Eduardo Martinez has tried to push forward after his wife, Margarita, died last month following a 14-year battle with breast cancer.
Martinez, a farmworker of 28 years, continues to head to his worksite each morning. He feeds the chickens that live at their modest home on the Madison Pheasant Farm, a rural plot of land in an unincorporated part of Yolo County, California. Most nights, Martinez is charged with making dinner — a responsibility previously taken on by his wife — for the family.
But Martinez is now grappling with another grim reality. His youngest son, Adrian, has also been diagnosed with cancer. The 20-year-old is currently at UC Davis Medical Center following his 10th cycle of chemotherapy. Each cycle consists of five straight days of treatment.
“I have to continue suffering, like I did all those years with her,” said 57-year-old Martinez.
The Martinez family, even in their unfortunate situation, are a reflection of farmworkers across the state and, more specifically, Yolo County.
For generations, families have immigrated to the area with the hope of a better life. Yolo County estimates a population of 7,000 farm workers, with 26,236 farmworker-related persons, or 12% of total residents. Eduardo and his wife hail from Zacatecas, a state in north-central Mexico.
The workers often commit to painstaking jobs in the sun for the sake of their children. Food is sometimes hard to come by. About 47% of farmworker households in the county are food insecure.
Most don’t get paid well or live long. The average life expectancy of a farmworker is 49, compared to 76 for the general U.S. population. Margarita died at 63.
This community confronts obstacles even in death, said Antonio De Loera-Brust, a longtime farmworker advocate and friend of the family. Low-paying jobs leave workers with little time to grieve deaths.
Martinez’s oldest son, Cesar, went back to working the fields within days of his mother’s death. The family is roughly $22,000 in debt due to the funeral services and Adrian’s illness.
“Their life is a microcosm of our community,” De Loera-Brust said.
A life caring for others
Margarita was born in 1960 Francisco I. Madero, a small town in Zacatecas, Mexico. She was the third of nine children — two boys and seven girls.
Their childhood was difficult and poor, said younger sister Juanita Gutierrez. Their father was a farmworker and, with only two boys in the family, the women had to work as well.
“I don’t remember at what age we started, but we were young when we started helping my dad plant,” Gutierrez said.
The sisters were only separated by two years in age, so Gutierrez said they would constantly be with each other. Free time away from school and work was spent hanging out with friends and going out to dances.
“She loved to dance,” recalled Guiterrez.
By her late teens, Margarita had moved to Guadalajara for work. There, Martinez said, she cared for seniors.
A few years later, in 1986, she arrived in the United States. Margarita settled in Los Angeles, and spent the next few years providing child care.
In 1989, Martinez was introduced to Margarita at baile, or dance, by a family member. His first memory of her is dancing together that day, he said. They married the next year.
“There’s so many memories with her, but right now it’s difficult to think about any of them,” Martinez said.
Settling in Yolo County
The couple moved to Yolo County in the early 1990s and both immediately began working in agriculture.
Margarita spent many years armed with a hoe and working with tomatoes, while Martinez took on jobs welding and driving trucks full of seeds. It was a modest life, but one rooted in migration because of the seasonal nature of their work.
Even after the birth of their two children, Cesar and Adrian, the family struggled to secure year-round housing. The family would eventually settle at the Madison migrant center, a seasonal farmworker housing complex off Highway 16.
In 2009, Margarita’s breast cancer was detected, when her two children were 7 and 11.
“She asked God not to take her yet, to let her watch her kids grow up,” Martinez said.
Margarita tried to keep working, but within months, disease symptoms and treatment side effects relegated her to stay home. The years that followed consisted of constant trips to the doctor, chemotherapy appointments, and copious amounts of medicine, according to the family members.
The family continued to migrate each year, until in 2020, Martinez connected with the owner of Madison Pheasant Farm, which is roughly 35 miles northwest of Sacramento. The farm is home to many birds and the family’s small two-bedroom housing unit.
Finding a permanent home was a decades-long ambition for the Martinez family. They had grown tired of migrating, and Margarita’s condition was worsening.
“We wanted a home to stay in forever,” Martinez said.
Margarita died three years later, at 3:55 pm on Nov. 5, in their home.
What comes next for the family
On a late November night, traces of Margarita can be seen throughout the family’s home.
Her room has yet to be touched by the family, and features heaps of pink clothing, pink purses, pink stuffed animals and pink curtains. It’s not hard to tell what her favorite color was, Martinez said.
In the living room, the walls are plastered with photos of her from family outings — baptisms, birthday parties and trips back to their pueblo in Mexico. There’s also the Christmas decorations that she loved to put up each year.
At the same time, there’s obvious signs of her missing presence.
“It’s a piece that will never be able to be replaced,” said Cesar, as he pointed to his heart.
He is watching a telenovela, or Spanish soap opera, alone. He recalled that his mother would often ask him to turn on the TV, so she could watch her favorite shows.
A few feet away, Martinez cooks dinner for the family. Cooking was one of Margarita’s many talents, even while sick. She would typically have food ready when the men arrived home from work. They will miss her enchiladas the most, said all three Martinez men.
The family plans to head off to Mexico for the holidays, hoping the trip will help their grieving process. There’s not much for them to do here without her, said Martinez.
But they must wait until the youngest, Adrian, is released from the hospital. He was diagnosed with testicular cancer in July 2022, and has been at the hospital for the last five weeks. This latest round of chemotherapy is supposed to significantly help his condition.
Still, Martinez can’t help but worry.
“She (Margarita) is resting, but she left me to keep battling,” Martinez said.
A verified GoFundMe was launched last month to help the family with funeral and medical expenses.
