How Tia Lola Came to (Visit) Stay

In the spring, Tía Lola puts on her lucky yellow scarf and goes to meet the neighbors, including Tom and Becky, a couple who own a sheep farm next door. Becky, who is usually shy, happily chats with Tía Lola and lets the woman hold one of her lambs. Tía Lola is beginning to learn English, but the neighbors seem to understand her even when she speaks Spanish, prompting Miguel to wonder if her scarf is magic. Tía Lola visits Rudy’s Restaurant, where she receives a warm welcome from everyone except for Colonel Charlebois, “a sour-looking old man in a uniform” (46). The retired colonel owns the farmhouse where the Guzmáns live. He chooses to rent his family’s ancestral home and live in town because his arthritis limits his mobility and causes him pain. Charlebois repeatedly sends back Rudy’s huevos rancheros, but he praises the ones Tía Lola cooks, prompting an awed Rudy to mutter that she is magic.

Miguel wonders if Tía Lola’s magic can help him improve his grades and his chances at making the little league team. Tía Lola makes Dominican recipes for the boy’s lunches, and an athletic classmate named Mort helps himself to some of the