Las Posadas in the Hood
One evening the week before Christmas, Joana called to me from the living room to come quick and see! I went, slowly, expecting that another loud car was driving by or maybe she wanted to show me another arrangement of food-shaped erasers in her Littlest Petshop universe. Instead, I heard human voices lifted in song, and when we pulled aside the curtain, a procession of people carrying candles and singing in a sweet, flawed way in Spanish. They were just passing our house, there must have been 35 or 40 of them, kids, adults, ancianos, wearing blue jeans and jackets, some with music in their hands. I ran outside with the camera and asked if I could take their picture. One boy looked at me with an unbelieving blank face, and I snapped away. I asked what they were doing in a bright, happy voice because it made me so happy to see people using our street for a non-commercial, human communion reason. He said "We are praying," and walked on. I felt a little humbled. But not so humbled that I stopped taking pictures of this precious event. Over the next week, the procession happened almost every night. I thought they must all eat dinner, then joyfully take to the streets for their caroling. How beautiful. I wanted to join them.