Hector didn’t reply for several very long moments.  Jason felt him searching, looking for something that could explain one person to another person.
     “When I was fourteen,” Hector finally started, “two years before my father died, Ana Maria came home from school and she was crying very hard.  She said that a little boy had hit her and spit on her and called her names like ‘spic’ and ‘wetback,’ names that I had been called a few times but which did not bother me all that much.  They bothered my sister, though, and my mother took her in her arms and comforted her.  As she held her there, I couldn’t imagine a more peaceful sight, for my mother was the very picture of peace and calm and love.  The sunlight was coming in through the window from behind her, and I remember sitting on the couch and watching them, feeling that deep sense of peace myself, loving my mother more than ever.  In a few minutes my sister had cried herself to sleep in her arms, and my mother brought her very gently to the couch and lay her down on it, whispering to her the whole time.  She kneeled down next to my sleeping sister and kissed her on the forehead, and I could see in her eyes all of the peace that she had just caused Ana to feel.
     “Then she stood up and turned to me and I almost yelled out in fear, because her eyes were now filled with an anger such as I had never seen before.  ‘I need you to watch Ana Maria,’ she told me, and her voice which had just been filled with peace and calm and loving words was now filled with a rage that matched that in her eyes.  ‘I am going to that school and I am going to find out who could do such a thing to my daughter, and why nobody did anything about it.’
     “I was speechless.  I watched in awe as she went calmly to the closet and got a sweater, then came over to me and kissed me on the forehead.  I was even a bit afraid because she seemed like a bomb about to explode, but when she touched me I felt none of her anger at all, only love.  I knew that if my father had been that angry, he would be yelling very loudly and even throwing things around the room, but my mother was completely in control of herself.  I think it was the control that gave me the most fear.  I could see just how much anger she had, but if I had not known her as my mother I would not have seen it at all.  I was afraid for the people at the school as she went out the front door.  I watched her through the window as she walked away, and I could see the energy and tension that she walked with.  I felt that I should call my father and tell him, or call the school and warn them all to leave before she got there, but I was only fourteen, so of course I did nothing.
     “She came back almost two hours later, and I could see that she was satisfied with what she had accomplished.  She never spoke another word of the incident to me, or even to my sister, but I knew on that day that if I ever needed anyone to support me in any way, my mother would be there for me with all of her heart and soul.  I could not imagine anyone standing up against that kind of anger without being very, very afraid of what might happen.  And she seemed to have no fear of anything, especially when her children were involved.
     “In a store once, I dropped a jar of pickles that I was carrying for her.  A man from the store was standing very near to me, and he turned around and saw what had happened.  He said, ‘That was a very stupid thing to do.’
     “’Don’t you ever talk to my son that way!’ my mother said immediately.  ‘Everyone has dropped something in their lives, and I will not allow you to insult my son for a simple mistake.’  I thought we were in trouble for sure, but the man backed down. ‘I’m sorry, ma’am,’ he said.  ‘I meant nothing by it.’
     “’If there is no meaning behind the words,’ my mother answered, ‘then perhaps they should not be said at all.”  I have always remembered those words.  They were full of wisdom—I recognized that, even then.  My mother was a simple woman with very little schooling, but she was a very wise woman.”
     “She sounds it,” Jason said.  “She sounds like a very marvelous woman.”
     “Of course she was marvelous.  She was a saint.  I told you that.”  Hector sounded surprised that Jason could have forgotten such a thing.
     “Right—you’re right.  Sorry about that.  I forgot.”