Manana

Manana is the Spanish word for tomorrow that Terry and Sal repeat during their first days living near Sabinal. In the cotton fields and grape vineyards, it offers an intimate promise that things will improve, even as the stalled manure-truck plan makes tomorrow a habit of deferral rather than a guarantee.

The Word as Reassurance

After a long day, Sal, Terry, and Johnny stop at a roadside place on Highway 99, where they rent a motel room for two dollars. The next morning, after moving into a one-dollar-a-day tent five miles outside Sabinal, Terry and Sal gaze at the stars and kiss. She says, "Manana" and asks whether everything will be all right tomorrow; Sal answers, "Sure, baby, manana." Their exchange gives the word the force of mutual comfort: it lets them imagine a settled future while they are still finding somewhere to sleep.

A Refrain Against Delay

Sal says that for the next week, manana is all he hears. He describes it as a lovely word that probably means heaven, turning an ordinary promise of tomorrow into a hopeful ideal. Yet the immediate circumstances complicate that hope. Rickey and Ponzo arrive at the tent with beer instead of making progress with the manure truck, and Ponzo says it is too late to work that day: they will make money tomorrow, while today is for drinking. Sal begins to realize that their plans to earn money this way will never materialize. The repeated word thus holds both comfort and postponement: it points toward a better day that the group's actions continually put off.

Domestic Hope and Its Limits

The tenderness attached to manana persists within a precarious domestic scene. Johnny, whose shoes spill Madera sand onto the motel-room sheets, is asleep when Terry and Sal brush the sand away in the middle of the night. In the tent, Terry asks Sal whether he wants to make love; Sal asks about Johnny, and she replies that the boy is asleep, though Johnny is awake and says nothing. Against these concrete signs of care and unsettled living, manana sounds less like a plan than a small shared shelter. Its warmth is real, but the story leaves tomorrow unresolved.