and then takes a portion of sticky rice. The two ingredients together are pushed straight toward his lips. Camilo knows that here, with Mee Tao, a dirty hand is never acceptable and so receives the sticky rice to his mouth with time for little dances between each bite.

Coming to see May Tao (the Lao word for grandma) has converted to a special morning ritual. This rice, leftover from May Tao´s alms giving, is a token of love to Camilo. He knows he is loved as May Tao scoops him up and plants kisses on his nose and cheek. Camilo is blessed to have his May Tao in his neighborhood and she seems to cherish the always squirmy foreign boy.