"La Chiva" Adolescence, Coming of Age

"La Chiva"

Ever since I could remember, my brother Junior was a "little shit," I can say that because I am his sister who grew up with him. Junior, at the age of four years old, was already riding my older sister's ten-speed-bike. The story goes that my brother had been missing for a while. My parents were frantically looking for him. One of my neighbors went up to them, saying, "I just saw Junior on the bike going to the park."

Both my parents hurried up, jumped into the car. They drove to the nearby park that's not too far from our house. Arriving there, they noticed a little body on my sisters' bike, it was hard to distinguish who was on, but since my neighbor had said it was him, they followed the bike. By this time, they knew my little brother was having a joy ride on my sisters' bike, little did they know, was that he went on this joy ride with only his underwear on.

Being a little "twerp" Junior decided to go for this so-called joy ride, nearly giving both of my parents a close heart attack. Once they flagged him down, my mother gave him a huge "papa-chon," meaning a good heartfelt squeeze. My mother really couldn't really get mad at him since he was too young and maybe not understanding the consequences of his actions. So my mom did what most moms do, "Wasaso, unas nalgadas" meaning, he got a good ole' spanking.

I know my mom hated giving us kids spankings. Still, she would always say, "Ustedes hacen lo que les da la gana sin ver el peligro." This meant, "you kids do whatever you want, without seeing the danger," which was very accurate.

Despite this phase in my brother's life, my brother grew into a little dare-devil. Whatever he could get his hands on, he would either crash, redo it to what he envisioned it to be, like a hot rod or anything he thought was cool. But by then, he was a rambunctious "pain in the butt" teenager.

Junior was always getting into things that he shouldn't have, even if both my parents would threaten him by saying, "no lo vayas a hacer." This meaning, "don't go and do that" it was like saying, "yeah, go and do that." I don't think my parents thought about reverse psychology back in those days.

"Cuando yo era joven," meaning, "when I was young," we were taught to mind our elders and pay attention to what our parents were saying to us. My mom's way of saying, "look when I was young, I had rules I had to follow" to be honest, I don't think Junior ever got that lesson. Being the youngest of the girls, I always felt he got the most attention, and he did, because he was still getting into some sort of trouble.

By then, we were in middle school, and Junior, I guess, was going through what at the time was, "Boy Puberty." He was awkward looking, but what do I know? I was his "punk-ass sister" who, in his eyes, was just as ugly looking as well. Junior was forced to bathe regularly for school, as he owned some nasty smelling "arm-pits." Never in my young, adventurous life had I smelled such putrid arm-pits.

My dad, I guess, felt that it was his fatherly duty to buy my brother some "Irish Spring" I think he thought my bro needed "to smell freshy" or something. Needless to say, the soap didn't work, and Junior continued to smell like "pungent cumin." The reason why I knew how cumin smelled like was that we had gone on a trip to Mexico that summer. We had decided to enter a "Mercado," meaning a "Mexican outdoor market." Here is where I was able to place my brother's aroma with a Mexican spice, now known as "Junior's Eau de Parfum."

Junior had accumulated several bottles of body wash, Irish Spring, Suave, Dial, and my favorite, Old Spice, on a rope. Having an array of body washes in the restroom was like a spa experience, I'd leave the bathroom feeling fresh and remembering "you deserve a break today," which I did due to having to deal with my "pesky" bro all day. As many body washes as Junior had, he still smelled terrible. By then, you could tell that his smelly powerful arm-pits had been bothering him. Unfortunately, he was probably being teased by other kids, and maybe also by, his "so-called friends."