Bogotá, Colombia 1963
My earliest memory is at two years old, standing up high on top of this large wooden table, being held by the hands of two old men, maybe they were young, but in my eyes they seemed old, as one of them proposed his love for me and desire to marry me one day when I grew up. “When you grow up, you and I will marry and you will be my wife.” He pronounced as he looked into my eyes. These men were bakers who worked for my father at his “Pasterleria Guernica” on Carrera decima, numero 21-58 in Bogotá, Colombia. I remember clearly the sweet aroma of vanilla, and cinammon upon entering La Guernica. Just to the right upon entering, was a large display with all sorts of delicious, beautiful looking pastries. More often than not, passing by these delicacies, I’d sneak behind the counter and poke my finger into one of the Eclairs, or Brazo de Gitanos to scoop out the yummy creamy filling bursting inside. In the back room where my father and his assistants massaged the dough into delectable creations, stood these ominous like sculpture pieces of metal mixing bowls sitting on bases of industrious machines. Glances of puffy breads and naked cakes emerged from inside ovens that continously opened and closed, ready for their decorating dress up phase. On the floor stacked high were bags bigger than myself, filled with flour and sugar. The two men must have proped me up onto that table, holding me hostage for their own entertainment, and fantasies of later years. “You came out looking like a little monkey when you were born, I was in shock how ugly you were at birth,” my father sometimes reminded me. “You became beautiful later on, but at first you embarrassed me you were so hairy and ugly.” My father didn’t mean any harm in saying these things to me, or at least I didn’t take them mal intentioned. Maybe because by then, I felt pretty enough and secure enough to enjoy my father’s accomplice revelations. I couldn’t have been that ugly, I probably thought, if the bakery assistant wanted to marry me. Somehow that early memorable incident gave weight to my sense of self as a positive outlook insisted on taking shape. Looking back I think to myself, how dare they say such things to a little girl. What could marriage possibly signify to a merely two year-old? What did they expect me to feel? Proud? Happy? Loved? I recall feeling a kind of unspecific fear, confussion, and loss. Their niceties while holding me up high on a table, without my father or mother nearby was the begining of men's suspicious overtures.