Reflections from a Mother's Heart

Describe your childhood bedroom. What was the view from your window?

This is the next question in the journal I mentioned in my post of June 5, 2008 and it's a hard question to answer because I had so many childhood bedrooms. We were a family of nomads basically as my dad worked as a farm hand and we always lived in homes provided by the farm up until I was 18 years old.

We first lived in Eloy, Arizona. I remember living in about 3 or 4 houses there and I don't remember much about my bedroom, the clearest thing I remember is a huge weeping willow in the yard and ever since I've always loved weeping willows.

After we left Eloy, we traveled to Harquahala, Arizona. There we lived in a really cute house. I remember that one pretty clearly but oddly enough I don't remember my bedroom. I remember the living room and staying up late watching scary movies with my mom. I remember the kitchen and eating with my dad and I remember my mom being pregnant with my baby brother Jaime and sitting on her bed and she let us each pick a name we wanted for the baby and we put the names in my dad's hat and my sister had chosen Jaime because she had a crush on a little boy in school named Jaime aka Jimmy Lopez. And that's how Jaime got his name.

After Harquahala, we moved to Yuma, Arizona and I don't really remember my bedroom there too well, but I do remember my mom let my sister and I set up everything the way we wanted. I remember my cousin Albert lived with us because he was going to college in Yuma and I can remember both my mom and I crying because I didn't know how to do math and my mom telling me to wait for Albert to come home since he was a college student and he didn't know how to do my math either!

After Yuma, we moved to Poston, Arizona. I remember this room just a tiny bit, it was blue with twin beds and I remember each night I would do a hundred sit ups in bed because even way back then I was obsessed with my weight. I remember sitting up and that slamming myself back so hard into the mattress that it would pop me back up, which made sit ups a breeze! I never even got sore.

After Poston, we moved to Calipatria, California. Once we moved there we stayed there from my 8th grade year to graduation from high school. We lived in two houses and I remember my bedroom in the first house because I had a room all to myself and I used to stay up really late talking on the phone with Hector Gutierrez. The second house I don't remember the bedroom too much, but I remember the view, it was a field, usually of cotton but sometimes it was tomatoes or something else.

Once we left Calipatria, we moved to Shafter. I clearly remember my bedroom in Shafter because I was 18 by then. I remember sharing the room with my sister and while I don't remember the decor, I remember my sister popping every bone in her body before she went to sleep and also she made this sound like a dog scratching itself.

I guess the important thing looking back is not how big the room was, what was in it, what color paint was on the wall, whether or not I had a TV, video games, stereo, etc, etc. The important thing was the memories made in that room and in the whole house. The memory of loving parents, brothers and sister, adventures, fights, games and all the other things that went along with growing up in the wonderful family I call mine.

Home Cooking

I was starving today when I came home and I was in the kitchen thinking I was just going to eat a couple of flour tortilla's with sliced avocado in them when I realized that I had all the makings of a real "Alarcon" down home meal.






My dad (pictured at left) can make a meal of almost anything as long as he has tomatoes and jalapeno's. He mixes them with potatoes or shredded beef or eggs or spam and even ground beef. MMMMmm good. So I had just a little bit of ground beef left over from the chili beans that I had made yesterday and so I thought I would try dad's recipe.






So I browned the ground beef in a pan with salt and onion powder. While it was browning I sliced and diced the tomatoes and jalapeno's. Once the meat was browned I added first the tomatoes, see below:





These were Roma tomatoes, not the regular big red tomatoes, so they didn't release as much liquid as they should have, but then again they don't have as many seeds and that's why I prefer them. Ok, so after the tomatoes cook with the meat a bit, add the jalapenos, like so...

There you go, and of course this meal wouldn't be complete without refried beans...

Now here I had barely spooned the beans into the pan, so they're not smashed and refried yet. I don't have a "done" picture of them because I let them overcook, just a little bit, without meaning to and they weren't picture perfect. They tasted great but they didn't look appetizing.

And here's the cook, happy and ready to heat up a couple of tortillas and sit down to a meal that brings back her childhood...

My son, Jim got into the mood of cooking after seeing me and decided he'd bake brownies. You can see my tortilla's sitting there on the counter ready to be heated up.

And here's a slice of finished brownies, I decided to slice them with the pizza slicer to make them more camera worthy...

Mmmmmmm Good!

Mom's Perm

About 8 years ago I learned how to give perms. I gave one to my daughter when she was just a little girl and then started giving them to my mom. I always thought it was so great because of everyone, I was the only one that got to play with my mom's nappy little head! It was something that I knew I would cherish after she passed.

About 5 years or so ago, her dear friend Concha started giving mom her perms. I was busy and going to school, new job, etc, etc, etc. You know those things that get in our way...every day living. At first I was bothered because that was my thing, you know? But then I realized that my mom loved Concha, Concha loved my mom and my mom was the closest thing to a mother that Concha had, so I figured, ok...my moment in the sun is over and I let Concha continue without any ill will.

So Saturday my mom told me she would like me to give her a perm. I asked what happened to Concha and she said that Concha is still willing to do it, but my mom feels bad asking her because Concha now lives about 25 miles away and gas is $4.59 or more a gallon. So I told her sure, I would come over on Monday after work and do that for her.

So that's what I did tonight, I reopened Alicia's Beauty Salon and got to play with my mommas nappy little head again. I really enjoyed the time we spent together and nothing is ever a chore or a sense of responsibility with my moms, it's a joy.

Here's some pics from the evening, my memories captured forever...my labor of love.

Here's the before picture. This is my mom's scary face, she's made this face to every grandchild and I remember once coming home from school and she was in her bedroom in front of her mirror and I said hi mom and she turned around and this is the face I saw!!! She scared the height right out of me which is why I'm only 5'2".

Step One: The setting of the curlers. This is the hardest part because you have to take tiny little strips of hair and wind it around the curlers you see by using a tiny little sheet of curling paper.

So here I have the top and back.

Here's a back and side view. I couldn't get the little bottom hairs rolled, but mom's going to go get her hair cut and they usually cut that part and it will blend...I hope, I hope, I hope.

*crossing fingers*

Here's mom, all rolled up now and I guess I didn't pull her hair too bad because she's still smiling.

I know that there are some blue and pinks rollers in there. The blue are because those areas had hair that was either too short or there wasn't room for a pink one.

Another view and we're ready for the finished product!

And there you have it, you notice it's dark outside the window by now? If you scroll up you will see it was still daylight outside when I started, this ain't easy folks, but I'M BACK, I loved doing this for my mom.

Below, just a couple more views only because I did a heck of a job!

Pedicure Friday

We have a tradition, my sis and I. Every Friday we try to do something together. Most of the time it's dinner somewhere new or an old fav, or we go shopping or do Walmart and Wendy's, but this Friday my sis proclaimed that she had had a really rough week and nothing else would do but to get Pedicures! Well powder my butt and call me Princess....that's one of my fav things.

We went to one of my fav places, Top Nail.

And since it was our special Friday treat we went for the whole enchilada...the Spa Pedi!

I know, it looks intimidating, but if it were a man I would marry it! This amazing chair treats your feet. You relax while your feet soak in warm, aromatic water. While your feet are soaking, pressured jets gently massage away those aches and pains.

This amazing chair also has a state-of-the-art shiatsu roller back massage system. The roller back system works on applying pressure to all the right spots providing several different functions: compression, kneading, percussion and rolling.

We sat there and chit-chatted while soft spoken Vietnamese women pamper our tootsies, *sigh* sheer bliss!

Once all the pampering is done, we get our little tootsies massaged, decuticled? (is that a word) and polished.

And Wa-la, here are the results!

My Sis's tootsies. She was going to a Black Tie fundraiser the next night so she opted for the dressier polish job with the flower and the little crystal ruby on the big toe.

Here's my tootsies. I opted for the more casual polish as I didn't have anything to do the next night *sigh again*.

Pretty huh? I wish we could have gotten manicures, but that wasn't in the budget for this Friday as we still had to have dinner.

Just a quick note on dinner. We went to one of our favorite Mexican places, Mexicali. I had two margaritas and I felt them both! I was slightly tipsy which made the rest of the evening oodles of fun, for me anyway as Lisa was now the designated driver!

Ok, so then as Lisa had this special event the next night we decided to go shoe shopping. Now I know there are many that would not be caught dead in a Payless Shoe Store, but I love, love, love that store. I've bought many expensive shoes at other places and they have always hurt my feet, but for some reason any shoe bought at Payless has never, ever hurt and they last forever!

My Sis ended up with these beautiful black, strappy shoes. They looked great with her dress and her new pedicure.

I tried on several shoes and really liked these, but as I didn't have any special event to go to, I didn't buy anything *sigh*. My Friday was just one big *sigh* fest!

So after shoe shopping, Lisa decided that she would like to color her hair. She'd been trying to get me to color mine a kind of burgundy color but I don't know, it's just not me, so she thought she would try it. We went to Longs which was in the same shopping center as Payless (now mind you, I'm still pretty buzzed so it was all fun for me). We bought the hair color and came back to my house where I colored her hair and we called it a day. I think it took me longer to write this than it took to do all this.

So here she is with her new haircolor and new shoes the next day off to go to her Black Tie Event. Beautiful, don't you agree?

Here's a closer pic so you can see the new haircolor. It really doesn't show up too well here but I does in the picture above because the sunlight is shining on it.

Reflections from a Mother's Heart

Several years ago, I found this really great journal and I bought it thinking how much fun it would be and how well I would use it. The journal was entitled "Reflections from a Mother's Heart" Your life Story in Your Own Words. Each page has a different question or idea to help you write.

Sad to say I only wrote on the first page and never picked it up again. It's just been sitting here for years next to my PC. So today I felt like blogging but couldn't really think of anything that would get my creative juices flowing, so I thought, "Hey...why not try writing a page in that journal on your blog once in a while?" So that is what I am going to do. Maybe it will also get you to thinking how you would have answered the questions or remembered certain moments in your life....here goes.

Alicia...
A Latinization of Alice, which is in turn from the Germanic Adalheidis (from the Germanic *adal, meaning noble, and *heid, meaning type), via the Old French Adelais, via Old High German.

Alicia Trivia...
Alicia Foster, better known as Jodie Foster, U.S. Actress
Alicia Appleman-Jurman, Polish memorist of the Holocaust
Alicia Moore, better known as "Pink" U.S. pop singer
Hurricane Alicia, devastating hurricane in 1983
Alicia Submarine, a six-seater submarine
Alicia, California, a city in California, also a city in Arkansas
Alicia Spinnet, fictional character in Harry Potter stories

Why all this info on the name Alicia? Because the question is:

Who gave you your name and why? Did you have a family nickname? How did you get it?

My name was given to me by my mother, Tomasa. She tells me that when she was a little girl living in a labor camp with her parents and about 12 siblings she used to hear a women that lived in the same camp come outside of her door in the evenings and yell her daughters name to get her to come home. She would hear... ahleeseeah, only stretched out as mothers do when they call their children at the top of their lungs.

Every time she heard it she would think that someday when she had a girl she would name her Alicia because she herself didn't like her name at all, Tomasa.

And that is how I came to be named Alicia.

About nicknames, I had a few. My entire name is Nora Alicia, so on my dads side of the family they all usually called me Nora. On my mom's side of the family they usually called me Licha or Vachecha. Lots of people have also called me Guera because of my light complexion. One of my dad's favorite nicknames for me unfortunately was "chingada enanita" translated to mean roughly a swear word followed by midget, like damn midget..sort of. I'm not the tallest of people, standing at 5'1". Most recently all my nieces and nephews have taken to calling me Tia Ale and my sister Lisa calls me Al or White. It's funny because sometimes when we answer the phone with each other she'll say "Hey White" and I'll say "Hey Black" because I am light complected and she's dark complected.

And thats how I happened to have this beautiful name that I love so much!
That's my story...and I'm sticking to it!

The Office

Today was a good day at the office. We got a surprise visit from one of the big bosses from the Fresno office. Brian came by to bring me more work. Why would this make it a good day? Well for one thing because it shows that he has faith in me and that he feels I can handle more work.

Another thing that made it a good day is that he took us to lunch, well he invited but my immediate supervisor Michele paid...odd huh?

We went to one of my fav places, Tokyo Gardens. It's like a Benihana where you sit around a table and the chef cooks right in front of you. The cool thing is he doesn't just cook but he does these cool tricks with the food, my favorite is when he puts some type of flammable liquid on the cooking area and he lights it with a lighter and the fire leaps into the air, you practically feel your eyebrows being burned off (but they're not).

Another favorite is when he takes the spatula in one hand and takes a raw egg in the other. He spins the egg on the cooking area and while its spinning he puts the spatula under the egg and pops it onto the spatula and then he tosses the egg up in the air a couple of times and catches it with the spatula before finally letting it fall onto the spatula cracking the egg. Then he does the same thing again with another egg but when he breaks it he does so by turning the spatula so the egg hits the sharp edge cracking it, but it doesn't crack all the way through, only half way. He lets you enjoy that before finally shaking the spatula and cracking it all the way! It's awesome!

The food was great, the show was great and I had a good time with my coworkers, plus we left the office at 11:30 and didn't get back til almost 1:30!

Class of 2008!

Well ok, finally I'm doing my Congratulations Blog to my nieces and nephew that graduated this year from high school.

And here, from the Shafter High School Class of 2008 are

Alicia and Sean Anthony

These two started out together in Kindergarten and were together right up to Graduation. I am so proud of both of them! They're great kids.

Alicia graduated with honors and is a Lifetime Member of the California Scholarship Federation...just like me :-)

Sean played Football and his mom and I were there every Friday night braving freezing and hot weather just to see him play.

And here from the

West High School Class of 2008 is my other niece

Sarena

Sarena is into sports as well, just like Sean. She played lots and lots of Soccer. I remember picking her up at Daycare and bringing her to Shafter with me when she was just a tiny girl...time flys.

I know these three kids are going to do great things and most importantly they're all going to do the right things because they had great parents who set good examples.

And remember...I love you all,

Tia Ale