Notes and illustrations that he had put on paper more than 40 years ago ignited Larry Torres’ imagination as he combed through his old files in 2019 for the first time in decades .
Recently retired from the University of New Mexico-Taos and spending his days looking after his father, who had suffered a stroke, Torres gave a second look to past research, and eventually a Lady in Blue came to the fore.
Twelve years of notes on the Venerable María de Ágreda, a Spanish mystic of the 1600s with extraordinary ties to New Mexico, laid the groundwork for Torres to begin a historical fiction book and gave him something to work on while his dad was convalescing at the Taos Living Center.
The book soon took on much greater significance for Torres when he faced serious health challenges of his own.
Between March and June 2020, Torres suffered two strokes and lost control of the left side of his body. Working on the book was a form of therapy, he said, and finishing the work became a goal to strive for as he pushed to regain his strength with encouragement from his family and former students.
“I told myself, let go of the past and complete what you started to do, and that’s what the Blue Nun is about — completing what I started to do,” said Torres, 66, a longtime educator and historian who writes a weekly humor column called “Growing up Spanglish” in The New Mexican.
Typing helped Torres regain some feeling in his left hand, but he said most of the second half of the novel, The Children of the Blue Nun, was typed with only his right hand. He completed the 362-page book, written in both English and Spanish, in November.
The work follows fictional encounters of María de Ágreda, a real-life nun who lived in a convent in rural Spain and wrote a book called Mystical City of God about the Virgin Mary’s life that she said was dictated to her by the Virgin Mary.
María de Ágreda also claimed to have the ability of bilocation, or to be in two places at once.
While she was in the convent in Spain, she reported visiting Native Americans in the American Southwest, including present-day New Mexico and Texas. She would encourage them to visit Spanish missions. In the 1620s, there were stories of Natives visiting missions on directions from a “Lady in Blue.”
Torres, a deacon in the Archdiocese of Santa Fe, said his book doesn’t focus as much on the more sensational aspects of María de Ágreda's life. Rather, it shows her praying in Native languages and meeting prominent historical figures in an unsettled New Mexico territory.
Torres’ two strokes, which occurred during the first few months of the coronavirus pandemic, disrupted his work on the book, though he tried to maintain normalcy as much as possible.
While serving as a deacon during Mass at Holy Trinity Parish in Arroyo Seco, he would arrive an hour early to go over the readings and prepare himself to walk around the altar to avoid getting tripped up.
“I came back almost immediately,” Torres said. “The only one who knew I’d had a stroke was the priest, Father Angelo Marquez.”
Some others did find out about the strokes, including former students.
Torres has taught at every level, from elementary school to master’s programs at universities, and he’s maintained close connections throughout the decades.
One of his early pupils was Tod McKeon, who had Torres as a ninth grade teacher at Taos Junior High in 1984.
McKeon had moved to Taos from Connecticut and was having a tough time with the transition. Torres took him under his wing and later became a mentor. The two remain good friends 36 years later.
“If you need perspective and a calming voice, Larry Torres would provide that for you,” said McKeon, whose wife, Jessie, is also a former Torres pupil from Taos.
McKeon felt Torres’ demeanor after the strokes was almost too positive. Torres didn’t see the areas where he needed help, McKeon said.
McKeon would make day trips from his home in Albuquerque to Arroyo Seco to visit and have lunch. He also encouraged Torres, who had recovered some of his upper-body control through typing, to take frequent laps around his house to build the strength in his legs.
“I just want the guy to get back to normal,” McKeon said. “There are too many fun times with Torres that I don’t want to miss out on.”
Torres said he knows many stroke victims who have lost the ability to speak accurately and clearly. The longtime language educator — who has taught English, Spanish, Russian and French — feels fortunate that his strokes didn’t affect his speech in that way.
He also feels fortunate to still be able to share his stories.
The Children of the Blue Nun appeared in serialized articles in The Taos News over the course of two years. It was published as a book in February by Outskirts Press, and he's already working on another book on a pair of mystics from the 1100s.
A cowboy series called Tall Tales of Johnny Mudd, which Torres wrote some 40 years ago, is also running in the Taos News along with his old illustrations.
He gets a kick out of looking back on what he's created and he hopes others do, too.
“We have to be focused on what our intention is,” Torres said. “My intention is to bring humor to the world, to bring faith to the world, to bring understanding and, more than anything else, to bring mercy to the world.”
“I’m far from being at a 100 percent perfect working order,” Torres added. “But I’m still around, I’m still alive, and I can still tell you this story.”
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