THE ANGEL OF NOGALES

[kiltgreen]

It was twenty years ago, an older friend wished to repair the cover on his fathers grave in Nogales, Arizona. For those of you who do not know. Nogales is on both sides of the border.

The land has many hills. The trip was two days before the "Day Of The Dead", he wanted it to be finished before the holiday. No problem a few bags of cement, some 2X4's for the forms, we poured and finished about 5PM. About 1AM it started to rain as it only can in that part of Arizona and Mexico.

We jumped out of bed, pulled on jeans and shoes and headed the 1/4 mile to the graveyard to put plastic over the fresh cement. This graveyard is over 300 years old, so there are a great deal of large angels and the like guarding the graves.

As the thunder and lighting raged Robert and I works to keep the wind from taking our plastic away. The clouds moved in and covered the moon, our small source of light was gone. "Dj, go to the truck, behind the seat is a large flashlight. Get it, please", Robert called to me above the wind. I run for the truck, it is dark gray and almost disappeared in the gloom. A lighting flash helped me the last few feet.

Digging in the truck I came up with the flashlight, one of the 9 volt kind. Slamming the door I got to the front of the truck when I discovered the thing did not work. As I stood shaking the thing I heard voices, men that were feeling no pain, they were drunk. Singing at the top of their lungs, the three were coming over the hill just down from me. Weaving, arms around each other for support, and singing some song in Spanish.

I was still shaking the flashlight when Robert called, "Hit it on the bottom."
So I up ended the thing, light pointing up and gave it a great whack. By now the men were even with me and because of the dark night they did not notice me standing about 10 feet off the road. So when the light flashed into full brilliance it bathed me in a halo of light. The thing had a strong bright beam.

The men screamed, up went their hand and they started to pray while at a full dead run. The last I saw them they had crossed over a hill and were still yelling.

Robert in the meantime was rolling around in the wet grass. At this point I was soaked and cold, not really in the mood for fun and games. "What's so funny?", I ask.

"Well, look down. You are in your night shirt which is pure white, your hair is loose and blowing in the wind, ( it hangs below my booty and is light blond). You just scared the holy@#it out of those guys. They were screaming, The Avenging Angel had come for them, but they promised to never drink again."

"Really", I said, "whatever- lets go before I get sick in this cold rain."

Next morning at the restaurant everyone was talking about the Avenging Angel that came to capture the souls of those who got drunk. Robert looked at me and smiled. As I glared back, he just ate and kept still.

That was 20 years ago and the story is still told in the small town of Nogales AZ/MEX.
I am the color of wallpaper paste, so I guess in a storm I might appear all white......Who knows?

And NO, I do not go to Nogales anymore

[A Douglas! A Douglas!]

Cute story, Kiltgreen.

You may well have some women in Nogales blessing you, if their husbands gave up drinking after you scared the holy bejeezus out of them.

[Elspeth]

Great story, DJ! Pretty cool to have an Avenging Angel as a member of TBIS!