I fondly remember the worn-out screen door at the house my mother shared with my grandmother in Oklahoma. Vulnerable to weather patterns that alternated between scorching Southwest sun and torrential rainstorms, the screen hung on its worn hinges, misshapen and rusty. The old wood frame, warped and in need of repair, hadn't seen a fresh coat of paint in—well, never! The only mechanism it had for opening and closing was an old spring so stretched out that it sagged and barely functioned. Sometimes, it needed to be nudged to close. It never had a latch; it stood unlocked, welcoming all who approached.

That old door appealed to me because of what it stood for: family. Each time I visited, I heard the bottom of the door scrape on the wooden porch all day long as it opened and closed. No one knocked. If we were at the back of the house in the sunroom, our friends and relatives called out a joyful hello as they came down the hall. During the day, any of number of relatives could come in to visit with us. They stopped by on their way to church. They stopped by on their way to the store. They stopped by because they were "in the area" to see if my grandmother needed anything.

Usually, the women brought something with them. In the summer, it could be strawberry ice cream or strawberry pop, both favorites of my grandmother. In the fall, they brought wild pecans or persimmons, harvested on the reservation.

During the week, the men stopped by on their lunch hour and brought their empty stomachs.

Most summer mornings, as a cool breeze danced through the rusty screen, my grandmother put on a big pot of coffee and an even bigger pot of pinto beans. If the screen door opened before the beans were ready, she'd whip up a quick batch of tortilla dough that she cut in strips, fried, and sprinkled with granulated sugar.

Sometimes, after the snack, our company sat around the living room and visited for hours until the frijoles were ready. To go with the beans, Grandmother would cook a big pile of flour tortillas and make enough fresh salsa in her molcajete to feed a crowd of friends and relatives for only pennies. Our family matriarch's eyes sparkled and her steps quickened during these visits.

Once, Uncle Benny came in and found a living room filled with relatives. He quickly looked around and asked, "Where's Inge?" Inge, the wife of one of my cousins, had terminal cancer. My cousin Hilbert had married her years before during a tour in Germany with the army. Hilbert replied he had left her at home so she could rest. "Go get her. She should be with us!" my uncle urged.

Off Hilbert went, clear across town to pick up his wife. Inge walked in and my uncle greeted her as if the party was in her honor. He made a space for her to sit next to him in the crowded room and wrapped his arm snugly around her. Without missing a beat, he reached into his bag of stories and had her laughing so hard she forgot all about her illness.

How I envied Uncle Benny's and everyone else's storytelling skills. Once, after one of our Mexican-style powwows, my Aunt Norah asked me why I had become a writer. We'd never had one in the family before. I told her that everyone in our family was a storyteller and the only difference between them and me was that I wrote my stories down. Laughing, she quipped, "We aren't a family of storytellers. We're a family of liars!"
The way I saw it, their tales qualified as an art form. Besides, in each story, at least a smidge of truth could be found—somewhere! And if not, what did it matter? My family loved and cared for each other, especially when things got tough. Who could want anything more?

Most of them are gone now. Whenever I think of them, I swear I can hear that screen door...lazily opening and closing all day...

About Janelle Meraz Hooper

I’m a part-Hispanic/part-Anglo author who was born and raised in a Hispanic family in Oklahoma. I’m the author of five books. Three of them are fictional autobiographies about my Hispanic family. The first two have won awards*. I now live in Washington State with my husband.

*A Three-Turtle Summer won the Bold Media Award for fiction in 2002. As Brown As I Want: The Indianhead Diaries was a finalist in the 2004 Oklahoma Book Awards and a first place fiction winner in the 1999 Surrey (Canada) Book Awards. The third book in what I call my Turtle Trilogy is newer, and is titled: Custer and His Naked Ladies

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