We flew into Panama City every few months on tiny airplanes,  (you know that if a plane falls over the jungle you will never be found, it just closes around you) my husband more frequently then I, He would bring back food and books magazines and chocolate.  It was a difficult time for me and he didn’t really understand that as he had his own devils to deal with.  When in the city we stayed in his mother’s home that was the pit stop for families in town or kids going to school.  His Mother was retired as director of a school and was the primary caregiver to two young granddaughters.

His sister lived there too and was employed by a US agency, she spoke perfect English but didn’t have much to say to me during those first difficult years.  She did us a kindness sending everything needed for a Thanksgiving dinner to El Real one year.    We were able to share it with some visiting scientists, a real Thanksgiving dinner, they were very surprised and certainly didn’t expect to have turkey on good china that  Thanksgiving!

We were married for 30 years, some were the best years of my life but there were times when I wanted to run home, I guess that happens in many marriages, especially when opposites marry and are unable to make allowances for each other.  The years in Darien were made more difficult by the cantinas.  My husband had a weakness and I didn’t know how to deal with it, It seemed there was nothing else for a man to do in El Real, drink and play dominoes. My saving grace was that another PCV gave me his peace corp library when he left Panama.  I read while he spent time at the cantina with other like-minded souls.  I had my children to keep me busy, his fathering skills were underdeveloped.  Part of his frustration was because his father didn’t allow him to use the skills he had learned in his studies at LSU so he was unable to implement new systems for the finca.  He was and is a good man and now is married to a woman he has   more in common with and I am very happy for him, we were married for 30 years before I left.

We are still in El Real at this point in my story.

This is a photo of the family home in El Real, my daughter has a watercolor painting of it and in it, it is a very elegant structure.  But by 1965 it is getting tired looking.  My daughter has the painting because she was born in this house.

My first two children were born in Panama city in a hospital,  I would live in the city for the last month of pregnancy just waiting to get this done so I could go back home to El Real with my new baby.

My second was born in the city as well but my last baby came a bit before expected and she was born at home with Carmen, a midwife from town. My brother-in-law Doctor was spending a few days during Easter and was there for delivery but doubted me when I told him the baby was ready to be born that day.    So I made preparations. Carmen and I did all the work. It went fine but for some reason tears flowed for hours after the birth, uncontrolled, just tears falling, not crying but the tears just kept rolling down, we told the kids that a big mosquito had stung me and that’s why mamá is crying. I was happy to see my Mother-in-law come to help me a few days later when there were flights after the Easter holiday.

Baby was without a name for a week while we thought of a name for this beautiful baby.  I wanted a name my family could pronounce correctly as they had trouble with Marissa and Enrique.  I wanted to name her after my sisters and tried combinations of their names Sharon and Nancy but ended up just using Nancy.  I needed help giving her the first bath because I couldn’t stand up after delivery.  I think had a subluxation of my coccyx (displaced tailbone) that corrected itself after a couple days, so a cousin gave her the first bath. Odd, I never said anything about it to the Doctor or anyone, they probably thought I was just a lazy wimp.

Carmen pierced her ears a few days later.

Getting and sending mail from El Real was an iffy proposition.  It happened that my outgoing letters to the family were held up by the person responsible for the mail. He kept the money I gave him for the stamps and was found out by my friend who to happened to see them in this person’s home. I got them all back. Things like that were not unusual for me, not everyone was kind.

I lived in a small room in the hospital and slept on an army cot, it was my only piece of furniture besides my black trunk. I’d brought from home a small tocadiscos phonograph and a couple albums to play,  living in the hospital meant I had electricity during the day with their generator, while the rest of the town only had it from 6pm until midnight. Between the Doctors quarters and my quarters and the hospital ward there was a small screened visiting room where I spent time with my  English speaking friend who helped me adjust to my new circumstances. The Doctors wife wasn’t able to be in the sun and spent her days with her son in their room, she didn’t speak English and you know my Spanish was non-existent at that time so we didn’t spend time together. I had a perico (small green bird) that stayed on my shoulder (clipped wings) as I walked around town until I sat on it.   He (?) was sitting on my cot, I didn’t see him. So Sad.

Somehow my grandmother was able to send me two huge dark fruitcakes for several years and it was a royal treat to share with friends. They were sent to the Panama City address and then sent on to El Real via the daily flights from Panama City to El Real. We were so happy to have and share them. ( I was even moved to bake fruitcake heavy on the rum myself for a few years.)

It’s funny that while I  look back on a memory, other related memories crowd in and  I have to make room for it. It’s the details that make a story spark,  I’m trying for the spark!

I admit to being guilty of not fulfilling my two-year obligation to the Peace Corps.  I mentioned this in an earlier post but as I said, I stayed in my ‘town’ for 6 years, leaving when my daughter was ready to start school.  She was thrilled to start school as a listener in her uniform with her two friends in El Real but it was time for us to go live in the big city. Love that photo!

oh yeah,

I married the English speaking friend.

What can you write about babies diapers?  Plenty if you live in Panama, either in the city or in the jungle.  There was a particular way I was told to wash diapers

• rinse them out with soapy water
• lay them in the sun
• wash them again
• rinse them again
• any spotted diapers go back in the sun
• rinse again
• hang to dry

repeat every day. Or give them to be washed in the river by AnaJulia?

 No

I washed my babies diapers always, though I did have to take them on horseback to wash them in a clean river when the aqueduct was broken so no good water in the pipes that day.

When my parents were visiting the aqueduct again was broken, my Mom and I took them to the river on foot this time.  Not sure what my Mom thought of all this, but she was a good sport and had a story to tell back home.

I believe those are my husband’s clothes there. ***

When my parents came to visit the first time, they came to El Real on the tiny airplanes and were really good sports about everything because as luck would have it nothing worked while they were there.  The aqueduct was broken so the water in the shower and bathrooms didn’t work and we had to bring up water to the 2nd floor for showers in tubs with totumas (gourds) to splash over ourselves to bathe.  I always bathed in the afternoon when the water was warm. My father-in-law was in residence and he had men bring water up into another tank so it would flow from the shower head for them.  We had a rodeo of sorts where my Dad helped emasculate cows and inject medicine into them while we watched sipping fresh coconut milk from a palm climbed by kids and opened by machete, everyone carries one no? Dad loved it    

We made tamales while my parents were there and my mother-in-law directed the activity.  It meant we needed chickens and pork cooked, corn ground and cooked for the masa,   2 types of leaves for them to be wrapped in, inner and outer layers, no corn husks here, .pickles, onions,  and   tamales were  made with each  person’s favorite bit of meat or part of chicken, and marked  with a string or colored bit of cloth to tell whose is whose.  They are the best tamales I’ve ever tasted, have not tasted one better, but this production is not for the weak of heart, it takes all day to make and you need a team!   It was a New Years event much anticipated by those lucky enough to get one.

*****Many of my Darien photos are here though the generosity of my friend Janet Fish.