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certain prayer and <strong>with</strong> cooled baths to the head and eyes. Nighttime<br />
headaches need hot baths and a different prayer.”<br />
“Ooooooooooh,” responded Doña Juana, nodding her head approvingly<br />
toward Marina. “I told you he would know what to do.”<br />
“Rosita,” said Don Elijio, not missing a beat. “Go to the other house and<br />
fill this bag <strong>with</strong> the Nine Xiv for Marina.”<br />
I used my flashlight to find the Xiv and filled the bag. The delicious<br />
aroma of the oils in the fresh leaves delighted and refreshed me. I wished I<br />
could sleep on a bed of freshly collected Xiv.<br />
“Here you are, maestro,” I said when I returned to the crowded room<br />
and handed Don Elijio the leaves.<br />
“You are to boil a handful of these leaves for ten minutes, allow it to<br />
cool thoroughly, and then sit down in a chair <strong>with</strong> your head bent backward<br />
like this,” he instructed. He mimicked the position he wanted her to take so<br />
that she would know how to do it. “Then, wash your head <strong>with</strong> the cool Xiv<br />
water and allow some to fall into your eyes. Cover your head <strong>with</strong> a thick<br />
towel and do not remove it for the rest of the day. Do this for three<br />
consecutive days.”<br />
Don Elijio reached out for her arm to feel her right pulse at the wrist,<br />
and as he often did, he motioned for me to feel the left.<br />
“What do you feel?” he asked, peering at me intently.<br />
“It seems rather slow and weak,” I said. “Somewhat faint.”<br />
“Right,” he said. “You have felt it correctly. The circulation is very<br />
poor. When I finish the prayer you will massage her neck and shoulders as<br />
you do mine. I know that will help her too.”<br />
When he finished the nine prayers, she shifted into a stool closer to the<br />
door where I massaged her neck muscles and corrected the alignment of her<br />
cervical vertebrae.<br />
As I worked, the children sat wide-eyed and silent. They watched us<br />
like hawks, obviously drinking the scene in. Thus is traditional healing kept<br />
alive, I thought, by moments just like this, when matriarchs show their<br />
progeny how to get help from village healers.<br />
No sooner had Don Elijio finished <strong>with</strong> Marina than Doña Juana pushed<br />
one of the smaller girls into the patient seat.<br />
“Now, this little girl lives <strong>with</strong> the sniffles all the time,” continued the<br />
matriarch. “Her father wants to get some pills for her, but I told him no, not<br />
to do that, as I have never seen that those pills work on people but instead