"I spent my life moving between the Latin American culture of my Puerto Rican mother and the Anglo-American culture of my father. I was born on March 26, 1941 in Washington, D.C., one of a pair of identical twins. My sister died only a month after our birth. A year later my parents and I moved to Mexico where another sister was born. My childhood and early adulthood were spent in Mexico and El Salvador. When I think of those years, the images that come to me are awash in the color saffron: the Spanish language, the permeable scent of cedar and leather, the shimmering heat, the color of the women in the household, the stories they told, the lives they shared.

"In Latin America, I learned that life is frail and most always capricious, that people find joy in the midst of insurmountable obstacles, that in the end, it is hope that saves us.

"When I became a teenager, I was sent to live for three years on my paternal grandparents' farm in Northeastern Missouri, and this is where I attended high school. I was the first Latina the people there had ever known. Those years live for me in a pale blue light: the thin sheen the setting sun casts on the snow banks, the color of my father's eyes, the doleful bawl a cow makes when it has lost its calf, the back-breaking work that is the farmer's lot.

"In Missouri, I learned that life is what you make it, and that satisfaction comes with a job well done, that in the end, it is steadfastness that saves us."

"I received my undergraduate and master's degrees from Northeast Missouri State University. Over the years I have been an English, Spanish, and Literature teacher at both high school and university levels. I have been a translator, and I have worked in the international division of a major training corporation. I have traveled extensively throughout Latin America. Since 1980, I have been a fiction writer and a creative writing teacher. I have two grown sons and I live with my husband in Minnesota."

"I came to writing late. I was thirty-nine before I gathered enough courage to begin. When I hear other writers talk about writing, I'm amazed by those who say they always knew they had to write. When I was a girl, I never wished to do it. Being a writer was something magical I never dreamed I could attain. But while growing up, I frequently had a book in my lap -- and so I was linked even then to writing and to the spell that stories cast. I didn't know a writing life was lying in store for me. I had to live and grow before I caught the faint call. Since heeding the call, I've worked hard at being faithful to it, for writing is an act of faith. We must keep faith each day with our writing if we want to be called writers.

"Since I've been writing I've searched what's in my heart and its from that core that I write and not from what seems marketable. I am a Latina American. In my heart are stored the stories of my Latin American and Missourian heritage -- of a childhood lived in Mexico and El Salvador. When I write, I have to suppress the knowledge that mainstream America often ignores the stories of 'the other America.' Over the years, I've learned to write from the heart, to persevere despite the setbacks of a host of rejections.

"In the end, I've learned these things about writing: its never too late to begin; we know all we need to know in order to do it; persistence and tenacity will take us all the way. There are angels on our shoulders, be still to catch their whisperings."

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Remedios

La Curandera (curandera, n.f. healer)

Remedios,la curandera,stands at the edge of the sea. The old healer is weary, a result, in part, of the countless times she has cocked her head in the direction of someone's story. Remedios knows the town's stories. Just as the sea, as their witness, knows them, too.

Remedios looks out over the deep. Tucked under an arm is the swordfish beak that is one of her prized possessions. She has owned it for many years. Usually she keeps the sword in her hut, on her altar,la mesa santa.Not today. Today she has brought the sword to the sea because it signifies the waters and the mighty fish that live there. She has brought it becauseel pico de pez espadahelps her find those who have drowned.

Today Remedios awaits the one blue wave that will bring a corpse to shore. The body we wait for, she thinks, the sea will yield up. Today. Tomorrow. The sea cannot be rushed. The others wring their hands, hold their breaths on the far side of the crag, at the place where the river joins the sea. But not Remedios.El picohas led her to this spot, and it is here she'll keep her vigil.

Gathering her long dark skirt between her legs, Remedios squats on the shore. She laysel picoacross her lap. Around her neck is the cord from which her medicine pouch hangs. The pouch rests directly over her heart and contains the secret talismans that fortify and empower her. Remedios spreads a palm over the little pouch, then reaches for the line of foamy brine rippling toward her. In the biting honesty of salt, the sea makes her secrets known to those who care to listen. She touches a finger to her tongue and the stories come.

The sea remembers. So it is the sea retells.

Copyright © 1993 by Sandra Benítez

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Excerpted from A Place Where the Sea Remembers by Sandra Benitez
All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.