July, East L.A.

Sandia! Sandia! The Ramirez brothers are yelling their heads off on the back of the old man’s flatbed truck, peddling watermelons up and down the neighborhoods around City Terrace. It’s July hot and the water-wiggle is going crazy in the backyard. A beautiful day in East L.A. A bunch of pigeons and a stray gull are doing a cholo-strut in the playground, pecking at Fritos crumbs the kids dropped. I get on my blue metal-flake stingray bike--banana seat, sissy bar, rear slick cool--and ride down to the new 7-Eleven by the projects for a cherry Slurpee and a free button. Across the street from the Davidson brickyard, Lefty is selling illegal Mexican fireworks out of his garage, kids are crowding the driveway and it won’t be long before the cops come by to bust him again. I swing around my corner and see my mom standing at he curb talking to the Helms Bakery truck guy. “Hold on, Ma, get me a glazed and a bag of wam-pums!”

Inside the house, the air is stinging from the chile my grandma’s pounding out on the stone molcajete. My dad shows up at the door, covered with yellow paint, carrying a sack of carnitas he picked up on the way home from work. We all sit down at the kitchen table to eat while my mother deals out tortillas fresh off the griddle and my sister drops scoops of macaroni ‘n’ cheese onto paper plates. Later on, after newspapers are read and dogs are put to bed, a cool breeze blows through the screen door as my father, in boxers and a Hawaiian shirt, folds out the convertible sofa. We lie around smiling and telling stories ‘til the last bus rolls past the house and we all quietly drift off to mimi land on a star shining summer eve. Que vida! What a life! Good night.

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Perez is a songwriter and drummer for the band Los Lobos.