CXIV. Cuando Ellos Traen Los Rifles...

When They Bring the Guns

Rico, last month, at the door to his self-built shack. Inside was
a toaster oven, radio, lights, bed, chair, etc.

“Cuando ellos traen los rifles, no hay nada qué ustedes pueden hacer.” When they bring the rifles, there’s nothing you can do. Trying to be comradely, this is what I said to Rico as he walked dazed around the mess of broken wood and palm branches, pieces of blanket and tarp, and a lot of unrecognizable (at least to me) debris that just this morning had served as his self-built shanty. 

“Está bien, está bien,” he muttered. It’s OK, it’s OK. Trying to keep his cool.

About 15 black-suited municipal police, a few with automatic rifles slung over their shoulder, all with holstered hand guns, sat about 20 meters away on benches they’d scavenged from their recent wreckage.  Half a dozen others were in plain clothes—jeans, and blue or plaid long sleeve shirts stretched tight across their shoulders.

One of the whimsical planters the community constructed. "La
Borrachita", or the Little Drunkard, is the name of the boat.

Rico’s wasn’t the only shelter that had been destroyed. A handful of others had barnacled together over the past couple of years on the shady lakeshore several blocks from where we live. They had all been leveled during probably less than an hour on a thankfully clear and warm morning in our central Mexican village.

When I stopped to ineffectually commiserate with Rico I saw the few other former residents poking through the rubble of what had served as their homes. I had admired the industry with which they constructed rock planters around the trees in this area, painted signage, regularly raked windfall from the sandy trail, began raising a small nursery of plants, fished in the lake and barbecued their catch, and kept what I thought was a friendly profile along this stretch of the shoreline. 

The "found" sign from Hacienda del Lago is a good tongue-in-cheek name
for this ramshackle hut.

Their jerry-built structures sure looked funky, but I never smelled their poop or pee, and there was an endearing whimsy to their lifestyle which admittedly included lazing in the shade with one or more of those big brown bottles of Corona. Over the past months we were happy to contribute an air mattress bed we could no longer use, an old sleeping bag, a few tarps, and a number of plastic pots and the seeds to plant in them. 

I doubt if it’s a coincidence that this relatively long-term community has been destroyed at this particular time. It’s only a little more than a month before nationwide elections that include a complete slate of municipal seats up for grabs. I’m sure there is a large constituency that will applaud the current officeholders’ actions to rid the beautiful lakeshore of rabble.

Squatters, yes. But we admired their unapologetic, scrounge-based individualism in a world that’s way too often lockstep to a numbing digital beat.