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Oh the wonders that are seen through the eyes of a five year old. Wonders that are both scary and delightful at the same time.

I was five years old when my family visited Mexico. We had driven out to Arizona to visit my Uncle Dan and his family. My Uncle Dan, Aunt Joyce, and cousins Luke and Amy lived in Tucson at the time.

I'm not sure, but it seems to me like the four of them and the six of us all rode together in one car from my Uncle's house to Mexico. I do remember my cousin Amy, who was also five years old at the time, and I arguing most of the way there about the right way to pronounce the name of the country. She said it was "Meh-HE-ko" like the Mexicans would actually say it, and I said it was "Mex-E-ko", like the Americans would say it.

When we got there we parked in a huge parking lot, then literally walked across the border and through a turnstile. For many years after that I honestly believed that you had to walk across the border to get in to Mexico. What we were actually doing was entering the tourist town of Old Tucson, Mexico.

Wow! I was intrigued by all the music, street entertainers and shops full of Mexican wares. I remember my mom buying a blue donkey piata that she would never let us bust open. She told us it was a Christmas decoration and did not want it busted. She brought that piata out every year until it fell apart.

My brothers, sister and I all got all the stereotypical Mexican souvenirs: colorful ponchos, sombreros, and maracas. We all eventually outgrew our ponchos and sombreros and gave them away. The maracas that were made out of dried gourds rotted after a few years.

I was enchanted by the man who had the wooden puppet on the strings; He could make the puppet tap dance by bouncing it on a wooden board. Of course I had to get one of those wooden dancing men, but I never could get it to dance quite right. I have no idea what became of my wooden dancing man.

We had been there for a while when all of a sudden some bank robbers came running out of the bank with guns blazing. They were chased by lawmen on horseback and a shootout took place. I watched in horror as I saw some men being shot and killed. I clung to my mother's side not knowing what to do.

After those men had been shot and the robbers caught and handcuffed, something odd happened. I stood there in disbelief as the crowd on the street broke out in applause. How in the world could these people be cheering when there were men lying dead on the street?

My mother explained to me that it was all a show, and they weren't really dead. She told me that the man who had killed the people was not really a bad guy, he was an actor. I still did not believe her. So she suggested that we go talk to the gun toting killer/actor.

It took a while for the man to convince me it was just a show. He got down on one knee to talk to me face to face. He showed me the gun he had used. It was nothing but a toy tin gun. He asked me if I had ever seen a TV show. When I said that I had, he explained to me that that was all they had done: put on a show for those in the audience.

Despite the scary incident, I still have wonderful memories of that day. The most wonderful being the fact that the actor took the time to make sure I wasn't scared, and understood it was all staged. And I have a great picture of that cowboy actor as he talked to me placed securely in my special photo album.

Learn more about this author, Jill Ardary.
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