Una mujer de esas
_¿Quién es esa? –pregunté porque mis ojos infantiles jamás la habían visto antes.
_Es una mujer de esas –fue su respuesta cortante.
Aquella chica se llamaba Garúa, como la lluvia menuda que cae por las tardes y así como su nombre, era ella: fresca, silenciosa, pero que dejaba una agradable sensación cuando pasaba. Muchas veces me topé con ella y ella, siempre me regalaba una sonrisa y un leve guiño en los ojos. Garúa no solo me sonreía a mí, le sonreía a todos, pero ninguna de las mujeres respondía a su sonrisa. En cambio los hombres, como Don Eulogio, Lencho y Eustaquio, se esmeraban en complacerla:
_¿Qué quiere lo más hermoso que han visto mis ojos hoy? -preguntaba Lencho y pagaba todo lo que ella pidiera. Garúa sonreía y luego se iba dejando sin ojos a los hombres porque los ojos de los hombres se iban detrás de ella.
Por más que Garúa se dedicó a intentar crear lazos con las otras mujeres del pueblo, no lo logró. Garúa era demasiado tormenta, huracán, risas, color y alegría para estar al lado de aquellas mujeres grises e insípidas, que no llegaban a sereno, ni a tarde de marzo.
Como niña, secretamente, me miraba en el espejo y dentro de mí quería llegar a ser como Garúa, ser una mujer de esas, sin saber a qué se refería mi madre y las otras mujeres con aquella expresión tan llena de secretos. Para mí ser una mujer de esas, tenía que ver con un cuerpo volcán, con ser mujer trueno, mujer torbellino, mujer feria: mujer con ventanas abiertas donde asomarse para conocer la alegría.
HASTA UNA PRÓXIMA OPORTUNIDAD, AMIGOS
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One such woman
The first time I saw her, she was walking down the dusty street of town with a suitcase in her hand and in the other hand she was carrying a bouquet of flowers that someone had probably given her. Doña Ingina, Socorro, mother and I were standing on a corner. The first one to see her was Socorro who motioned to my mother and then we all turned to look at her. While in my eyes there was surprise and admiration, in the eyes of the adult women, there was repudiation and anger. I asked my mother:
_Who is that? -I asked because my childish eyes had never seen her before.
She is one of those women,” was her curt reply.
That girl's name was Garúa, like the light rain that falls in the afternoon, and just like her name, she was her: fresh, silent, but she left a pleasant sensation when she passed by. Many times I ran into her and she always gave me a smile and a slight wink in her eyes. Garúa not only smiled at me, she smiled at everyone, but none of the women responded to her smile. On the other hand, the men, like Don Eulogio, Lencho and Eustaquio, went out of their way to please her:
What do you want the most beautiful thing my eyes have seen today? -asked Lencho and paid whatever she asked for. Garúa would smile and then walk away leaving the men without eyes because the men's eyes would go after her.
As hard as Garúa tried to bond with the other women in town, she did not succeed. Garúa was too much storm, hurricane, laughter, color and joy to be next to those gray and insipid women, who did not reach serene, not even on a March afternoon.
As a child, secretly, I looked at myself in the mirror and inside me I wanted to become like Garúa, to be one of those women, without knowing what my mother and the other women were referring to with that expression so full of secrets. For me, to be one of those women had to do with a volcanic body, with being a thunder woman, a whirlwind woman, a fair woman: a woman with open windows to look out of to know joy.