1946

January 7, Monday

Spring turns to summer, the days pass. It is January, so Daniel goes back to school and I stay home to take care of the younger children. Cacilda comes every morning. Neighbor ladies come with food.

Papai puts on his white linen suit and goes to work every day. I get up early and make café for him with fruit and bread and fry him some cheese, and sometimes I make him tapioca like Mamãe taught me.

Papai is going to be staying at the post office in Picuí: they are giving him a permanent job so he doesn’t have to ride the horse and deliver the mail. He worked very hard to learn numbers and counting money and now God has blessed him with this new job.

My new baby brother is named João. He is still with Dona Maria because he needs mamar, and making bottles is too hard for me with four other children to take care of. We walk to Dona Maria’s house every few days to visit. She has lots of children but she feeds us cookies or rice and beans. Baby João is quiet and calm, always looking around at all the commotion with those blue eyes, eyes like Papai. I hold him and kiss him and I try not to cry.

We are six children with no mother. Samuel is two, happy and laughing most of the time. Paulo is three. Ana is five and she will go to school next year. Daniel is seven, very serious, helps me around the house when he comes home from school, does his homework. I am eight years old but I know a lot about taking care of the house and kids.

Things were a mess at first because caring for the chickens and pigs and tending the garden and making food and cleaning are very hard, but I have learned how to take care of everything. I get up early and go to sleep when all the children are in bed. Sometimes one of them will cry in the night and I hug and kiss them until they go back to sleep.

We go to church on Wednesday and Sunday. Papai preaches sometimes. I am obedient and follow the ways of the Lord. I must wear long sleeves. I must not cut my hair—it is down past my shoulders. I braid it to keep it out of my face while I work around the house. I pray with the children before we eat, before we leave the house for a walk to Dona Maria’s, before bedtime. We ask for peace for Mamãe in heaven. We ask for strength and health so that we may serve the Lord.

It is not our will that decides what happens in our lives, it is the will of the Lord. When I work with Cacilda and the neighbor ladies to plan for our Sunday dinner, I can’t say we will have a nice dinner, I say, we will have a nice dinner if God wishes it. And I cannot be proud of Daniel doing well in school, I must say, thanks be to God Daniel is doing well in school. And I cannot say it was wrong for God to take Mamãe, I must say that she is with the Lord and walking beside the river in heaven.

The days are hot, without a bit of rain. Sometimes there are little puffs of cloud in the distance, but they are just pretty and bring no rain. We have a well but we must be careful not to use too much water. Just enough for the animals, just enough to keep the garden growing, just enough to be clean. To wash clothes, we use the same water with a little soap and don’t waste it: we pour it on the garden. When I was little everyone would wash clothes on the banks of the creek, but the creek is only a trickle now.

People pass through town walking toward the cities in the south, because there is drought where they come from. Parents with children and men by themselves looking for a better life. They stop outside our door and clap, “Oi in the house!” I don’t answer them because I can’t let them in and feed them like Mamãe did; we can’t let strangers know we are children alone. I wish I could help them. The children look so tired and hungry. I say a prayer for them.