Explaining 'stina
I told this story to Graham, and he said it went a long, long way to explaining me....
When my brother was born, my grandfather was also in the same hospital. He'd suffered a stroke, and it took him awhile to recover. My mom and dad say that his personality changed.
I never knew him any other way, and I never really knew that he was unusual until I was much older. He was my grandfather. The only other basis of comparison that I had was my other grandfather, and I didn't see him as often, because he lived 1500 miles away. Even before the stroke, I'm sure he was a little odd. It's the nature of my family to be a little off somehow.
At any rate, my grandfather, when I was little, had no real notion about what was appropriate to talk about in front of small children. He used to discuss his WWII surgeries after DDay in enough detail so that the opening scenes in Saving Private Ryan weren't particularly noteworthy for me. He'd relish in the gruesome details.
And he'd talk about the Aztecs.
Specifically, he'd talk about the Aztec's human sacrifice. He'd describe in detail how some poor soul would be picked out. And she'd be trussed up on the top of a pyramid or other temple altar structure. And how a priest would use a stone knife to carve the still beating heart out of the person and show the heart to the sun. And how her blood was mixed a little with the corn used for that year's crops. And how she'd die dramatically, but the crops would grow in abundance. (Sometimes he liked to mix it up a bit and give a similar story about Mayans throwing their sacrifices into cenotes, or deep, deep wells.)
And he'd tell me that the person sacrificed was a virgin girl.
Being a virgin, as far as I could tell, wasn't a particularly good thing. In fact, it seemed to me that the best course of action to avoid human sacrifice was to lose that virginity as soon as possible. 'course it didn't happen for me until I was 19 minus one day, but still. That virginity thing always seemed to me more like a burden, something to be discarded of quickly rather than held onto like a precious gift to be given to some future husband.
By and large, I think his descriptions were about as accurate as history suggests. Though of course, being a member of my family, he added a bit of a flourish to his tales. That I saw the Pyramid of the Sun in Teotihuacán when I was eight, and the cenotes in Chichen Itza when I was ten, that the remains in the Anthropology Museum in Mexico City* suggested he wasn't really that far off from the truth didn't help matters much as far as my willingness to hold on to my virginity goes. I'm pretty sure now that not all the sacrifices were virgins, but that didn't matter much then. "Virgin" and "human sacrifice" were inextricably intertwined in my head. And if one of those things was bad, so was the other.
It's funny, looking back, on how certain details of stories told to you at childhood become hugely important. I'm 80 percent sure that my grandfather wasn't intending on fucking up all the hard work the Roman Catholic Church had been doing on stressing the importance of virginity on his small granddaughter. He was probably trying to just freak me out a bit. I don't think it scarred me for life, but I do think it absolutely hysterical that my upbringing was the complete and total opposite of those poor girls who are forced to sign *shudder* chastity contracts with their fathers.
I prefer my family's way of fucking their offspring up.
*My favorite museum in the world so far.
When my brother was born, my grandfather was also in the same hospital. He'd suffered a stroke, and it took him awhile to recover. My mom and dad say that his personality changed.
I never knew him any other way, and I never really knew that he was unusual until I was much older. He was my grandfather. The only other basis of comparison that I had was my other grandfather, and I didn't see him as often, because he lived 1500 miles away. Even before the stroke, I'm sure he was a little odd. It's the nature of my family to be a little off somehow.
At any rate, my grandfather, when I was little, had no real notion about what was appropriate to talk about in front of small children. He used to discuss his WWII surgeries after DDay in enough detail so that the opening scenes in Saving Private Ryan weren't particularly noteworthy for me. He'd relish in the gruesome details.
And he'd talk about the Aztecs.
Specifically, he'd talk about the Aztec's human sacrifice. He'd describe in detail how some poor soul would be picked out. And she'd be trussed up on the top of a pyramid or other temple altar structure. And how a priest would use a stone knife to carve the still beating heart out of the person and show the heart to the sun. And how her blood was mixed a little with the corn used for that year's crops. And how she'd die dramatically, but the crops would grow in abundance. (Sometimes he liked to mix it up a bit and give a similar story about Mayans throwing their sacrifices into cenotes, or deep, deep wells.)
And he'd tell me that the person sacrificed was a virgin girl.
Being a virgin, as far as I could tell, wasn't a particularly good thing. In fact, it seemed to me that the best course of action to avoid human sacrifice was to lose that virginity as soon as possible. 'course it didn't happen for me until I was 19 minus one day, but still. That virginity thing always seemed to me more like a burden, something to be discarded of quickly rather than held onto like a precious gift to be given to some future husband.
By and large, I think his descriptions were about as accurate as history suggests. Though of course, being a member of my family, he added a bit of a flourish to his tales. That I saw the Pyramid of the Sun in Teotihuacán when I was eight, and the cenotes in Chichen Itza when I was ten, that the remains in the Anthropology Museum in Mexico City* suggested he wasn't really that far off from the truth didn't help matters much as far as my willingness to hold on to my virginity goes. I'm pretty sure now that not all the sacrifices were virgins, but that didn't matter much then. "Virgin" and "human sacrifice" were inextricably intertwined in my head. And if one of those things was bad, so was the other.
It's funny, looking back, on how certain details of stories told to you at childhood become hugely important. I'm 80 percent sure that my grandfather wasn't intending on fucking up all the hard work the Roman Catholic Church had been doing on stressing the importance of virginity on his small granddaughter. He was probably trying to just freak me out a bit. I don't think it scarred me for life, but I do think it absolutely hysterical that my upbringing was the complete and total opposite of those poor girls who are forced to sign *shudder* chastity contracts with their fathers.
I prefer my family's way of fucking their offspring up.
*My favorite museum in the world so far.