The Ruiz home, 111 Iturbide Street, Barrio Azteca.
In the summer of 1949, my parents were living at 402 San Pablo Avenue in the Barrio El Azteca and across the Arroyo del Zacate. I was three-years-old, my brother Peter was six, and sister Lupe was five. My paternal grandparents lived around the corner at 105 Iturbide Street in a small wooden house, and my brother and I spent many happy moments with them. Next door to my grandparents lived the Ruiz family in a two-story white stone house at 111 Iturbide Street.
The father, Don José Ruiz, owned a meat market on the 600 block of San Agustín Avenue. Over time, Peter and I became very good friends of the Ruiz’s two daughters, Stella and Sylvia, even though they were older than we were, and we spent many weekends playing games. On one of those fun afternoons, their mother decided to take a picture of all of us sitting on the outside wooden stairs that led to the second floor of their house.
Stella, Sylvia, and baby Teresita Ruiz; Peter and Jorge Quezada.
In this photograph, Stella is next to Sylvia, who is the eldest and is holding baby Teresita. I am next to her with both hands on my knees. Peter is behind me. Peter and I are wearing a cap with a small visor, and our identical starched shirts look impeccable.
During the horrific flood of 1954, our house on San Pablo Avenue was partially destroyed, and we were ordered by National Guard soldiers to get in their boat. They took us around the corner to the two-story white stone house that belonged to the Ruiz family, telling us we would be safe there. We ascended the outside creaking wooden staircase and entered a big room that had little furniture and no beds. Our grandparents, Pana and Memia, were sitting on two small wooden chairs and got up to greet us.
The Ruiz family was there too, making us feel at home. Stella and Sylvia came over to join Peter, Lupe, and me. Their mother was holding baby Teresita. The windows did not have curtains, and I could see that it was dark already. I had no idea what time it was, but I do remember that Papá walked in some time later. He was still wearing his bus driver’s light grey uniform of the Laredo Transportation Company. He explained to Mamá and to the group that since the Arroyo El Zacate Bridge was closed, he was given another route. I was too tired from all the excitement. The lights were turned off and we all fell asleep on the cold linoleum floor.
A crashing knock at the door woke me from a deep sleep. We were all in a state of somnambulism. Somebody managed to turn on the lights while Don Ruiz opened the door. The National Guard soldier with the loud bass voice told him that we had to leave because the water was getting close to the first floor. He said that there was no time to waste. Papá looked at his watch and said it was after midnight. We all went outside and waited while three soldiers were saying something to the adults and pointing west. Leaving them behind, we started walking in the middle of Iturbide Street. There was not a car in sight. Mamá was holding Lupe’s hand and mine. Peter was walking with Papá and Pana and Memia. People started getting out of their houses and joining us. I had no idea where we were going.
After walking for five blocks, we turned right on San Eduardo Avenue and then immediately to our left were some open empty rooms that were part of a long one-story building. Some more National Guard soldiers were standing outside and motioning us to go inside one of them. Papá, Mamá, Pana, Memia, and the three of us went in and lay on the cold stone floor. The rest of the people went into the other ones. We slept through the night. I did not bring any of my toys or books with me. I did not have time to think about them or anything else. All we could salvage was the clothes on our backs. Early the next morning, someone from the Red Cross knocked at the door and brought us cold milk, beef tacos, and coffee for the grownups. Our room contained a bathroom with a flushing toilet and a sink. I was so grateful we didn’t have to use a chamber pot. We were completely safe because the flood did not reach this far.
After breakfast we walked down Iturbide Street one block to San Francisco Avenue to watch the National Guard soldiers patrol the streets on boats.
After the devastating flood of 1954, which partially destroyed our house, we were forced to relocate just two blocks away to 210 Iturbide Street. My grandparents also had to move a few blocks up the street. During this tumultuous time, Peter and I lost track of the two Ruiz girls, who had been our close friends. The years passed, and in the 1960s, when we moved again to 801 Zaragoza Street, we completely lost touch with them. Despite our efforts, we never found out what happened to the Ruiz girls, leaving their fate a lingering mystery in our memories.
Fast forward to the summer of 1995, forty-six years later, when Jo Emma and I visited my beloved Barrio El Azteca, and we walked all over the neighborhood, and she took very memorable photographs of the houses and businesses that I frequented when I was growing up in the 1940s through the 1960s. My grandparent’s house had been razed. When we walked by the Ruiz house, I asked Jo Emma to take a picture of the front of the house. And when we got closer and I saw the stairs where the photograph was taken in the summer of 1949, I asked Jo Emma to take a photograph of that memorable stairway where we had posed with the Ruiz sisters when I was three.
As I stood before those familiar wooden stairs with my wife by my side, I was transported back to that summer. The laughter of my brother Peter and me and the Ruiz girls echoed in my mind, as vivid as the photograph Mrs. Ruiz had taken so many years ago. The stairs, unchanged by time, stood as a testament to the enduring nature of our memories. My wife captured a new photograph, bridging the past and present, the then and now, reminding me that while much has changed, the essence of those cherished moments remains forever etched in my heart.
