A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings The story, "A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings", is a symbolic story about an old man who people believe is an angel. They believe that the old man is sent to take the son of Pelayo and Elisenda because he has been sick. The story tells of the angel’s hard times throughout his stay with Pelayo and his family, but the people lose interest in the so called angel after word spreads of the "spider-woman". There is a sigh of relief when the angel disappears over the horizon. During the beginning of the story, Pelayo and his wife are having a hard time. Their house was over-flowing with rotten crabs, and their son was extremely ill. They thought the illness was from the stench of the crabs. One day when Pelayo went to the beach to throw some crabs back, he discovered something in the mud. The movement was an old man who had wings. Pelayo was told that it was an angel sent to take their son away, and they were advised to kill the old man. They did not kill the man; however, they found out that hundreds of pilgrims were willing to pay to see the angel. Elisenda and Pelayo put the man in the chicken coop and decided to charge five cents for people to see the angel. The curious came from far away. Less than a week there rooms were filled with money. After that, the people had begun to hear about a woman who had been changed into a spider because she disobeyed her parents. The spider-woman told her story to people and they listened with amazement.When she was a child she snuck out of her room to attend a dance. On her way home she was struck by a bolt of lightning that changed her into a spider. She was a frightful tarantula the size of a ram and with the head of a sad maiden. The only nourishment she got came from the meatballs that nice souls tossed into her mouth. People took to her story better than the old man who had only did a few minor miracles that mocked the people rather than actually hear what they were asking. She gained more attention than the angel did, and the people slowly started leaving the old man alone. Pelayo's courtyard had gone back to being empty and filled with crabs once again. Furthermore, Pelayo and Elisenda used the money they had made to build a new two-story mansion to where the crabs would not be able to come inside during the winter. He also put iron bars on the windows so the angels would not enter. Pelayo almost built himself a business in town to make a living. Elisenda bought dresses made of silk, worn by some of the most desirable women. She also bought some satin pumps with high heels. The chicken coop was the only place that did not receive attention. The stench that hung in numerous areas began to turn the new house into an old house. When the child began to walk they made sure he did not get entirely too close to the coop. Before the child got his second teeth he went to the chicken coop to play. The angel and the little child both fell ill with the chicken pox at the same time. A doctor that cared for the child could not fight the temptation to listen to the angel’s heart. He found so many whistles in the angel’s heart and so many sounds in his kidney’s he should not be alive. The angel had gotten very sick one winter and Pelayo thought he was going to die. He began to eat less and less every day and along this his antiquarian eyes began to fog. The angel started bumping into posts. All he had left were just bareness of his feathers. Pelayo tossed a blanket over him and carried him to the shed to sleep. Then did he notice that the angel had a fever during the night. The wise woman who was their neighbor had not told them what to do with the dead angels. To conclude, he survived the winter and somewhat improved when the sun started to beam through the sky. Still he remained motionless. He placed himself where nobody was capable to see him. In the beginning of December he developed a large set of stiff feathers on his wings. They were in shape of a scarecrow. The angel did not want anyone to notice the feathers. Elisenda was in the kitchen cutting onions and was blasted by a gust of wind that she thought flew in from the seas. She walked to the window and saw the angel trying to learn to fly. The angel almost knocked the shed down with his enormous wings. He finally began to gain altitude. Elisenda saw him pass over the last houses and let out a sigh of relief. She kept an eye on him until she could not see him anymore. The angel was no longer an annoyance in Elisenda’s life. “The Very Old Man with Enormous Wings”, was a story in which people believed an old man was an angel. The story tells of the angel’s rough times with the family. Everyone began to lose interest in the Angel because of a wise woman. When he disappeared there was a big relief.