In a current WIP my main character’s wife is named Marta. I’ve loved that name since I met my first Marta in Esteli, Nicaragua, back when the U.S. government was funding the Contras in an attempt to destabilize the Sandinista government.<\/p>\n
Marta was a young woman who’d been kidnapped by the Contras — according to what she told my guide. They had raped her a hundred times and used her as a pack mule to carry weapons and gear. Nobody in town knew her, she had just appeared wearing a muddy soldier’s uniform, shoeless.<\/p>\n
I was on a layover between scouting missions with a Sandinista BLI unit and had three days off. I told my guide that we should pay for a room for her and make sure she had food and saw a doctor. But he was hesitant, saying two Americans — he was originally an aid worker from San Francisco — paying and caring for some Nica woman who danced into town late at night, claiming to be a victim of the Contras, might bring trouble. He worried she might turn on us, accuse us of hurting her. <\/p>\n
We argued for a while and Marta ended up sleeping on the front porch of the small restaurant where we’d been having dinner. The owner brought her a blanket and we gave him some money to feed her in the morning.<\/p>\n
But she was gone when we came back just after dawn. She’d left the blanket behind, folded on top of a table. That was the last I saw of the woman until I brought her name back to life on my computer screen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In a current WIP my main character’s wife is named Marta. I’ve loved that name since I met my first Marta in Esteli, Nicaragua, back when the U.S. government was funding the Contras in an attempt to destabilize the Sandinista … Continue reading