The payphone at the Güal-Mar entrance doesn’t ring. It squeals. It shrieks. It’s the old school ringing like that of a mechanical La Llorona’s screech. When it goes off, a few bystanders flinch, startled.
Quién chingados llama a Güal-Mar? Who the hell calls Wal-Mart?
_ _ _
It’s 2003 and summer is nearing its end. It’s our first one ever in the States. My father, mother, sister and I have just arrived in a Volkswagen Pointer, a model that counted kilometers, not miles, and had carried our two sole pieces of furniture on its roof for an eight-hour trek.
We crossed the Nuevo Laredo - Laredo border listening to Neil Diamond’s “Coming to America” (an actual rolaza, a banger of a song and one I would eventually blast on the way to my naturalization ceremony years later.) Not that this was uncommon but it was our first time coming to Gringolandia to live, to work. To give it a try.
We traded the scorching, arid heat of Monterrey for the overwhelming humidity that thrived in Houston. “Que pinche calor hace,” I told Texas. “It’s fucking hot here.”
Our very first home in Texas, a series of copper-colored apartments in Copperfield Harris County, was just in front of that white-blue-lettered behemoth that somehow sold (then) guns, tires and eggs all in one place. These weren’t your tiny, neighborhoody stores. I’m pretty certain any Houston Wal-Mart would simply devour all of New Canaan, Connecticut (a place where I had never felt more like a minority btw) and have space left over for their gardening section.
“Welcome to Wal-Mart,” that greeter would say. “We just took over New Canaan.”
In our first weeks abroad, my father was still going back and forth between borders. In the frenzy that was settling in, we didn’t have a landline for some time — but Güal-Mar did. Two, actually.
“Les llamo a ese número. A las 6 p.m.” mi papá nos dijo antes de salir rumbo a Monterrey. “I’ll call you at that number at 6 p.m,” he’d say before, once again, driving back to Monterrey.
These machines weren’t particularly hidden, anyone could call for a quarter a minute but no one ever pays any attention to what’s next to the gigantic refrigerator that is the soda dispenser. My mother, my sister and I did. Hell, that space became our oficina away from home.
I wonder if someone ever calls that teléfono. Does anyone pick up?
Homies vending machine. Apparently Trailer Park characters were also made. Lol. (Credit to the internet)
Just to the left of that standing ear-mouth tube of plastic that connected far away voices was a vending machine that sold Homies, the miniature collectible toys based on David Gonzales’ Los Angeles Chicano characters. There was the man with the two-sizes too large playera de tirantes (I don’t know who came up with the term ‘wife-beater’ for a sleeveless undershirt but goddamn, for the longest time I thought it was called a ‘wife-beader’ because there was no way a shirt could be that violent), the woman with chola eyebrows and of course the shredded, tatted-up gangster with dark shades.
Is this how I’m supposed to look to fit in this new country? as my third-grade self mentally jotted down: “get some Dickies pants.”
To the right of the voicebox was the cheese-grater surfaced metallic bench where my mother, sister and I, like substitutes on fútbol team with repeatedly injured players, would swap places as we awaited our turn not on the pitch but on the phone, at a chance to hear his voice. The metal bench was always freezing in the summer due to the gusts of aire acondicionado from the ceiling of that Capitalist-ine Chapel.
Wal-Mart payphone. Cheese-grater surfaced bench on left. Also not in Houston. (Also credited to the internet)
“Apúrate, que hace frío. Hurry up, it’s cold here,” my sister said to my father who was thousands of kilometers away.
And also like a soccer team, our squad of three would rush into the Wal-Mart entrance after crossing the six-lane 529 Highway, praying we hadn’t missed my father’s call. It was 5:57 p.m. but you never knew. Maybe the Monterrey kitchen clock was four minutes ahead of ours. Would his 6 p.m. also be our 6 de la tarde?
“Ha sonado el teléfono?,” we would beseech the unfortunate bystander who happened to be buying a Dr. Pepper next to our office.
“Ehh...no?” They would say, confused.
“Ah, muchas gracias!”
We awaited that metallic screech patiently, as patiently as a nine and a five-year-old can.
Someone had bought all the Homies next to the phone! The machine was empty. Who would have so much money? How big are their pockets? Did they buy them for someone? Where did Big Loco go? Where were Sapo and Mr. Raza now? I always wanted El Paletero, he reminded me of —
— and finally it came. A shriek to others, a song specifically for us.
“Hola, papá! Eres tú? Hi, dad, is that you?”, my sister and I both screamed into those little holes on that black plastic surface where hundreds of thousands of voices had passed through.
Silence.
“Bueno! Hola?!”
“Hola hijos. Claro que soy yo. Of course it’s me,” the man on the other line, in the other country, in the other side said.
“Quién más llamaría a un Güal-Mar? Who else would call Wal-Mart?”