We escorted the dying woman to a plot of land. Not the land she has been cultivating with wild seeds for the last who knows how many years. No. We walked with her to a plain spot of loose red soil and mountains at a distance.

She was very short, by the standards of the village, but large in the ways women like her seem to grow to be given titles like curandera, mother of us all, high priestess, or maybe even goddess. Whatever it was she did for you would trigger the right title. For she had touched us all in one form or another. She was our center. We gravitated around her like a planet to a star, a hog to his slop, or a bee to the hive. How did she become like this, we often wondered?

She was born a little late in the month of May when the rains fell like translucent bedsheets onto the red soil of the village, creating the muds we often curse in our own happy and colorful language. Cabronazo, mierda, puñeta.

She took two years in her mother’s womb. When she finally deigned to come into the shack that was her birthplace. As the partera placed the baby on her belly while cutting the umbilical cord, the mother looked into her baby’s eyes, ‘Impressive,’ is all she said.  What had the mother meant by that? Was anyone’s guess, since the ripping of the placenta brought a cascade of blood too severe for the partera to cauterize. The mother died and the little lady grew with a name that would be her omen, Impressive.

We all watched in awe as the years went in and out. Some of us were born after her. Others died without seeing the most impressive moments of her life. But then there was this moment as she walked onto this small plot of land inspecting it in silence. She was so curved and bent from years of looking into the soil, she looked more like a question mark than a woman of short height.

“Look,” she commanded and we craned our necks to see where she pointed. Some said it was a crow that flew by, others the mountain peaks at the distance. Still, others swore that it was a block of granite not too far from the yellowish nail on her crooked wood-like finger.

We would never reach a consensus on what exactly she had wanted us to see. That was just like her. Impressive always left us wondering about her actions. Her few words, always so wise, were diluted by the distance of our ears to her speech. We took pains to tell each other what she had said. Like the childhood game of telephone. The many ways we interpreted her words led us to riot and fight each other. We all thought the other had it wrong.

But on that day, the day of her impending death, we stood by her and listened as she whizzed the air in and out of her rattling lungs. Marveling at the cacophony of noise in that chest that had taken shape of a washboard from years of famine and bodily neglect. Not that she could not afford to eat, we made sure of that. Not that she could not afford to take care of herself, we were sure to keep an eye on her. No. Impressive just was not meant to be like other folks. She was not like us.

She was better, closer to the gods, saints, angels, or whatever it is that is believed. We believed in her. That is why when she said, “Dig my grave. Right here on this spot,” We fought each other for the shovel.

She looked at us with those eyes that were between a raptor’s eyes and those of a frog.  We instantly felt shame. Trying to outdo each other! This was a sacred moment. Not a time for bloody competition. So, with deportment, and a great deal of apologies, we took the task and digged the grave. Shovel by shovel making small mounds of earth onto each side. Someone began to decorate the sides with little pieces of shells and pretty pebbles. Impressive watched as we worked.

Another brought a chair for her.  She sat, and watch as we took turns. A couple of times she applauded our effort. Little claps with no sound that were like the battings of a bat. When she did that, we celebrated cheering each other and patting each other’s backs. Of course, between shots of rum or moonshine, whatever was closer. Until she said, “Enough now. I will take my rest.” That we heard.

We lower her, still sitting on that wooden chair, into the dark hole we had digged. She looked at the walls with the decorations of shells and pebbles that made pictures of her life and some of her works, with that she smiled a toothless smile and added, “Impressive.”

– Amelia Diaz Ettinger