PickUp Sticks and 6 Year Olds

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Venus was the youngest child of the Chapa family. They lived two blocks up. You had to get to Reynolds then to 15th Street from where I lived in the middle of the block of 14th Street to get to her house. It was a wood framed craftsman 2 story home. It all looked very wood-y to me. Tall ceilings and a wooden staircase met you at the door. This day I knocked. Venus' sister let me in.

I remember blue walls in the living room or maybe it was the bedroom upstairs that Venus' brother's had. Her brother's bedroom looked out onto the street. Venus' name was Alvina. We called her Venus. I met her in the first grade. We were 6 years old. Her parents would let me in to their home when I ran away from the people in my house. It was easy to runaway at 6.

At Venus' house I remember her papa sitting on the floor in the living room with me and Venus. We were playing pick up sticks. This game with these sticks in a tube that were all different colors was aimed at the players using their stick to remove other sticks without disturbing the surrounding sticks. So, Mr. Chapa would dump the sticks out from the can and hand us each a stick. Whoever collected the most sticks won.




Mrs. Chapa was outside grilling hamburgers. She came inside and gave us plates of hamburgers with lettuce and cheese. I felt loved, engaged, and happy in the Chapa's house. I am not even sure they ever met my parents. But, I will always know I met Alvina Chapa's parents. I met her brothers. I met her sister. I met her "right hook" when we put on one glove each of her brother's boxing gloves. Never box with someone who has brothers who own boxing gloves,- even if you think black people were all from the Muhammad Ali family.

I walked back to my house pondering why I lost the one glove boxing match. I was happy we didn't seek out the brother's sword set. With a full belly I darted toward the back of my house because as far as I was concerned no one missed me. I climbed up to the back bathroom window and climbed back into the house. I shut the window behind me as I stood on the toilet seat. I jumped down from the toilet seat and headed to the bathroom door and unhooked the latch that kept the people out, and I reentered the house with the people in it.

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