Grandfather's stories were the best because they
were true. His stories had been handed down word by word from
his grandfather and his grandfather's grandfather. Diego had already
heard the stories enough to repeat them, but he would have to
wait until he had children who wanted to hear them. Grandfather
would tell of the ancient Mayans who developed the first system
of writing in the Americas (North & South). They listened
proudly to their heritage as grandfather described how the ancients
had mapped the stars long before anyone else in the world. They
were captivated by hearing that their ancestors had developed
mathematics long before anyone else in the world. The concept
of zero being a number, the Mayans developed it where the Romans
couldn't. The Mayans had a system based on 20 (vegesimal) as opposed
to the moderns system of 10 (decimal). Maria liked the way grandfather
would count to twenty by wiggling her ten fingers then her ten
toes.
Best of all was when grandfather would describe the silly things. They giggled out loud as he would describe people tying boards to youngsters foreheads because they believed a flat forehead to be a sign of beauty. Diego almost fell out of his hammock as he laughed at his grandfather acting out how the ancients used to hang a bead of wax in front of their baby's eyes in order to make the child cross eyed. They thought it was another sign of beauty.
As sleep was almost near for his grandchildren, grandfather would describe how the ancient Mayans would perform sacrifices or blood letting as an offering to any one of their 166 gods. At this point in the story, Maria would always reach up and shake Diego's hammock to try and scare him. It always worked. The scream was also a signal to mom that it was time to put the weaving away and go to sleep. Flora put all her wonderful cloth into a basket underneath her son's hammock and went to bed.
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