juanzqui

I THINK MY all-time favorite thing about Mexico are the words, “me regala su firma (or autógrafo, por favor.”

They are uttered by restaurant servers and store clerks when they want you to sign a credit card receipt. 

In Texas, we use the verb dar instead of regalar. They mean the same, to give, except that to me regalar is used in connection with a gift. I haven’t studied Spanish so I don’t know if the two words are interchangeable but my limited knowledge tells me that you use dar for your run-of-the-mill giving and you use regalar for the special kind, the kind of giving that comes with a dose of love. 

Toma mi corazón, te lo regalo.

Those are the beginning words and title of one of my favorite songs, and it illustrates perfectly how that word should be used. Take my heart, it says, I offer it to you as a gift. 

That aspect of offering something as a gift is what makes special its use in this case. You might find it hard to believe that there is anything special or romantic about asking for someone’s signature on a credit card, and there may not be. 

But when I’m asked to sign something in such a manner, the request comes with a good dose of gentility, of respect, and that to me is what makes it special. 

So, in that spirit, here, take this post; I offer it to you as a gift. 

Wednesday, May 11, 2016 | Mexico City

I’M SITTING IN the spacious rooftop terrace of my hotel. I am the only one up here and I’m enjoying the solitude. I was going to say that I was enjoying the silence, but there is no silence in the big city. In addition to the hum and honks of the traffic and the roaring of airliners above, I can hear birds chirping, and, from six stories down, the sweet sound of an alto saxophone.

And I’m sipping from a paper cup filled with bourbon, water and ice. I know, I know: I should be imbibing on tequila or mescal, being in Mexico and all. I wanted to. I really, really wanted to, but tequila and mescal are not meant to be drunk diluted with water, and I just wasn’t up to drinking straight booze. So bourbon it is, and bourbon is nice.

As happened yesterday, the intense heat of the early afternoon has magically disappeared with the arrival of storm clouds in the western sky (I had to check my iPhone compass app to find that out because I had no idea which way is what). The cool breeze feels good as I listen to the thunder in the distance. I don’t know if it will rain here. If it does, I will have to retreat to my room, which is right next to the terrace, because I don’t know if it is wise to be under the fancy tarp-like roof is designed in a thunderstorm.

I HAVE LONG prided myself, almost to the point of arrogance, at not getting sick in this country, no matter what I eat or drink. For a while this morning I thought my luck had run out. Throughout most of the morning, as I made my way to Colonia Roma, I felt that perhaps my stomach was not reacting too kindly to whatever I had eaten or drunk last night. I blamed it on the ice I had last night, from the hotel ice machine. Luckily, though, by the time I had lunch, those yucky feelings were gone and I felt OK throughout the rest of the afternoon.

IF MY FITBIT machine is correct, I took some 16,500 steps today. (If you doubt it, ask my feet; they are killing me, even after the hot shower.) It would have been a lot more if I hadn’t used the subway twice. I love the Mexico City subway, even if it’s not air-conditioned. I stay away from it during rush hour, though. Too crowded.

I spent most of my time today in the Roma district. Colonia Roma, as it’s officially known, is a chic, tree-lined streets with many stately old homes that remind you of Paris or Washington, DC along Massachusetts Avenue. Lots of sidewalk cafes. There are supposed to be art galleries also but I found only one. Maybe I didn’t look hard enough.

On my way to Roma I stopped at the Mercado de Artesanias de la Ciudad. Something I’d read had led me to believe that I might be able to find crafts that aren’t the usual stuff designed for tourists. I didn’t.

I went to Roma because my friend Elena, a Mexicana who has lived in this city and visits often, recommended that I go to the Mercado Roma, which is like a regular market except that they don’t sell tchotchkes. They sell food. It’s an upscale version of the street and mercado food vendors. Everything looked good but I settled for taquitos. I chose rajas (strips of roasted peppers in a cream sauce) and verdolagas (purslane), each served with a bit of rice. Oh, my God! They were heavenly.

(An American couple just came up. From Florida. They sound Texan. They came up to smoke. I was getting ready to be upset but they’ve installed themselves way on the other side of the terrace so their smoke should not bother me. The woman commented that she wished they had a bar up here. Nice guy that I am, I asked if they liked bourbon. Jack and Coke every once in a while, she said, but she’s a beer gal. Fuck ‘em.)

THE RAIN HAS come and the lightning is too close for comfort, so I’ve moved inside. I think I’ll take a nap. I’d love to head back to Roma to try one of the cafes I saw but it’s too far, so I’ll have to settle for something closer.

Tuesday, May 10, 2016 | Queretaro

MY APOLOGIES TO those of you who assumed I was talking about ghosts I had seen when I posted the photos of my hotel, La Casa de la Marquesa. I did not. Thank God! What I should have written was that I had been told by a local resident that this old hotel is haunted. I heard that shortly after I had registered. Had I heard it before, I might have seriously considered getting another hotel.

I will tell you about my one and only night in the Cristobal Colón room (which is on the same floor as the Niña, the Pinta and the Santa María) later, but first let me give you a bit of history and lore.

Construction for the baroque-style hotel started in 1729 and finished in 1756. It was built as the home for Josefa Pula Guerrero, the wife of the Marquis of Villa del Villar de Aguila, otherwise known as Juan Antonio de Urrutia y Arana. Among the many prominent guests of the Marquis was the emperor Maximilian I, Mexico’s only monarch, who was executed not far from here in 1867.

That’s the official story. Here is what I learned from the guy who drove me here from San Miguel: Josefa Pula Guerrero was a nun in Queretaro. When her future husband first saw her, he was immediately smitten and decided he would make her his wife. He asked and she said no; she was already married to Christ, after all.

But the Marquis didn’t give up and one day luck visited him, in the form of a plague that had hit the city, caused by contaminated drinking water. Residents of this city were dying like flies. The nuns did what they could but they were helpless; as long as the people drank the water, they were doomed. In desperation, she went to her suiter and made a proposal of her own. She would marry him but first he might find a way to clean up the water supply to stop the deaths. Once he did that, he must built her the grandest house in the city.

He cleaned up the water supply and she left her order to marry him, and soon construction of this house began. How much of that is true, I don’t know, but it’s a good story. As for the ghosts? I don’t know. With so many rooms and so many people having slept, lived and died here over the last 260 years, there are bound to be spirits lurking around and wanting to come out every once in a while.

FORTUNATELY, FOR ME, they either chose to not make their presence known to me last night. Perhaps they found other guests more haunting-worthy. Perhaps they just fell sorry for me, knowing my great fear of ghosts.

Or maybe it was my ghost prayer, an adaption of the doggie prayer our mother taught us so we could recite it when confronted by a mean dog. It was a simple, El diablo en tí, Dios en mí; la sangre de Cristo me libre de tí. (The devil is in you but God is in me. May the blood of Christ protect me from you.).

I recited that prayer several times last night, even though I no longer believe in the God of my childhood. (And here I can hear the voices of my family chanting in unison: No que no, chignon?) Why not? If I am wrong and there is a God, She would hear me. If I was right, no harm done, other than a wasted few seconds.

Even if there are no spirits in this building, the hotel management has sure made it easy to be suspicious. When I came back last night, I discovered that the hallway and stairwell lights are all motion-sensitive, meaning that they were really, really dark until I took my first step into the hallways or onto the stairwells. To have lights go off and on, noiselessly, as your mind is preoccupied with ghosts certainly does nothing to ease the fears.

So how was my night? Sleepless, in large part. I normally don’t watch old movies on TV and late TV but last night I watched all of the creepy “Fatal Attraction” with Michael Douglas and Glenn Close, and I was fully prepared to keep on watching whatever movies came on next, until dawn. Fortunately, I started to doze off and I found the courage to reach for the remote to turn off the TV.

But I didn’t sleep long. I must have awakened some 20 times throughout the night until dawn finally arrived. Any time the AC clicked on, I would hear it and wake up, each time wondering what the sound was. Of course,  the fact that I left several lights on the entire night.

SO THAT’S MY ghost story. Sorry I don’t have anything better. I’m off to get some breakfast and then I’ll head to the bus station to catch a bus to Mexico City.

Monday, May 9, 2016 | Queretaro

I’M SITTING ON a private deck outside my room of the Casa de Marquesa Hotel in old Queretaro. It’s a huge deck and very private. I could walk around naked if I wanted to and nobody would know. There’s a Jacuzzi up here that I’d be tempted to try out if it weren’t so late. Maybe I’ll do that first thing tomorrow morning.

Because of the high walls surrounding me I can’t see much of the city, other than a tall church steeple. There’s so many of them that I’ve forgotten which church that is. Behind it, barely visible through the thin layer of clouds, is the moon. Just a sliver. I don’t know if it’s waning or waxing; I haven’t kept up with Señora Luna in a bit. Whatever it is, it’s beautiful.

It’s a cool night, with just a slight breeze. I’m tempted to sleep out here except that the lounge chairs don’t look very comfortable.

QUERETARO IS A large city. Fourth in population, I believe, behind Mexico City, Guadalajara and Monterrey. It is beautiful city. At least the central historical district is. I don’t know about the rest. What little I saw from the highway on the way in does not seem that appealing, despite some of the beautiful architecture of some of the modern high-rise office buildings.

The central district is old, of course, but unlike San Miguel, it has more of a European look. There were times when I felt as if I was in Granada or Sevilla. There are wider streets and larger, statelier buildings, many of them headquarters of some government agency or other. No cobblestones. Much more green space than in SMA. It’s almost impossible to walk more than a block without coming upon a neatly tended plaza. Some are full blocks, others are just a corner lot; they all offer shade and benches, welcome escapes from the harsh afternoon sun. And the best part: almost all of them have free wi-fi and some of them even offer free cell phone charging stations.

There are numerous pedestrian-only streets and alleys and there is a lot of sculpture. Some old, some very modern.

I did not see a single bus. The city must have banned them from the centro. A wise move because it has made this a very pedestrian-friendly area, less noisy and less polluted. And pedestrians are everywhere, especially after the sun goes down and the temperatures start to drop a bit. A lot of young people. Couples everywhere, but also groups of male and/or female friends.

Comadres walked around hand in hand. Compadres shuffled along or sat on park benches, muttering to each other. Young couples cuddled and giggled. Whole families paraded around. I saw a number of women being pushed around in wheelchairs in the evening. I hadn’t seen that earlier in the day, and I concluded that the evening hours is the only time working children can take their mothers out for some fresh air.

There are the beggers. Not a lot of them, but enough to make their presence known. Not persistent. Very polite. I saw what I hadn’t seen since my visit to Oaxaca a number of years ago, young, pre-teen boys mindlessly playing accordions as their mothers stood by them with tin-cups in their hands.

AFTER DINNER TONIGHT, I came upon of students in graduation cap and gowns, posing for photos in front of the statue at the Plaza de Armas. They were a happy group and the joy they exhibited made me not want to leave, so I sat at a nearby bench and just watched them.

On my way home, I stopped at one last plaza and sat on a bench. Soon a man got up from a neighboring bench, went to stand in front of the fountain, and announced that he was going to preach. “I am a Christian,” he said. “I am not a Catholic or a Mormon or one of those, but I am a Christian.” And with that he began his spiel about sin and about how we’ll be judged when we die by the sins that are in our heart – not our friends’ sins and not our parents’ sins – and since we don’t know when we’re going to die, shouldn’t we be trying to get rid of those sins?

He went on for a long time. I had almost decided to start walking home but I felt bad for him because nobody was listening to him. Some even moved away as soon as he started talking. So I stayed and only half-listened, but I kept looking towards him, as if I was listening. As he spoke, a young girl on roller skates, wearing short cut-off jeans and a bright yellow T-shirt, began circling around the fountain, which meant that she was circling around him also. It was a strange, surreal sight.

Finally, the girl got tired and moved on, and so apparently did he, for he announced that he was going to quit preaching but that he would stick around in case anybody had any questions or needed him to point out where in the Bible can be found what he had said about sin, etc. Only that he didn’t quit preaching. He continued for another four or five minutes. He then reached into his backpack and took out a stack of pamphlets, which he said he was going to pass out, which he did, starting with the only person who seemed to have noticed his presence, me.

AND, SO, WITH that good deed, I ended my day on the streets of Queretaro. It was a good day.

Monday, May 9, 2016 | San Miguel de Allende

ALL THINGS MUST end, and so it is with this pleasant, exciting stay in this beautiful home of beautiful friends in this beautiful city. In a couple of hours, I’ll get in a car and head towards Queretaro, a little more than an hour’s drive from here. I’ll check in to La Casa de la Marquesa, an old hotel in the center of the city.

I’m looking forward to whatever adventure awaits me, of course, but I’m saddened at leaving my friends behind.

Yesterday we went for Sunday brunch at the Rosewood Hotel, one of the largest and better hotels in the city. The array of food offered with the buffet option was overwhelming. There were a lot of choices but I opted to go with primarily with the taquitos. Beef tinga (shredded beef in a tomato/chili sauce), rajas (roasted and sliced bell peppers in a cream sauce), carnitas, and huitlacoche (corn fungus), with various salsas. I also had a bit of chicken mole. Everything was perfect.

We were sitting at our table enjoying our dinner when we saw a couple walk by. My friend Blanca, who is very active in national Democratic Party politics, took one look at the guy and uttered a surprised, “Oh.” The guy heard her and looked at Blanca, and in a split second stopped and yelled, “¡Mira quien está aquí!”

It was Antonio Villairagosa, the former mayor of Los Angeles and soon to be candidate for that state’s governorship. He and Blanca recently participated in a party conference and got to know each well. The beautiful woman with him was his fiancée, Patricia Govea, a businesswoman from Guadalajara. They were in town to plan their upcoming wedding, at the hotel.

After introductions and a short excited conversation, Blanca and Cavanaugh invited the couple to their home that evening for cocktails and they readily agreed.

IT WAS AN interesting gathering. The conversation was wide-ranging and included how they met (during a conference in Guadalajara where Villairagosa had been invited to speak), their families (the combined families includes six children), their wedding (large despite her efforts to keep it small), his race (a challenge, against the current lieutenant governor and others) and the presidential election and Hillary’s prospects in the California (her chances are very good but it’s going to be a tough battle).

We also talked about our shared backgrounds and experiences. In his younger days he spent time in Texas working with the United Farm Workers.

I made the mistake of introducing myself to him using my full name, Juan Ramón, and he immediately latched on to the Ramón part because that is his middle name too, and for the rest of the evening I was either Ramón or Ramoncito.

I’ve been around many politicians in my life but not many like this guy. He is a master. At the restaurant, when he came over to shake my hand as I was seated at the table, he put his arm on my shoulder as we talked and squeezed lightly. He didn’t let go until he moved on to the other people and he did the same to all of them. Back at the house, he went out of his way to ensure that none of us felt left out, turning to each of us and asking specific questions about what we do of have done – and he listened and reacted to our responses. He reminded me of the Lyndon Johnson I’ve read so much about.

His fiancée is a beautiful, charming woman with even better people skills than those of her future husband.

I don’t know what Villaraigosa’s chances are in the race, but I wouldn’t mind seeing him as governor of that state. And I wouldn’t mind seeing a Mexican serving as California’s first lady.

TOMORROW IS Mexico’s Mothers’ Day but the kids in the elementary school near us are already celebrating it at their morning outdoor assembly. They are singing “Las Mañanitas.” And that, my friends, is as good a way as any to end this visit.

May 6, 2016 / San Miguel de Allende
Back at the Jardín, sitting on the same bench as yesterday.It is not even mine yet. The day is cool and the streets and sidewalks and park benches are mostly empty and quiet. Most shoppers and tourists are still at home and the only people out and about are the shopkeepers who are busy setting up their wares for the day’s sales, and those hurrying to work. 

Also awake is a gardener, watering the bushes behind where I sit. In his pocket he has a small radio, iPod or iPhone from which pours out the distinct sound of Perdro Infante singing, “Tu y las Nubes,” a classic song by Don José Alfredo Jiménez. This is one of the many José Alfredo tunes that inhabited my childhood and still hold a prominent place in my soul. 

Ando volando bajo, Pedro croons. I am flying low. 

Then he laments,

Tú y las nubes me traen muy loco

Tú y las nubes me van a matar.

And then comes the best lines:

Yo no nací pa pobre 

Me gusta todo lo que bueno.

I wasn’t born to be poor; I like all the good things in life. 

I like that one. I wrote once that I certainly identified with that sentiment for I too long for and strive for the good things in life even though wealth and I will never have an intimate relationship. 

It’s a defiant statement, one that proclaims that I may never be rich but by golly my life will be a good one. 

The gardener has now moved on to other bushes, but the emotions that his iPhone or iPod inspired remain. I think it has something to do with the fact that this morning, shortly after I woke up, I watched a video sent by my niece Carmel, of her son Eliseo, a high school senior, with the school’s mariachi band at a Cinco de Mayo celebration. 

Seo was singing “Ella,” another José Alfredo song. This was by far my favorite when I was a toddler. I remember clearly that every time I heard that song on the family radio I would run from wherever I was to sit by the radio to listen to that song. 

And here was this quiet, reserved boy, singing that very same song, putting into his effort as much energy and soul as he could muster. 

The video brought tears to my eyes, as did the sound of Pedro Infante’s voice that the young gardener allowed me to take in. 

It’s going to be a good day. 

May 7, 2016 | San Miguel de Allende

I’ve been awake for a while now, ever since the fireworks started going off somewhere in the distance a bit before 6. I think they may be dying down now, but by now I can’t imagine anyone in this city being asleep anymore.

The fireworks didn’t really bother me. I had been waking up every half our or so, so I can’t say that I was shaken from a restful sleep. I stood on the balcony outside my room for a while to watch the fireworks but I got cold and crawled back into my bed, leaving the door open. Through the door I can see the pinkish light of the new day emerging from the east. It’s a peaceful, beautiful sight, the kind that makes you glad you’re alive.

I didn’t stay too long in El Centro yesterday afternoon. After I met with Bonnie Lee, the woman I had told you about earlier who is a pen pal of Isabelle, one of my best friends, from Switzerland. She has been living here for several months after a short stint of house-sitting in nearby Guanajuato. She moved here from Taos, where she wrote and taught part-time at a university there.

She loves it here and plans to spend the rest of her live in Mexico. She can’t afford to live in the United States on her Social Security income. She was renting a nice two-bedroom house for $500 but she has to move to a smaller, more expensive apartment because her first place was broken into and she doesn’t feel safe there anymore.

We met at the Starbucks downtown, in its patio. Even outside, the smell of cigarette smoke was overwhelming. But the conversation was good; it was like meeting with an old friend. I don’t know if I’ll ever see her again but I’m glad the forces of the universe conspired to get us together for this brief session.

When I came home yesterday afternoon my stomach was growling. I hadn’t had anything to eat since breakfast but I had chosen not eat anything because I knew we were going out to eat in the evening. It just so happened that I arrived at Casa O’Leary at the time that La Señora was putting the finishing touches on some taquitos de pollo, made with some of the leftover chicken from the previous evening. There was also some guacamole and queso fresco. We ate it outside, on the veranda that overlooks the city. Can’t beat that.

On our way to dinner we stopped at the home of Irene, an ex-pat from Houston who moved here about a decade ago, maybe longer. A beautiful, beautiful home with a large lush patio that is surrounded by a tall wall painted bright red. She also has a beautiful rooftop deck with a spectacular view of the city and the mountains in the distance. Irene, who greeted us with a shot of some smooth, smooth mescal, is a self-taught painter and she proudly showed us most of her impressive work. She lives a good life here.

Dinner was at an Italian restaurant. The food was good and there were not that many other diners, so the noise level was down. Driving back home in the taxi I got glimpses of the nighttime crowds on the sidewalks, in the bars and restaurants, and in the parks. Mostly young people. It reminded me that I have never spent too much time out in the city at night. Maybe tonight after dinner I’ll do that.

I’m heading into town in a bit. I want to roam around and catch some of the color in this early-morning light.

Sitting under the shade of a tree in Plaza Allende. It is a beautiful day but warm under the intense sun. I’m taking a break after exploring in the Centro a bit.  The shade feels good. Every time I start walking around in a high-altitude city I am surprised how quickly I seem to run out of breath while walking or climbing. It takes a few days to get used to it and until then I’ll just have to take many breaks like this.

Blanca’s and Cavenaugh’s home is up on the hill so getting here was no problem. As Señor López, our driver, said yesterday, “downhill even a pumpkin can fly.” Getting back will be hard for this pumpkin won’t be able to fly.

I’m sitting across the street from Starbucks. I came here to make sure I know where it is because I’m supposed to meet someone there in about an hour.

I got a late start this morning after a scrumptious breakfast prepared by La Señora, as Blanca calls the beautiful woman who is in charge of the kitchen and the household. Eggs, fresh fruit, yogurt, oatmeal, fresh corn tortillas, orange juice and coffee. And La Señora’s specialty, her deep red salsa. Last time I was here she made a batch for me to take home with me when I left. This time she won’t do that because I’m not going back home right away, but she gave me her recipe and I look forward to making it when I get home.

I didn’t sleep well last night. I think perhaps Sandra’s stories last night about ghosts and spirits were still in my mind.

(Sandra lives not too far from where I am. On a block between Calle Quebrada and Calle Beneficia. Or, as she puts it, “between broke and a charity case.”)

I’ve poked around here and there. I accidentally walked into a large room at the Oratorio de San Felipe Neri where a priest was doing confessions, and then sat in the main church while another priest said Mass.

I’ve taken plenty of pictures. I’m finding it hard to ween myself from my iPhone camera and use my SLR instead. It is so easy to use and the quality is not bad. And I’m into instant gratification.

Here’s my favorite so far from this mornin:

Sitting next to me is a young couple. High school age. Don’t know if they’re boyfriend and girlfriend. Probably not. The guy appears to be gay.

I was struck by an exclamation that came out of his mouth in response to something she said: “¡Verga!” (slang for penis).

Young people these days!

San Miguel de Allende | May 5, 2016

The trip from León to San Miguel didn’t take as long as I remember and we seemed to go through more towns than we did the last time. It’s not really a beautiful ride. You only hit the outskirts of Guanajuato so you don’t get to experience any of the beauty of its colonial center, and you pass through a handful of poor smaller communities. The area is very dry and there we could see the black evidence of recent forest (brush?) fires everywhere.

Señor López, our driver, was a font of information about the area and about Mexico in general. I learned anew how ignorant I am about this country’s history and its people. We were talking about ancestry and I mentioned that my father, who was born in San Luís Potosí, claimed to be a Chichimeca Indian but that I don’t know if there was any truth to that. Señor López quickly informed us that the overwhelming majority of Mexico’s indigenous people – Aztecas included – were Chichimeca. The only ones who aren’t are those in the southern part of the country, the Mayans near the Guatemalan border, the Zapotecs and Mixtecs near Oaxaca, and others. So my father was right, I guess.

He also had something to offer about the U.S. political picture, saying at one point that if Trump should win, he is ready. He’s got a pick and a shovel ready to go so he can head north to build Trump’s wall. “Then I have to figure out how to pay for it,” he said.

Blanca, our hostess, was waiting for us in the beautiful, lush patio of her home on a hillside above the city. Her husband, Cavanaugh, soon joined us. A late al fresco lunch was ready to be served, Blanca said, as soon as her other guests arrived.

The soon did. There was an expat from Houston who came here more than 10 years ago, fell in love with it and never went back to Texas. There was her companion who, among other things, conducts tours of various sites in San Miguel and the region for tourist and others. He knows a lot about the city and its history, and that seemed to delight the other guest, a writer named Sandra, who moved here three years ago after having lived in San Antonio for a number of years.

If you’re wondering whether Sandra The Writer is that Sandra, you’re right. I knew I would get to meet Cisneros during my visit because Blanca had talked about it. But I didn’t think it would be that soon. I was a bit nervous about the prospect about spending time in her presence because I’m always leery of being around famous people. They spend so much time being nice to ordinary people – because they have to; it’s their job – and my tendency is to think that they get very tired of having to be nice to strangers, of having to pretend they care about them when they’re probably never going to see them again.

So I didn’t know how I’d react to Sandra, and how she’d react to us. I needn’t have worried. The woman is delightful. She is full of energy and her words, both in Spanish and in English, exit her mouth with a spark and a tingle. In her animated style of speaking, she reminded me of mi Tía Pancha, one of my mother’s younger sister, whose eyes always sparkled when she spoke.

She lives in a magical world, surrounded by spirits, welcoming some and shunning others. She talked about how she “cleanses” her home after every visitor departs, to shoo away any nasty spirits they may have left behind. This aspect was a surprise for me but, thinking back on her last book, it probably shouldn’t because she talks about that some. Listening to her, I could easily place her in the magical realistic world of Gabriel García Márquez.

She is as curious about other people’s stories as she is eager to share her stories. And boy, does she have stories. I became a fan of hers the day I began to read “The House on Mango Street,” and my admiration for her increased with “Woman Hollering Creek” and her subsequent works. (I reviewed “Woman Hollering” for The Houston Post and I’m so glad now that I didn’t say anything negative about it!)

I’ve always known she’s a great story teller, but listening to her stories while sitting around drinking fresh lemonade and eating tortilla soup, with only a few friends around the table is far, far more rewarding than reading them in print or listening to her address a group from behind a lectern. The intimacy makes the difference.

I wish I could share some of those stories with you, but I can’t. First of all, she told too many of them and I can’t remember them that well; I can’t remember the details. Secondly, I could never do those stories justice. And, finally, they are her stories to share, not mine.

It was a wonderful, long and leisurely lunch and I was sorry that it had to end. I kind of think she did too, that if she hadn’t had to go home to pack for her trip tomorrow, she would have gladly stayed here all afternoon.

This trip into Mexico is still in its infancy. I have a long way to go, but I really doubt that anything I do or see over the next eight days will top today’s experience.

The guests have been gone for a while. I retreated to my room for a much-needed nap and I’m now back in the patio, writing this. I am surrounded by the sound of leaves rustling in the winds, and doves cooing. A while ago I heard some beautiful bells marking the hour, and a while before that I heard the faint distant tinny sounds of a military brass band somewhere in the city. A Cinco de Mayo observance? Maybe. That holiday is not as big deal here as it is in the United States. Whatever it was, it was nice.

Now my hosts and the others are back and the conversation has started. Soon we will eat. Tandoori chicken, I understand. And that is how this first day in this beautiful country will end.