"I was born August the 27th, 1924 in Morenci. [My parents were] Teresa Limón Díaz and Wenseslado Díaz. They came from Mexico. Jalisco. [We lived] up in AC Hill. [My father] did odd jobs, building trincheras (walls) and then during the Depression he worked in the theater as a maintenance man. He used to work underground [in the mine] before the Depression. My mother never worked. She had too much to do at home with so many kids. [There were] about nine or ten [of us]. One of them passed away. The first one was Leandro. I think he was a year old when he passed away. And then Marcelino [Chelino], Carmen [Carmela], Benseslado [Chelado], Natividad [Nati], and then me, Josefina [Josie], then María Luisa [Licha], Teresa [Tere], Dolores [Lola], and Anita [Annie].

My mother [disciplined the children]. My daddy [too]. We used to run away from my dad. He would hit us and my mother didn't. We used to hide, after Chelino [my oldest brother]got big, we used to hide behind Chelino. One day my daddy was gonna hit me and I ran behind Chelino and I told him, "Chelino, Chelino, my daddy's gonna hit me." He went and told my dad off. He told him, "Aprovechado. Porque no se approvecha con uno de su tamaño. No le ande pegando a mis carnalitas." (Why don't you take beat on someone your own size. Don't be hitting my little sisters). (laughs) He [father] wouldn't say nothing. He would tell my mother alcahueta (protector of mischief) because she would cover up for us too. Because my mother hated for him to hit us. He did hit us. He was such a kind man but he had a temper. My mother whenever she was gonna hit us, she would tell us, "Mijas, no me hagan enojar. Se me sube lo Limón." (laughs) (Daughters, don't make me mad. My Limón will rise up). She would show us what she meant by that. She was really covering up for us all the time. She was such a good mother.

That's when my dad used to tell her she was muy alcahueta. She would say, "Vayanse a jugar mis hijas." (Go play, my daughters). She knew what it was not being young because when she was young, my grandma developed a very bad case of arthritis where she got crippled that she couldn't move. She [mother] must have been about eight years old so she took over the taking care of her sisters, and the family, and my grandpa. Then she took over all her nephews and nieces besides us. They would come and eat at her house. It was always full of people. They would come and eat at her house. She would say, "Even if I [don't] have anything, you're welcome to it." So even if she only had beans, she would give us all beans.

They [parents] would argue about any little thing. My mother was always doing something wrong. One day I remember my mother really told my dad off. She says, "One thing I'm gonna tell you, that you're never gonna take my religion away from me or my parents. You can take anything away from me but my religion and my parents. I can go see them any time I want to." And he tried to but my mother won.

One time, he didn't want us to go to church so my mother says, "Vayanse muy quedito y salganse y esperenme alla arriba del serro." (Leave very slowly and wait for me up on the hill.) My mother made believe that we were outside playing so she went and very quietly she took off and she got her shawl and started going up the hill and from there she says, "Bye!" From there we went to my grandma's house and we stayed all day long at my grandma. (laughs) She wasn't going to let my daddy push her around. She didn't argue or anything. She knew that he was the head but she had rights too. He settled down after he knew that my mother was right. He was sorry he had hurt my mother in any way.

My grandmother taught her [my mother] to be a woman, a real woman where they have to do everything from scratch. She said she was about six or seven, real young, and my grandmother she got paralyzed with some kind of a virus where she couldn't move so my mother used to get up early in the morning and put her nxtamal to make her tortillas and put her beans to cook. That's all they ate, was tortillas and beans. When they were in Mexico. She was just a little girl. When we grew up, she said, "Vayanse a jugar, mis hijas." "Go play." She never was a young girl where she played because she had to be a woman from when she was just a little girl. We took advantage of it. We used to climb up the hills and we'd tell stories."