PORTAL Journal of 
Multidisciplinary 
International Studies

Vol. 16, No. 1/2 
2019

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Citation: Dwyer, K.A. 2019. 
Doce horas: A Family Border 
Tale. PORTAL Journal of 
Multidisciplinary International 
Studies, 16:1/2, 163-165. http://
dx.doi.org/10.5130/portal.
v16i1/2.6474

PORTAL is published under 
the auspices of UTSePress, 
Sydney, Australia. ISSN: 1449-
2490; http://epress.lib.uts.edu.
au/ojs/index.php/portal

CULTURAL WORKS

Doce horas: A Family Border Tale

K. Angelique Dwyer

Corresponding author: Associate Professor K. Angelique Dwyer, Chair of Latinx, Latin 
American, and Caribbean Studies, Department of Modern Languages, Literatures and Cultures, 
Gustavus Adolphus College, 800 West College Avenue, St. Peter, MN. 56082 USA.  
Email: adwyer@gustavus.edu

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5130/portal.v16i1/2.6474   
Article History: Received 09/02/2019; Accepted 12/2/2019; Published 13/11/2019

Abstract
This creative non-fiction piece written in Spanglish called ‘Doce horas: A Family Border Tale’ 
comically narrates my family’s adventure crossing the U.S.-Mexico border by car a few days 
after New Year’s. The story deals with identity negotiation, biculturalism and bilingualism in a 
non-conventional American family raised in Mexico. The narrative voice in my piece provides 
a unique perspective broadening dialogue(s) on Mexican American identity.

Keywords:
K. Angelique Dwyer; Short Story; ‘Doce horas.’

‘Llévele, llévele … La figurita del chavo … ¡hay elotes!’ Óyeme, pero ¿qué es esto? I thought, 
mientras my family and I were stuck in traffic—en el tapón—for 12 hours. Yes. TWELVE 
HOURS stuck. No motion. Stopped, on our drive back from Central Mexico after ‘las vacas’ 
de navidad. ¡Qué rollo! We’ve driven this at least 20 times in my lifetime. Pero nada como 
esta vez. ¡Qué circo! And it wasn’t because we were travelling with two kids, a dog, my senior 
parents and teenage nieces … nel. Esos gritos infernales de ‘¡¡¡se le acabó la batería a mi 
i-pad!!!’ eran music to my ears comparado con lo que les voy a contar. Y como si fuera corrido 
de Antonio Aguilar, ‘viene de ay, compadre’:

‘Un día 28 de enero …’ Well, it was actually January 4th to be precise, después de haber 
disfrutado las fiestas con mi familia extendida en Jalisco, una selección de las familias Dwyer, 
Dwyer Razo y Salivia Dwyer se lanzaron de regreso a hibernar a los lagos congelados de 
Minnesota. We had planned to leave sooner but el Piti, didn’t recommend it. ‘Never leave the 

DECLARATION OF CONFLICTING INTEREST The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with  
respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. FUNDING The author(s) received no  
financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

163

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http://dx.doi.org/10.5130/portal.v16i1/2.6474


day after New Year’s.’ Imposible cruzar la frontera. So, we waited a couple days. We left the same 
way we arrived, en caravana, de ‘roadtrip’ desde Minnesota hasta Jalisco: dos carros, 4 días, buena 
conversación, esnakeando, y tomando fotos a lo loco, porque le prometí al maestro de mi hija, que 
le mandaría fotos, so he could share with the rest of the 2nd grade class. I was psyched about it 
because: what a better way than to introduce the ‘dangerous borderlands’ to the mainstream than 
through their white Latina classmate’s family taking a roadtrip ¿no? Obvi.

We should have known the trip was cursed cuando tres días antes de irnos el patriarca de la 
familia, también conocido como Don Adán, got a horrible spasm in his back, which ended up 
leaving him in major pain over a month after our return. Se puso tan fea la cosa que we had to 
stop in San Toño for 2 days so he could rest. Así que se armó el jangueo intra-generacional en 
el downtown con un muy merecido BBQ and iced tea. The third day, we woke up at 4:30 a.m. 
(auxilio: try to get a 2-year-old, a 7-year-old and an overstuffed dog in a car at that hour—before 
coffee) y nos juimos pa’ la frontera y ‘por ay’ pá’ bajo,’ como dice mi familia puertorriqueña. Even 
though we’re usually shot from all the driving, llegar a México after a 4-day—in this case 7-day 
trip—no tiene precio. There are just no words to describe the feeling of being back, being home, 
aunque no haya nacido ahí, it’s the home I’ve always known. Ever since I was a kid I remember 
descending the Barranca hills into the city and even if it was 2:00 a.m. the whole family would 
be singing loudly: ‘Guadalajara, Guadalajara … tienes el alma de provinciana … son mis palomas 
tu cacerío … hueles a pura tierra mojadaaaa’ as a welcome-back-home anthem. And even though 
we wouldn’t sing cuando bajábamos las curvas de la carretera a Chapala—not because we didn’t 
know the Chapala song, but because it’s a lullaby—y no vamos a abandonar al conductor así, 
oye…—but like sinking into a comfy chair, we would nestle into the realization of being home, al 
lado de esas aguas, rodeadas por montañas, moradas por el atardecer, y luces lejanas, cual pulsera 
de diamantes. Truly the core of it all. 

Home.
I miss it.

The fire place, 
The stars,

The diamond bracelet across the water.
The view,

The tile floor under my bare feet,
The wooden doors creek.

My heart aches.

Bueno, pero ya me puse sappy. The whole point of this is to tell you what happened. Porque 
un buen cuento nunca cansa y siempre divierte. Así que, after spending a great Christmas 
together, where my cuñada and I finally got the opportunity to cook a meal instead of Don 
Adán and la Señora Linda always working in the kitchen like Trojans, pos ándale que nos tocó 
a nosotras … y que se arma la competencia de meatloafs. Christmas Day we went with El Piti 
& familia a los toros y al bailongo. My kids were like “wow”: la banda, las papitas con chile, 
las botas de avestruz, the bathrooms … pretty cool cultural exposure. They also learned that 
while the enraged words: ‘¡Háblame en español!’ work so well in the U.S. after they ask loudly: 
‘Mommy, why is that lady so mean?’ for everyone to hear; it doesn’t work well in Mexico. Así 
que en plena plaza de toros as people are coming in and finding places to sit, my daughter 
goes: ‘Mami, ¿por qué esa señora tiene una verruga tan grande en la cara?’ the words ‘¡Háblame 

Dwyer

PORTAL,  Vol. 16, No. 1/2, 2019164



en inglés, carajo!’ could not have come out faster from my mouth. Too late. Just smile. The lady 
may not have noticed we were referring to her mole specifically. ‘Buenas tardes.’

En fin, la pasamos chido. Y como todo tiene final, pos nos lanzamos de regreso unos días 
después de New Year’s. Actually, it wasn’t all that bad of a return trip. We managed to leave 
early—cuando canta el gallo—we had lunch pre-made and only stopped a couple times. Como 
suele pasar, both of our cars were nearly ravaged by the snake vendors in San Luis Potosí as 
we stopped for gas. I still remember the impression it had on me to see another kid of about 
my age RUN up to my window con culebra en mano. What a juxtaposition: My 12-year old 
self daydreaming the trip away as I listened to the tapes in my Walkman and these kids selling 
snake skin in the middle of the desert just to make it. It was like being slapped in the face by 
the harsh reality de la vida que les tocó. Para los que no sepan, ojo, porque lo que pasa es que: si 
le compras a uno, se te avientan todos, onda ‘The Walking Dead.’ You’re lucky if you’re able to 
exit the gas station without harming anyone. Gruuueso. Pero, aparte de eso, we made it to the 
border radius intact, until … well … we should have known. 

First: let’s look at the facts: 1) this was pre-Trump; 2) we were 10 miles from the border; 
3) had made record time; 4) had a hotel reserved al otro lado; 5) the GPS indicated that the 
remaining route to the hotel would take us 15 minutes; 6) we had minimal provisions aboard. 
De repente, we slowed down. Llegamos a una fila masiva de carros moviéndose a vuelta de 
rueda. The questions in the car start: ‘What happened?’ ‘Why’d we stop?’ the oh-so-horrible 
for-any-driver-ever: ‘Are we there yet?!’ and amidst the smog, the intermittent break lights 
and mini vans beside us—like a neon sign indicating we had arrived at the land of Bizarre—
emerges a vendor with a huge Cristo en la Cruz for sale. ‘Llévele, llévele …’ y te hace precio, 
¿eh? Behind that vendor: el carrito de los elotes comes through the traffic lanes. Luego, otro 
con la enorme imagen de la Virgen de Guadalupe, el de las paletas, brooms for sale, the 
ginormous ‘Last supper’ painting with a gold frame, and oh, the many etceteras. Things you 
would never dream would be for sale in the middle of the road just a few miles from one of the 
most talked-about borders of the modern world. We look at the vendors and start talking shit: 
‘hay mira eso … nombre, ¿quién va a querer una pinche madre de esas? ¿ni que fuera qué?’ not 
knowing what bad karma might come of it. Después de unos minutos, after sheer boredom—
and when we were still optimistic about the traffic lessening—we bought 4 overstuffed figures 
of el Chavo del 8 and friends. Se nos hizo raro when we saw people getting out of their idling 
cars to access their ice chests, like tail gaiting. Then, small groups of people would walk past us 
in the dark. ¿Y esos? 6 hours later—after we had peed in a bottle inside the car and almost had 
our bladders burst—we found out people had opened their homes to rent the bathrooms out 
to desperate travelers. Hicieron buena ganancia, eso sí. 

That night we experienced a varying range of human emotions: Determination (we had to 
cross the border—no había de otra, I mean, you’re not gonna make a u-turn and drive 14 hours 
back when you’re only 15 miles away… right?). Optimism (there’s traffic, pero sí se puede, 
hombre). Joy (‘que pinches cuadros más feos’). Anger (WHAT is the hold up?). Desperation 
(… que me estoy orinando …). Exhaustion (12 hours stopped in traffic after a 14-hour drive, 
I don’t think I need to explain this one). Curiosity (¿quién fregados se traga un elote en pleno 
desierto?). Had the city of Nuevo Laredo not made enough that month or was the universe 
just messing with us? WTF? It all dawned on me: I knew why there was oversized religious 
imagery for sale: ‘Pa’ que te arrepientas, cabrona.’ Repent and pray to the higher power to get 
you out of this faster. A no, pero ¿tú? criticando y contenta. Ándele. Yep, you had to laugh 
about the last supper guy and the verruga lady. What goes around … jamás su tronco endereza.

Doce horas: A Family Border Tale

PORTAL,  Vol. 16, No. 1/2, 2019165