Although anything with the virgin Mary screams Most Mexican Moment to me, I think this story is extra special. This evening when I got home from work, one of my old spinster landladies invited me in to see the candles she paints and sells. She paints mostly flowers but she also does the major candles for masses, and she does the work for free for two nunnery cathedrals. When I asked her which ones, curious if I would see her candles in the sanctuaries, she just said, "The Carmelites and the Sisters of Mercy." She also told me that once she (jokingly) told the nuns to stop coming by in big groups, telling them "Van a pensar que aqui es un convento, mano!" She basically called a nun "man."

My favorite part of the visit, though, was what they told me about a virgin they have in their home, the Virgin of Sevilla. It's about 1.5 feet tall, wooden, painted with gold accent, and has milagritos pinned all over the mantel. Milagritos are the little metal figures that people offer to thank saints or the virgin for a miracle. There were tons of hearts, little arms and legs, a little baby. They told me that those all come from people who have visited, and come back to pin on a milagrito, saying that the virgin did a miracle for them. She has a little bit of local fame, and once the wife of a woodworker who had done work for the ladies came to ask if she would speak with the virgin, and take a picture of her. Once a relative who had visited for a few days sent them some money to buy three milagritos to pin on the virgin, because she had performed three miracles for him. A woman they know who couldn't get pregnant "talked" privately with the virgin (she asked to be left alone with her) and then got pregnant. On the way home from the hospital, she brought the baby girl to present her to the virgin. There is a tradition in Mexico City that newborns are brought to the Villa to be presented to the Virgin of Guadalupe. I feel so nice having that wonderful little virgincita tan cerca!