My mother did not believe in locks. She said a locked door only kept out the people you would have been glad to see. Our kitchen door opened onto the road to Chimayó, and in the sixty years she lived in that house it was never locked once, not even the winter somebody stole my father’s truck.
I learned to set the table for one more than we had. Most nights somebody came. A cousin between jobs. A farmworker from the orchard down the road. Father Anselmo, who always said he was passing by and always arrived at exactly six.
When I was nine I asked my mother what we would do if two extra people came. She said we would put more water in the beans. I have been putting more water in the beans for most of my life.
This is as far as the free sample goes — the rest of Adobe Walls, Open Doors is waiting for you.
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