Ven a mi casa esta Navidad

Tú que estás lejos de tus amigos,
de tu tierra y de tu hogar,
y tienes pena, pena en el alma,
porque no dejas de pensar.

Tú que esta noche no puedes
dejar de recordar,
quiero que sepas, que aquí en mi mesa,
para ti tengo un lugar.

Por eso y muchas cosas más,
ven a mi casa esta Navidad.

Por eso y muchas cosas más,
ven a mi casa esta Navidad.

Tú que recuerdas quizá a tu madre
o a un hijo que no está,
quiero que sepas, que en esta noche,
él te acompañará.

No vayas solo por esas calles,
queriéndote aturdir,
ven con nosotros y a nuestro lado
intenta sonreír.

Por eso y muchas cosas más,
ven a mi casa esta Navidad.

Tú que has vivido, siempre de espaldas,
sin perdonar ningún error,
ahora es momento de reencontrarnos,
ven a mi casa, por favor.

Ahora ya es tiempo, de que charlemos,
pues nada se perdió,
en estos días, todo se olvida,
y nada sucedió.

Por eso y muchas cosas más,
ven a mi casa esta Navidad.

Por eso y muchas cosas más,
ven a mi casa esta Navidad.

Por eso y muchas cosas más,
ven a mi casa esta Navidad.

Luis Aguilé

¡Y Feliz Año Nuevo!

Tradition

"A love of tradition has never weakened a nation--indeed, it has strengthened nations in their hour of peril; but the new view must come; the world must roll forward."

Churchill

I'm in love...

I first became aware of her because of my mother.

Then, I started paying attention on my own... but she was married... not that it would make any difference, but still, one likes to respect others' relationships.

Now that she's not married again, i'm back to drooling.

Ain't she grand?

She's a pretty good singer, too.

Que Pasa Cuando Crecen?

I give up!

I'm not trying any more.

I realize this is a hard process and that I myself had a terrible time going through it. I realize their mother and I have made this even harder with our problems. I know that both our families are not what one might expect on a stamp commemorating Norman Rockwell.

But I don't like it.

It just hurts too much.

They can call me when they're done.

Growing up just sucks.

Destino y medio

Hay dias en que me enoja ser cristiano.

Vivo en el pais con el mayor porcentage de atendencia a la iglesia del mundo. Mas gente visita su templo de preferencia de manera regular aqui que en el vaticano. Sin embargo, al acercarse la segunda celebracion mas importante de esta religion que mis padres me heredaron sin pedir permiso, me veo rodeado (atacado, casi) por la comercializacion semi-invencible que me dicen casi a diario as tanto admirable como exportable (mas de 2000 americanos han pagado con su vida en el proceso).

Esta es la vida.

Con un nivel de productividad por lo menos cinco veces mas valioso internacionalmente que cualquier trabajador latinoamericano, el americano no conoce el valor de la paciencia. La paz es un suenio loco que nuestros padres abandonaron y nuestros abuelos perdieron en la guerra. Nosotros nunca lo conocimos. El tiempo ya no es oro; en comparasion, el oro es abundante. Y aun asi, tomamos tiempo que no tenemos y vamos a la iglesia: a veces hasta dos veces por semana. Y cuando vamos, le pedimos al creador salud, paz, libertad, fortuna, tiempo. Le pedimos libertad--libertad de las mismas cadenas que con mucha ternura quitamos de nuestros propios tobillos para atar a aquellos de nuestros hijos.

Ser normal no es suficiente. En estos ultimos anios, he notado un movimiento extranio en la cultura protestante en el pais. Cristianos que se llaman a si mismos "born again" buscan maneras publicas de demostrar su triunfo economico como para indicar el beneficio de su decision religiosa y asi convencer a mas a seguirlos. Algo asi como: yo sigo a dios y el me dio este carro; siguelo tu y veras lo que te da.

Mientras esto pasa, el pais busca como demostrarle al mundo su superioridad. Tomemos en cuenta que el triunfo que Japon gozo en los 60's y 70's fue directamente derivado de la invasion americana despues de la segunda guerra mundial. Si no fuera por Marshall y su plan, donde estaria Europa hoy? Mirad Alemania. Rusia nos deberia haber suplicado los invadieramos. Iraq deberia festejar el evento. Todas las guerras de los catolicos para conquistar jerusalem fallaron... y nosotros se la regalamos a los judios. ESO es generosidad.

Somos lo mejor del mundo. Me siento con ganas de gritar "My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!"

Pero se acerca la navidad. Solo SU resurreccion es mayor evento, y el no fue el primero. Tomaremos tiempo de nuestros ocupadisimos dias para rezar y celebrar. Compraremos arbolitos y les pondremos luces de colores y cajas con papeles brillantes. Nos daremos mas cosas para amontonar encima de las cosas que ya tenemos. Nos abrazaremos los unos a los otros y a nosotros mismos, agradeciendo a diario ser de los favoritos de dios, nuestro dios, el mejor de los dioses, superior, mas fuerte, mas sabio, y nuestro. Que suerte de este dios ser nuestro dios! Pues nosotros tenemos mas dinero que cualquier otra gente para celebrar su nacimiento.

Ay! Hay dias en que me averguenza ser cristiano.

Round and round

So I left the country--which is a very fancy (indeed) way of saying I went to TJ (Tijuana, for those of you not in the know).

For some strange reason, I love the place. It is a dirty, messy, uncouth place--and I love it.

I got some coffee; I got a book; I saw a movie; I went to the mall. I didn't do anything there that I could not have done here just as well. I saw not a single face I could not just as easily have seen doing the same things here in Los Angeles. They who live there do not speak differently.

And yet...

There is something about those people I like. I am not Mexican; I am not American. And while I love living here, I think I might love living there just as much. I know I should expect no less--many of my friends are Mexican, if anything as pragmatic as anyone else up north, if not more.

I guess I like the change that comes from crossing an arbitrary line and seeing a world so different and yet (a cliche i shan't avoid) so similar.

I can only hope one day something similar will happen other places, where the lines are harder to cross, and the fee for crossing is often someone's life. They who are not welcome are yet welcoming--for the subtle rejection of everything about them can be seen crossing back north. They who are not hated (that takes too much energy) but just belittled and disdained, will still smile and greet and while it's true many will as soon pick your pocket, most won't--and in the end i think fewer will there than here--and more honestly even then.

I have this picture in my head of a democracy tyrannically lording over the weaker, less educated, just-plain-not-as-lucky neighbors, controlling them with guns and money. It happens, you know. I was there just this past Saturday. And though it may not seem to be going on now, the now there is has come of many thens when it did happen--to a nation's shame and another's anger.

And still, I see this and see three steps to peace that I can only pray others will take before more of their children die...

I guess it's weird that I hope others can have this no-man's-land, with its own share of crime, perhaps, but mostly carefreeness. This, too, is too simplistic and forgets the suffering many live there. I won't go into too much detail, this mention of it shall be enough.

I will say this: one day, my mother and I will have to go and finally have our $200 tacos.

She doesn't read this--but if she did, she would smile.

Time after Time

My birthday is on Thanksgiving.

Not around Thanksgiving, but on Thanksgiving. Every year. Never fails. This has something to do with the strange timekeeping methodology on my planet, but I find it rather convenient, as I never have to work on my birthday. See? Very nice.

A similar side effect from this strange space-time continuum thingy that's unfortunately to blame for my insufferable condition as a human (a terrible clerical error sometime in the evolutionary past is to blame, I'm sure, as I am sure G-d Himself will fix it as soon as He gets around to it), make all communication with me impossible three days before and three days after. My children (G-d bless their innocent little souls) are fully aware of this and know to call the Monday after the aforementioned American holiday to retroactively (not belatedly) wish me a happy birthday--a matter both very much appreciated by me, and expedient to both, as they get to save on the gift they didn't give me because they could not see me. Well, according to my calculations, that would have been last Monday, otherwise discernable on your calendar as 28-Nov-2005, or the incongruous 11/28/05. but NO!!!!! Did they call? No. Did they write? No. Fax? No.Telegraph, telex, smoke signal? no, No, NO! I'm sure I am to blame somehow--or perhaps this is what happens to parents when their children are old enough to build a life outside the home, with friends of their very own with whom to spend their own time--or this is what happens to fathers when ex-wives get new boyfriends with kids and the new kids and the old kids get along great and they all decide to spend the weekend together... dunno.

Perhaps I will not mind. Perhaps I know what this is all like from the kids' point of view because I already lived it as a child when my own parents separated and then divorced. Perhaps this is how I pay for what I did to my mother, who moved out, moved away, and I thought she moved away from me and hated her for it. And maybe I will just drink to forget, like grandpa drank after grandma left.

And maybe I will write To Have and Have Not, and then I'll shoot myself.

or maybe i'll simply be a single drop of rain.

Vaster than empires and more slow...

Steven Saylor writes books about Rome. I have them all. I don't usually read historical fiction, but I'm addicted.

My son walks in my room and asks: "dang, dad! how MANY books has Steven Saylor written?"

It is in the little moments that I steal at work when I look past my book and see the hills beyond that I remember that the greatest moments of this world just might not have come before me. No dust of Caesar's now remains--no memory of Gordianus, who might well have lived... and my children's grandchildren will not know my name... and still I will have left my footprint somewhere, left there to be found by sharp eyes.

All this, and it's fun reading, too.

Do good, and do well.

Double, double, toil and trouble...

Halloween cae en lunes este año.

Ricardo me hablo para invitarme a ir a West Hollywood con el. Hace casi tres años acabe con el y mantengo minima comunicacion con el, pero el insiste--y como queria ir de todas maneras, le dije que si Carlos me daba permiso, lo haria.

Carlos dijo que si.

Esto me ha hecho reconsiderar la regla que siempre he tenido de no tener ningun contacto con mis ex's. Es justo para Ricardo y yo continuar aunque sea hablando? Si no nos pudimos comunicar bien cuando teniamos tanto que perder, como nos podemos comunicar mejor como amigos, habiendo perdido tanto? Es justo para Carlos y yo, poniendo a prueba la confianza que apenas hemos empezado a construir? Y siendo que yo ya tenia una regla al respecto, que debilidad indica el hacerle caso a Ricardo esta vez solo porque su sugerencia coincida con lo que yo pensaba hacer anyway?

Bueno, como todo en la vida, supongo lo sabre solo cuando todo haya pasado ya. De nada sirve especular que viene.

Ahora tengo sueño.

Buenas noches!

A little story of was and were

Introspection is too often the bane of the nascent writer’s experience. More frequently than is good, we butcher the basic principles of decent communication in the attempt to manifest our personal experiences into the a global perspective, into the ever-elusive and overly-revered human condition, which is to say we tie ourselves inside a cave beyond our own ability to escape and then spend the better part of life describing the things that go on outside by the mere shapes of shadows the sun we sought to escape makes dance on the walls inside. And then we call this insight. I see this all the time, mostly reading my own blog—or my old essays—or most of the things I have written. Nowadays, with a veritable barrage of pseudo-semi-biographical rubbish making it to paper, film, or radio, I can at least feel somewhat proud that I hardly ever waste any paper printing the junk I write—save a tree, I say. Still, I hope one day to grow up, to tear this selfish little cocoon all us fakers weave around our fragile, brittle egos and write good one day.

In just one paragraph, I used the word “I” six times and made other references to myself seven times; all that in just 188 words. And that’s assuming I can count.

I grew up reading real writers. When they say “I” they hardly ever mean their real “I”s but rather the characters they’ve masterfully created and subtly developed to not only arouse interest, but real concern on our part. Real writers need no readers. They suffer our intrusions into the worlds they have created and sometimes guide us through, to no benefit of theirs. We follow, just outside the reach of their candle-light, and sometimes peek over their shoulders at their lives, prurient observers morbidly curious—seeking to gain from their experience what we cannot in our own, or (even worse) to have ours validated by searching blindly through their work for what we’ve grandiosely chosen to call “the human experience.” Except that in the vast expanse that is such experience, one hardly finds the sense that is so often the point of their writings; the best descriptions of it are those that dissociate completely from the purpose of such enterprise and make art of the sharing—by which I think I mean that I appreciate subtlety.

Likewise, the greatest stories of love are about loves that never happened—success made sweeter by bitterly remembering it from most abject humiliation and defeat; or contrariwise, the worst in life somehow ennobled by reminiscing from the warm and comforting protection of (principally unearned) luxury.

I guess it’s all a matter of perspective, of structure, of sense. We seek the sense that life often lacks and in so doing force a shape on the shapelessness we have been given; this, in turn, is like the proverbial pebble in the shoe—and in the end, who can feel the pebble in his brother’s shoe?

Lengua Franca, Otra Vez

I find myself a bit at odds with my own culture.

Having received what in my humble opinion is a decent education prior to our move to the United States when I was thirteen years old, I find myself quite capable of communicating in Spanish with a modicum of self-assurance. I still make some grammatical mistakes, some quaint, some outright insulting to an educated ear, but none too terribly distracting from the message—if sometimes amusing. Often, when speaking or writing about things that happened to me before high school, I write in Spanish because that is how I remember it. Memories taste different in Spanish, smell sweeter, and even those of pain are best remembered as they happened; something is always lost in translation. By definition, it must change.

Sometimes, I write or speak in Spanish out of greatest tenderness or anger—unable to control the extremes.

And yet, the lure of the new culture made me hungry to learn the language. I went to great lengths to internalize this new mode of thinking, this new perspective on the world. A language is both a reflection of and an agent effecting change upon a society. Any interpreter (a word far more suitable than translator) will know of the famous shoe-on-the-podium incident at the United Nations when Mr. Kruschev told America what amounted to “we will outlive you” but was translated to “we will bury you,” a subtle but powerful difference that might have plunged the world into its final cataclysm.

So there was Mrs. Novotny, hardly a decade older than me, hotter than anyone teaching 14-year-olds has a right to be, teaching me what “boiling” meant. And Mr. Robles, or Castro, or whatever his name was—a Cuban man that spoke to me in English, French, Arabic and some other African language before trying Spanish when he met me. He taught me not the language, but the structure. I am more grateful to him for that than I am perhaps to any other teacher. Instead of giving me many fishes, he taught me to fish. Still, he wasn’t nearly as hot as Mrs. Novotny, so I can’t really remember his name.

I remember talking to myself in the bus on the way home, talking to myself while doing dishes or cleaning the back yard. I remember talking to my siblings, reading to them from the books assigned by Mrs. Novotny (sigh) and Mr. Whatshisname. I did it all in English. After a while, I didn’t have to ask people to repeat themselves so I could understand what they said—even if I didn’t know what the words meant, I knew what words they’d used. In three months, I knew English. My best friends were Polish and Vietnamese; we could only communicate in English. It was great.

And here I am now, in a world with no borders. This blogging world that lends itself to Hebrew and Arabic, to Russian and English, to Spanish like I spoke when I grew up and 50 other versions all descended from the tongue of Cervantes. What a world! I am fascinated by the sounds and the lines that tongues and throats will make and hands will write to convey a thought. The simple image that something as abstract as an idea can be encapsulated (to whatever limited degree we humans can) within two dots on a page enthralls me. Isn’t it silly? I get outright giddy that someone one day might read this and know what I mean!

Unfortunately, now that I have kids to feed and bills to pay, I have little time to learn more languages. There are more important things to learn. Priorities, being what they are, I have little room for this wild dream. Once I wanted to learn all the languages spoken at the United Nations. Now I can’t. Maybe I will later.

I wish for selfish reasons that I could read and write and speak all the languages there are, so that all can hear and read what I have to say, but also so that I can learn form them. So many stories are now lost when an old man dies! So much of a civilization is lost when a single old woman’s voice goes silent. And oftentimes, this happens when the young die, as in war, or famine, or the myriad other cruelties we inflict on one another.

I have such a little corner of the world. Sometimes I see it in Spanish, and I write, to let out all that has come in. Sometimes, I taste it in English, and English it is when it makes it here. I do not mean to exclude anybody—it is an accident of life, and I do hurt that we cannot all share all that all the others might want to share. As if it were food, I hunger for the tastes I haven’t had yet.

So, yes… this is my apology to those who speak only Spanish and would read what I would write. I am very grateful that you would want to read it, and I am sorry that it’s not always in Spanish. I find myself sometimes at odds with my culture, but not for having expanded it will I admit even hypothetically to having renounced it. Unlike the French, who seek to shut the doors to other languages, I find my Spanish open and receptive, a fertile flower in the Spring. I do not mourn that no one speaks the language of El Cid—it was bound to change, or die. And if you speak English and you come and find my words in Spanish, I am sorry too—for both of us!

Inocencia, al final (Parte II, final)

Te veo en la cama, dormida, boca medio abierta cual en interminable suspiro--y me da miedo. Te he visto asi por años, siempre pensando que algun dia me harias a mi lo que yo hice cuando fue mi turno; encuentro poca paz en pensar que todos tarde o temprano pasamos por esto--bueno, tal vez no todos; solo los que tienen buena suerte.

He medido los minutos de tu vida en lagrimas--a veces de alegria y a veces no. Me extraña pensar que el viejo tenia toda la razon cuando me dijo que amar es sufrir y que a pesar de eso nadie que valore la vida renuncia al amor; mas me extraña que me he dado cuenta de eso mas o menos a la misma edad que el tenia cuando me lo dijo. Que suerte: vivir hasta hoy buscando ser diferente y darme cuenta hoy que soy mi padre--como mi padre, no igual.

Estas aqui dormida, con tu cabeza sobre mi brazo, cansada de todas las labores que la niñez requiere. Roncas, como ronca tu padre y ronco tu abuelo; ojala encuentres un chamaco que te aguante eso.

Tu cara cambia mucho cuando duermes. Carece la concentracion que a menudo veo cuando haces tus tareas. Le falta la sonrisa que tantas veces hasta sin querer nos das en tus conversaciones, tan alegres y animadas, en las que nos cuentas de tus amigos, de tu escuela, y con las que demuestras cada dia como dejas de ser niña en tu despreocupada carrera a la madurez. Espero aprenderas como todos los que han transcurrido ese camino antes, que es dificil, que es mejor caminarlo despacio y no correr. Aqui estare cuando te caigas, para curar tus heridas y sobarte tus dolores. No estare solo; somos muchos los que te aman y te amaran mas. Y viendo tu carita dormida, me pregunto si es paz lo que veo, o tregua nada mas. Te falta mucho para ser independiente, pero cada dia pides mas, buscas mas, empujas mas contra las verjas que yo he puesto a tu alrededor por proteccion, pero que tu solo ves como jaula. En tu sueño, no escondes tu orejita de Arwen que de dia siempre guardas tras tu pelo--y aunque no haya nadie mas que yo para verla, muevo tu cabello sobre ella.

Te lo he dicho muchas veces y lo dire miles de veces mas. Aunque llegue yo a tener 75 años, y tu 53, seras mi baby, y te sentare en mis piernas y peinare tu pelo y te contare las historias que mi padre me conto. Es inevitable que llegues a ser tu propia persona--y anhelo como todo padre que tu independencia sea total y saludable--y aun asi espero comprendas que aunque los hijos se independicen de sus padres, los padres no pueden independizarse de sus hijos. El hilo que nos une desde el primer dia que senti tu cuerpo en la panza de tu madre, sin que tu lo supieras, es demasiado fuerte.

Asi que no te quejes si me ves un poco triste cuando dices que no puedes venir a verme este fin de semana porque vas al cine con tus amigos, o que es el cumpleaños de tu "novio" (ya discutiremos ese tema mas a fondo muy pronto), o que tienes un grupo de drama en tu escuela y van a practicar todo el sabado. No es enojo lo que siento cuando veo que los pantalones que usas son casi tan largos comos los mios (aunque todavia pueda hacer dos tuyos con la tela de uno de los mios). Cuando te pones tu makeup y te quedo viendo, no te burles de mi.

Que justa esta vida que nos hace pagar con los hijos lo que les hicimos a nuestros padres! Pero no por justa tendre que estarle agradecido.

Algun dia, leeras esto, y quiero que sepas que el "yo" de hoy apoya completamente tu rebeldia. Es tu vida para cometer los errores que tu quieras. Hare todo lo posible para enseñarte de los errores que yo he cometido, pero si no se puede, recuerda que simpre tendras aqui un abrazo fuerte, un plato de comida caliente, una cama comoda, y un hombro seco dispuesto a remojarse de tus lagrimas.

Te quiero.

Carlos y Miguel

Digamosle Carlos, aunque no sea mas Carlos que yo soy Miguel. ;-)

Es joven, inteligente, estable, religioso, amable, educado, bien criado; le gusta leer; oye mucha de la misma musica que yo oigo. Trabaja y va a la universidad. Baila, come, bebe, nunca fuma (aunque me perdona que yo si). Ve peliculas como las que veo yo. Las partes de sus intereses que no coinciden con los mios hasta ahora me han inspirado ya sea curiosidad o interes.

Es guapito, delgado, atletico y feliz. Se rie y su risa ilumina la sala oscura donde estamos sentados, el en mis brazos, viendo tele.

Me esta ensenando mucho y quiere aprender de mi.

Es un enigma que quiero decifrar--un nudo gordiano, pero yo no alejandro y no necesariamente por eso no tan violento, asi que hare lo que hacia mi madre en las tardes aquellas cuando llovia y nos sentabamos a platicar, cuando nosotros los ninos haciamos los nudos mas complicados que pudieramos y ella, con la mayor paciencia del mundo, y (segun nosotros los ninos) la mayor habilidad, poco a poco los deshacia, para regresarnos la cuerda tal como Dios la hizo. Y si lo logro, tal vez como aquel que lo deshizo una vez, conquistare al mundo entero.

oh... como materia que no le interese al mundo, les contare que el es de israel y yo de nicaragua. Estoy queriendo aprender de su cultura y el de la mia, y ese interes (el me ensenara Hebrew y yo a el Spanish) nos ha dado tanto tiempo para conocernos y me esta gustando.

sera sonso que ya tan pronto estemos planeando viaje a tierra santa? no sera hasta fines del proximo ano... pero me esta gustando el plan.

tengo miedo... mucho miedo... me han hecho dano y no estoy pa'eso ya mas. Pero he oido decir que la unica batalla que uno tiene garantizado perder es aquella a la que uno no fue.

disculpen, si es que leen esto, mi ausencia de un mes or so. He estado ocupado, como ya comprenderan, habiendo leido esto.

les contaria mas, desconocidos intimos mios, pero justo en este momento me voy a "arreglar" (eso quiere decir que hay algo malo conmigo?) y lo voy a ver. El sale de la escuela tarde hoy (a las 10) y vamos a Starbucks o Coffee Bean (o mejor algun independiente de los que abundan en los angeles).


que rico...




oh... y el cafe sabe bien tambien.

;-)

A Sound of Thunder

I just got back from the movies.

I read a lot, and one of my favorite writers is Ray Bradbury. I have a copy of The Martian Chronicles autographed by him twice--twenty years apart. When I gave it to him to sign the second time, he said: "but i've already signed this!" and laughed when he saw the date.

Still, I had never read "A Sound of Thunder" until my little friend, mamacita, put it on her blog, for which I greatly thank her. Honestly, though, I was not very impressed. It was too short and not well developed. It lacked the subtlety to which he had gotten me accustomed. Still, his stories do awaken in me a sense of wonder, and my imagination does (from time to time) surpass what burton, spielberg or lucas can put on film.

I was disappointed. What a waste of Ben Kingsley! His character was so devoid of depth or significance--a shame indeed. None of the characters was worth mentioning. The special effects were weak, though I like the "alternative evolution" monsters they came up with. Of course, you can get those for free on the discovery channel or the national geographic channel, or the science fiction channel, or a myriad more worthy movies.

So, then, in short: thanks, mamacita, for pointing me here. I always love expanding my limited horizons. However, this is definitely a renter. I'd watch it right after Jurassic Park (the first one), though definitely before Frankenfish (don't ask).

I'll probably just end up pissing Warner Brothers off by buying a fake copy from the guy at Tacos Mexico--again, don't ask.

Other than that, I had a wonderful, restful, weekend.

Plus I met Carlos--which is another story altogether.

More, God Willing, to come.

¿Por qué me abandonaste?

Oculto en el portal
fumando una colilla de ayer
el tiempo en el bolsillo
y el frío dibujado en la piel.

Se acercan como siempre
y él entre las rendijas les ve
amarse cada día
mirándose y riendo a la vez.

A punto de gritar
esconde el llanto con la pared
después desaparecen
y vuelve a repetir:


¿Por qué me abandonaste?
no sé por qué
si siempre fuiste mía
no sé por qué.

¿Por que me abandonaste
si mis besos y caricias
sólo me hablan de ti?

¿Por qué me abandonaste?
no sé por qué,
quemándome la vida—
no sé por qué—
llenando de tristeza y soledad
cada momento que no estás aquí.

---

A punto de gritar
esconde el llanto con la pared
después desaparecen
y vuelve a repetir:

¿Por qué me abandonaste,
Si siempre fuiste mia?
Si al cabo de los años
mis caricias y mis besos
sólo me hablan de tí.

¿Por qué me abandonaste?
no sé por qué,
quemándome la vida
no sé por qué,
llenando de tristeza y soledad
cada momento que no estás aquí.

¿Por qué me abandonaste?
No se por qué,
quemándome la vida

¿Por qué me abandonaste?
No se por qué,
quemándome la vida
llenando de tristeza y soledad
cada momento que no estás aquí.

¿Por qué me abandonaste?
No se por qué,
quemándome la vida

Autores: Elios-V Maguelli-Lazzari-Sebastiani
Intérprete: Paloma San Basilio

Por Los Caminos Van Los Campesinos...

De dos en dos,
de diez en diez,
de cien en cien,
de mil en mil,
descalzos van los campesinos
con la chamarra y el fusil.

De dos en dos los hijos han partido,
de cien en cien las madres han llorado,
de mil en mil los hombres han caído,
y hecho polvo ha quedado
su sueño en la chamarra, su vida en el fusil.

El rancho abandonado,
la milpa sola, el frijolar quemado.
El pájaro volando
sobre la espiga muda
y el corazón llorando
su lágrima desnuda.

De dos en dos,
de diez en diez,
de cien en cien,
de mil en mil,
descalzos van los campesinos
con la chamarra y el fusil.

De dos en dos,
de diez en diez,
de cien en cien,
de mil en mil,
¡por los caminos van los campesinos
a la guerra civil!

PABLO ANTONIO CUADRA

Dos Lobos

Mi amiga, Mamacita (de Scheiss Weekly), escribió una historia hace unos días que me gustó mucho. Para leerla en Ingles, por favor visítenla; su blog está generalmente muy bueno. Pero para aumentar la audiencia de los que quizás comprenderán el significado de la historia, la he traducido aquí. Disculpen si no lo hago bien, y les ruego traten de comprender su significado sin dejarse llevar por los errores de su humilde servidor:

-------------

Una tarde, un indio platicó con su nieto de una batalla constante que existe dentro de toda la gente.

Le dijo: “Hijo, la batalla es entre dos lobos dentro de todos nosotros. Uno es malo. Es enojo, furia, envidia, celos, pena, arrepentimiento, arrogancia, culpa, lástima de uno mismo, inferioridad, mentiras, orgullo falso, superioridad y egoísmo. El otro es bueno. Es felicidad, paz, amor, esperanza, serenidad, humildad, bondad, benevolencia, empatía, generosidad, verdad, compasión y fe.”

El nieto pensó acerca de esta historia un momento y al fin le preguntó a su abuelo: “¿Y cuál gana?”

El indio viejo simplemente contesto: “El que le das de comer.”

-------------

Que simple y que cierta esta historia. Y que difícil de aprender.

Legally Insane

A not-too-close acquaintance of mine (spell check is off... sue me!) sent me this.

It's funny.

I laughed.

I'm still laughing.

I hope you laugh, too.

here goes:

From: vendor
Sent: Saturday, June 04, 2005 7:53 PM
To: me
Subject: oldie but goodie

Disorder in the Court

These are from a book called Disorder in the American Courts, and are things people actually said in court, word for word, taken down and now published by court reporters that had the torment of staying calm while these exchanges were actually taking place.

ATTORNEY: Are you sexually active?
WITNESS: No, I just lie there.

______________________________

ATTORNEY: What is your date of birth?
WITNESS: July 18th.
ATTORNEY: What year?
WITNESS: Every year.

_____________________________________

ATTORNEY: What gear were you in at the moment of the impact?
WITNESS: Gucci sweats and Reeboks.

______________________________________

ATTORNEY: This myasthenia gravis, does it affect your memory at all?
WITNESS: Yes.
ATTORNEY: And in what ways does it affect your memory?
WITNESS: I forget.
ATTORNEY: You forget? Can you give us an example of something you forgot?

_____________________________________

ATTORNEY: How old is your son, the one living with you?
WITNESS: Thirty-eight or thirty-five, I can't remember which.
ATTORNEY: How long has he lived with you?
WITNESS: Forty-five years.

_____________________________________

ATTORNEY: What was the first thing your husband said to you that morning?
WITNESS: He said, "Where am I, Cathy?"
ATTORNEY: And why did that upset you?
WITNESS: My name is Susan.

______________________________________

This one reminds me of Labyrinth
ATTORNEY: Do you know if your daughter has ever been involved in voodoo?
WITNESS: We both do.
ATTORNEY: Voodoo?
WITNESS: We do.
ATTORNEY: You do?
WITNESS: Yes, voodoo.

______________________________________

ATTORNEY: Now doctor, isn't it true that when a person dies in his sleep, he doesn't know about it until the next morning?
WITNESS: Did you actually pass the bar exam?

___________________________________

ATTORNEY: The youngest son, the twenty-year-old, how old is he?
WITNESS: Uh, he's twenty-one.

________________________________________

ATTORNEY: Were you present when your picture was taken?
WITNESS: Would you repeat the question?

______________________________________

ATTORNEY: So the date of conception (of the baby) was August 8th?
WITNESS: Yes.
ATTORNEY: And what were you doing at that time?
WITNESS: Uh....

______________________________________

ATTORNEY: She had three children, right?
WITNESS: Yes.
ATTORNEY: How many were boys?
WITNESS: None.
ATTORNEY: Were there any girls?

_____________________________________

ATTORNEY: How was your first marriage terminated?
WITNESS: By death.
ATTORNEY: And by whose death was it terminated?

______________________________________

ATTORNEY: Can you describe the individual?
WITNESS: He was about medium height and had a beard.
ATTORNEY: Was this a male or a female?

______________________________________

ATTORNEY: Is your appearance here this morning pursuant to a deposition notice which I sent to your attorney?
WITNESS: No, this is how I dress when I go to work.

______________________________________

ATTORNEY: Doctor, how many of your autopsies have you performed on dead people?
WITNESS: All my autopsies are performed on dead people.

______________________________________

ATTORNEY: ALL your responses MUST be oral, OK? What school did you go to?
WITNESS: Oral.

______________________________________

ATTORNEY: Do you recall the time that you examined the body?
WITNESS: The autopsy started around 8:30 p.m.
ATTORNEY: And Mr. Denton was dead at the time?
WITNESS: No, he was sitting on the table wondering why I was doing an autopsy on him!

______________________________________

ATTORNEY: Are you qualified to give a urine sample?
WITNESS: Huh?

______________________________________

ATTORNEY: Doctor, before you performed the autopsy, did you check for a pulse?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: Did you check for blood pressure?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY Did you check for breathing?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: So, then it is possible that the patient was alive when you began the autopsy?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: How can you be so sure, Doctor?
WITNESS: Because his brain was sitting on my desk in a jar.
ATTORNEY: But could the patient have still been alive, nevertheless?
WITNESS: Yes, it is possible that he could have been alive and practicing law.

The World According to Oliver (consider yourself)

The war was over. Thousands of relieved parents poured onto the streets in celebration more than of the victory, than the end to the senseless death that had already taken so many thousands. Thousands of children poured onto the streets for no reason better than to shout and run and be free like they hadn’t for years. Three generations had fought for this day, and now it was here and no one had the temerity to point out that victory is when the hard work begins: that day was not a day for sense and logic, but for triumph and merriment. Walking with my mother, dressed in the requisite red shirt and black pants, waiving little blue and white flags right alongside the red and black ones, most of us with the peasant-inspired straw hats so en vogue after the revolution, I was of the people. There is no greater sense of freedom than the first dizzying moments of debauchery, drunkenness and love-making. How more free could one be than that one day, after one persecution ended and the next hadn’t yet begun?

We went back to school. The actual fighting in the cities had only taken one year out of school. Then, there was the literacy campaign, that took most literate men and women of 16 or older and took them to the fields, the jungles and the steppes, to teach those who had so long been kept in darkness the power of the written word, the sense of numbers and the words of the new founding fathers. History is the boon of the victors, and there was so much to rewrite, retell, redo. Thus, then, two years passed before we went back to school, but we went back.

To be sure, an endless debate could start by merely trying to pin down the real reasons for the revolution. Power corrupts those who hold it, but many who don’t lust after it to their souls’ decay—and we had both. Ultimately, Somoza faced thirteen armies, divided into three groups; each group had its own ideology, but mostly everybody agreed on one thing: Somoza had to go. He was not a nice man. He was not a good leader. He did not have the nation’s interests at heart. The United States had installed his father into the presidency many a year before for no better reason than to have a friend in a slightly unstable area. American economic interests required a modicum of stability to facilitate commerce—and (at the time) the possible construction of a canal, as I recall, but that might have been before. Unfortunately, there was a bit of a misunderstanding regarding the nature of that stability, and the Somozas assumed a despotic and tyrannical choke-hold on the nation that Stalin would have envied and Nixon (privately, of course) admired. But stability it was, and as such, met the requirements divinely inspired from the north, and so more money came, and more power, more arms and more dying. The dead, it seems, are ultimately stable—but they are not economically viable—so, per instructions implicitly declared en Anglais, the populace was kept at a happy medium. The suffering of the people of Nicaragua was considered secondary to the ultimate political and economic interests of the cold-war-era United States. The stability of the right-wing regime there was considered an advantage in the on-going fight against the possibility of Cuba exporting Soviet-style communism to the region; many of the Cubans who participated in the Bay of Pigs invasion were trained in Nicaragua with the full knowledge of President Kennedy, a liberal and a democrat—go figure. Cute little phrases came out of that: Alliance for Progress. We failed to see Alliance meant really Alignment (ours behind yours), for your progress. Of course, Americans justified this by the use of the eternal trickle-down economics: the ever-better scraps you threw our way should justify the rape of our country’s natural resources—and, to forestall those who’d chastise my use of the word “rape” as a leftist exaggeration, I’d like to beg that if you have not walked on the dead, eroded sands of what once was verdant, life-giving jungle but turns into a post-apocalyptic, war-torn moonscape after American-style deforestation seeking more wood or to drive out “insurgents”, it would be best to avoid commenting on the subject. The killing fields belong only to the dead. The living’s job is to prevent the next ones.

Americans get so wrapped up in their political dichotomy they fail to see the rest of the world can’t tell the difference between Democrats and Republicans once one starts talking Dollars.

Shortly after the revolution, the United States did to Nicaragua what it had done to Cuba, apparently ignoring the lesson of the past, and thereby dooming itself to the same results: economic sanctions practically drove the fledgling democracy into the hands of the Cubas, Chinas, East Germanies and Soviet Unions of the world. But the fault, you see, was with Nicaragua. Remember the three armies? The one that had won was the middle one, the one that wanted to build an independent country from any external power. But the United States demands immediate and unfailing allegiance, an oath of fealty a new democracy just now exercising the muscles of its sovereignty would never want. Ronald Reagan could not have wrapped the gift with a nicer, bigger, redder bow. Nicaragua needed money and the United States did not want to help. But Russia was all about helping us—so very friendly, so very accommodating, so very un-demanding of any subservience, at first.

And then, when the other two armies saw the failure of the third, the one that had won at first, they took over. Thus came the communists to power, not with the revolution, but after the Americans stopped sending help to Nicaragua.

Seeing the incredible oppression the new regime was bringing to the people, and the very real possibility of the exportation of soviet-styled communism to El Salvador and Honduras, and possibly to Colombia and maybe Panama, the United States took immediate, if not overt, action against the Nicaraguan government. Most of this was later celebrated in the Iran-Contra hearings, but I get ahead of myself. Remember I just got back to school after two years of forced and not-terribly-appreciated vacation.

It was a nice, private school. We were of the newly-formed upper class. Dedicated revolutionaries against the Somozas, we (as a family) landed nice positions in the new government. Suddenly, we were hot. The new equality brought a redistribution of wealth which, if not necessarily equitable, was somewhat just. After all, what do the victors get if not the spoils? My dad had a friend who ran a hospital. The school required “community service” hours before graduation. My brother and I went a couple of hours to the hospital and helped clean out some trash, file some papers, push wheel chairs around, all for credit. This was to teach us the value of social responsibility. This is the lesson that I learned.

Shortly after we started, the United States’ supported contras, with arms provided by the CIA, bought with money from Iran, bombed the primary port in Managua. A tanker that was waiting to be unloaded exploded; the line that connected it to the gigantic oil-tanks on the port caught fire. Fifty-thousand gallons of refined gasoline make for a hell of a cherry bomb. I never knew how many died—I did not want to know. I avoided the news. I was, you see, in the thick of things: I was at the hospital when they brought the burn victims in. Most were missing pieces, neatly cleaned and dressed to avoid infection. We kids were kept away from most of them—we were there to file, to push, to clean, not to deal with death and dismemberment.

We were specifically forbidden to go into the small room in the back of the burn unit, which made it most appealing. One day, we snuck in. The room was clean and white, every surface kept sterile to avoid any possibility of infection. There were three beds, each cocooned inside a plastic tent, oxygen running to them all the time; each bed pristine, the lights bright, the air cool and constantly running, like a soft breeze, with a slight disinfectant smell. On each bed there was a body. There were two women and one child, at some point, but when I went in, there was only a woman there—at least they told me later it was a woman. Looking through the plastic, I could hardly tell the mess of charcoal and blood on the bed was even human. She felt no pain, they told me when I ran out crying—so much of heir flesh was gone…and bone can’t feel the burn. They did not know why she wouldn’t just die. She had no name. She was just a body they brought in to the morgue, only to realize at the last moment she was still breathing, if only barely. I hope to God she died quickly.

That is how the United States exports democracy. Whatever else you may say on the matter, as of this writing 1400 human voices have been forever silenced just on the American side in Iraq. That is an irrefutable number that must be considered. I make no judgment on the political, economic and humanitarian motives that lead to their deaths, but add to these the countless deaths of those on the other side. Those 1400 bear no guilt, but those on the other side perhaps do, and so we sleep better at night knowing our boys and girls are there doing the right thing. But I have seen the wrong thing done in the name of right. Sometimes, I see it still. So do not dare to tell me that I don’t know why I speak when I speak strongly against any kind of military action. Somebody must. This is not to say that such an action may from time to time be necessary, but rather that it must be taken with full knowledge of the price to pay. Anything less than absolute torture over the decision is inhuman. Those making the decision must be held accountable for that decision every step of the way. The righteous do not mind to die for the cause of righteousness. They welcome sharing in the ultimate price they ask of all those others. It is only the cowards that try to hide behind lies and excuses.

It is irresponsible to dismiss the opposing view by merely exaggerating its points into their most ridiculous worst-case scenarios and thus attempt to call such a view equally ridiculous. Speaking of the anti-war movement as though it were an oily blob crawling its way up from the theatre screen to consume all foolish enough to try to stand their ground, seeks to dismiss the richness of individual experiences. It is not a movement, but a shifting coalition—and often only accidental association of those who for one reason or another feel this country’s interests could be best served by alternative courses of action.

The war in Viet-Nam was not ended by the anti-war movement. The insane numbers of American dead ended that war. The eternally missed goals ended that war. Why do we call the prolonged and bloody debacle of the soviets in Afghanistan a victory for democratic forces everywhere, but Viet-Nam is the failure of the “anti-war movement”? It is all a question of perspective, a fairy tale where we as Americans can do no wrong. The Soviets left and the Taliban moved in. Who wins? If there is a political aspect to American democracy that attracts the persecuted intellectuals of the rest of the world, it is that it welcomes individualism, and thus dissent. It is ultimately patriotic to question the motives of the government: keeping it honest. Questioning or outright opposing those motives is not irresponsible, weak, or pandering to the interest of terrorists. That some seek to silence the healthy debate reminds me how it feels to live under tyranny.

Any global action taken by a superpower like the United States will have both positive and negative effects—regardless of the original causes. Even the most selfish act may benefit others accidentally or deliberately in the accomplishment of the selfish goal. To try to justify the original intent by the ultimate effect is like saying “look at the Japanese economy of the 70’s and 80’s! It’s ok we dropped two nuclear bombs on them.” Any action must bear immediate justification, or it quickly turns into allowing the end to justify the means.

I, and many like me, admire and respect many who propose the opposing view, but I am getting sick and tired of being called weak, afraid, traitor simply because I don’t fall in line immediately behind them. Nothing could insult them more than my having a mind of my own. It is really a shame that their version of democratic discourse is limited to total, unconditional agreement to their views alone. They equate disagreement with hatred for this country. How incredibly irresponsible is that!? This country, born out of argument and debate, that fought to gain its voice from under the tyrannical dictum of the British Empire, where heroes gave their lives so the critical decisions could be made here—here being where every citizen is—now sees this fundamental right brought into question by those who fear dissention. What’s worse, they are now insulting those who have kept an open mind, calling them complacent, slow to act, sheep-like simply because they didn’t fall in line right behind them.

I find it very amusing how they deny the existence of a “vast, right-wing conspiracy” even as they accuse all who oppose them of being on-message, falling in line, being complacent. They don’t associate for the sake of unifying their voice and clarifying their views; they don’t need to! Their point is so patently clear and right that any non-fascist, non-terrorist, non-communist, red-blooded American would just know it to be true—the rest of us are just insane.

I am sincerely disturbed by the nature of the words many who oppose the war are saying. It is true that our troops deserve our support and every effort must be made to eliminate the dangers to which they can be exposed while there. Nothing should be said to endanger them. However, to equate any disagreement with a death wish on our children, our friends in Iraq, Afghanistan and other such places is sheer stupidity. But is not enough that there are destructive demagogues out there taking advantage of the situation to bring attention to themselves (on both sides of this argument) to translate dissent to lunacy. This country’s democracy demands dialog, and those who wish to live under dictatorial, tyrannical, overpowering forces are certainly welcome to move to China. God knows there’s plenty of work there.

Iraq is nothing like Viet-Nam. Viet-Nam is already lost. We can still win in Iraq. Let us, however, as responsible Americans, bring out into the open all our motives and democratically discuss what course of action will accomplish our humanitarian goals while minimizing deaths.

Dissent is difficult; it is often seen as unpatriotic, and those who don’t like it often bring out entire libraries of patriotic talk about falling in line behind the leader to bring about peace. But I have lived under tyranny, both communist and not. I have seen my friends and my parents’ friends die fighting for freedom. Many in my family died to free our land. I have lived through a war and know how necessary it can be. Some things are worth one’s life. One of these things is the freedom to dissent, to vote, to matter in a democracy.

Anything else is Un-American.

Una y otra vez

Al principio, pensé que no era mío. La enfermera me enseño un paquetito bien apretadito, ya limpio; solo se veían su pelito café claro y sus ojitos grises. Su carita, todavía hinchada por las hormonas a las que el parto lo expuso, lo hacia parecer si no blanco, chino. Dicen que casi no lloró al nacer. Yo llegué unos minutos tarde—ella nunca dura mas de dos horas en parto (ya ha tenido tres hijos) y el duró una hora nada mas. Para cuando llegué del trabajo al hospital ya había nacido. El nació casi a las diez de la mañana. Todavía en el cuarto donde todo sucedió, los encontré ya calmados, descansando, sonriendo. Me senté en una silla al lado de la cama—ella entre dormida y despierta; el bien despiertito, sus ojos investigando el mundo nuevo a donde lo habíamos traído sin pedirle permiso y sin darle explicación.

Lo saludé y le di un beso. Traté de hablarle usando el nombre que habíamos pensado darle, pero no funcionó. Después de meses de entrenarnos, mi hija nos había convencido darle otro nombre—traté el nombre nuevo, y ese si lleno mi boca bien: Andre, dizque fuerte, y aunque no físicamente, ha demostrado que su temperamento es así. El niño es un santo, calmado, aguantador y al mismo tiempo travieso y juguetón. Le doy mil gracias a Dios por traérnoslo, aunque trajo con él tantas dudas.

La historia viene así:

Lo debí haber sospechado desde el principio, pero se me escapó. Ella nunca fue muy romántica. Aun cuando nos casamos y después nació mi hija, ella quiso ser una mujer muy liberada, lo cual no era suficiente para sospechar nada. Queriendo yo mismo ser progresivo, acepté su manera de ser. Trabajé como idiota para pagarle su escuela. Cuando salio de la escuela, le di trabajo. Según yo, todo iba bien. No me di cuenta hasta que la niña tenía tres años.

Un día, salí del trabajo temprano para llevar a mi cuñada a visitar a su novio. La muchacha era amable conmigo y siendo el jefe, yo tenía mas que suficiente tiempo libre para llevarla. El muchacho, también árabe, me caía bien; en aquel entonces, él estaba trabajando en construcción a mas de una hora de distancia, y el carro de mi cuñada no aguantaba el viaje. Durante el viaje, ella le habló tres veces para avisarle donde estábamos, y para platicar un rato. Por supuesto, la plática siendo en mi carrito, me era imposible evitar oír todo lo que ella decía y la mayor parte de lo que él le contestaba. La mayor parte de lo que dijeron era el usual intercambio entre enamorados, con besitos y otras caricias verbales—pero un par de los comentarios me hicieron un poco sospechoso. El le preguntó de mi mujer, de su horario, de cómo puede ser que yo tenga tanto tiempo libre, que si no le preocupaba que pudiera yo aparecerme sin avisar, y esas cosas.

Para la tercera conversación entre ellos, yo ya sabia de que estaban hablando, y sin mucha interrogación, conseguí que mi cuñada me diera los detalles de la infidelidad de mi mujer. Resulta que un hombre preocupado por proveer lo que su familia necesita y trabajando hasta dos turnos al día no le da suficiente atención a su mujer—y mujeres que no reciben atención en casa la buscan en la calle.

Un año. Después de cuatro, estaba dispuesta a tirarlo todo a un lado por las caricias y un poco tiempo de un extraño que conoció una vez que salio con sus amigas a un TGI Friday’s. Atendían la misma universidad. Mientras yo trabajaba para pagarle sus estudios, ella andaba de manita sudada por toda la ciudad con su nuevo novio. Todos nuestros amigos sabían. Toda su familia sabía. Todos. Esa noche me lo admitió, buscando comprensión de mi parte.

Ella, protagonista de todos mis sueños pornográficos, amor de mi vida, participante principal de todas mis fantasías (sexuales y no), quería comprensión. Ella, que sabía como yo odié las indiscreciones de mi padre y a quien yo le juré jamás serle infiel. Mi Beatriz, mi Julieta, mi Penélope—¿Cómo explicarle que me dolía más? No era tanto que le diera el cuerpo, porque eso no se gasta. Me dolió mas que aun sabiendo cuanto me dolía no podía esconder esa ilusión en sus ojos cuando me contó todo.

El pendejo fui yo. Un mes traté y no pude quedarme. Por supuesto, en ese mes, sabiendo cuanto la quería y mas que todo como para pagar la indiscreción se me entregó completamente—una orgía para dos mas por culpa que por ganas. El cuerpo no se queja, pero el corazón no aguanta. La que lo usa como paga no se da cuenta pero se convierte en puta, y nadie quiere una puta antes de apagar la luz.

Mi hija tenía tres años. Todavía se acuerda del último día. Ese día no peleamos. En la mañana me levanté, lavé mi ropa, cociné un pequeño desayuno para los dos. Mi mujer no se levantó hasta las diez (típico, diría yo, de la nueva vocación que estaba desempleando). Todo listo, me subí a mi carrito y me fui. Recuerdo la imagen de mi niña llorando, solo moviendo su manita en el aire en mi retrovisor.

Al final de ese mes, la que fue mi mujer me llamó para avisarme que estaba embarazada y para decirme (de su propia cuenta y sin que yo le preguntara) que era mío. En todo caso, en California no importa de quien sea. Estando casados cuando el niño nació, era mío sin importar quien fuera el padre.

Al principio, pensé que no era mío. La enfermera me enseño un paquetito bien apretadito, ya limpio; solo se veían su pelito café claro y sus ojitos grises. Su carita, todavía hinchada por las hormonas a las que el parto lo expuso, lo hacia parecer si no blanco, chino. Dicen que casi no lloró al nacer. No importa—al cabo yo ya había llorado suficiente por los dos. Siempre ha sido el tranquilo. Así nos pagó Dios por todas las noches sin sueño que le dedicamos a la niña y su cólico. Ella, con sus decisiones, sus órdenes, sus demandas—él, siempre dispuesto a ver que viene, complaciente y tranquilo. Ella la mandona—él dispuesto a ir al cine a ver que película se nos antoja ver. Y si no hay ninguna, nos vamos a Starbucks a tomar un café y platicar un rato. El que aprendió a comer cebollas solo porque le gustan a daddy.

Ayer fue el día del padre. Mis hijos me lo celebraron en la manera normal: con regalitos baratos que compraron con el poco dinero que habían juntado, con tarjetas hechas a mano en la escuela, y con besos y abrazos. Fuimos al cine; vimos tele. Platicamos un rato y tomamos café.

No soy muy buen padre. Es casi injusto que siendo tan descuidado como soy me quieran tanto. Pero me quieren. Siempre he dicho que no hay mejor redención que la otorgada por los hijos: uno vive su vida lo mejor que puede, pidiéndole a Dios que sus hijos lo perdonen. Los míos ya no son tan niños, a pesar de su edad. Ayer, así aburrido (dirán) o tranquilo (tal vez), y tal vez sin querer queriendo, mi hija y mi hijo me dieron el mejor día de los padres que uno pueda querer.

Por Paulita.

There is always a disaster, somewhere. Happy lives are cut in half by man or nature, and hard lives are made the harder by the aftermath of devastation—pieces left to be picked up in loneliness or in quiet, vacant-eyed communities left stunned by the surprise. And yet, almost as if divinely commanded, soon after there will be another disaster. What senseless human hope makes us think that this one disaster will be the last? Why are we so surprised when the next one comes? All life needs to go wrong is time. True, the same applies to the happy moments, but we are so good at remembering ones and forgetting the others.

Strictly speaking, I don’t remember, though the images are well implanted in my memory from so much repetition. God shivered the day before Christmas Eve: the earth wouldn’t stand still; doors opened and closed, banging and clanging in an odd, offbeat applause; dishes and toys flew through the air and fell together into a broken mass on the floor; the ground roared; wind blew where before it had been calm. People who make a living counting the dead later said there were 10,000; the ones who make their living measuring devastation said it reached 6.5 on the Richter scale. Before the week was out, they’d increased those numbers to 20,000 and 7.2. With every telling, the numbers were different, but death and destruction are hardly quantifiable past a point where the brain simply turns them to multitudes—beyond, lies madness.

I was in my crib, or whatever those things are called that hold kids too big for cribs but too little for beds. My brother was in his bed, in the same room, but at the opposite corner from me. We were both away from the window. When the shaking started, the window exploded into a million tiny pieces and fine dust, covering the floor, but not quite reaching either of us. The ceiling collapsed; my brother was buried almost completely under it—only his skinny, long, left leg stuck out from under the rubble. I was fine, if a bit shaken. My mother was asleep in her room, at the other end of the house. Between us, the kitchen had become an impenetrable barrier of broken glass, fallen furniture and buckling floorboards. Gas leaked loudly; water poured from broken pipes. Electricity was out, but for the occasional blue lightning of exploding transformers up and down the street. My father was away; he would not return until the morning.

The maid, bless her heart, a young kid somehow related to my dad (probably a bastard child from one of many indiscretions), saved us. She was a tall, strong, young woman who couldn’t be bothered with panic or surprise. She dug my brother out of the rubble, pulled me from my crib, and literally elbowed and shouldered her way past the toppled refrigerator and dining-room table to the front door, where my mother sat sobbing. My brother and I were in our pajamas; my mother was in night gown; the maid was fully dressed, her hair pulled into a tight and tidy pony tail, her long, flowery skirt snugly and prudishly tied around her ample waist with a rope. She was ready for battle and a little shaking wasn’t going to get her off balance.

The house, however, had fallen to one knee, leaning heavily on the building beside it—itself quite weak and loudly complaining at the extra weight.

As I recall, that was the end of the weak, wooden construction in the city. Houses were built out of concrete blocks from then on, with rebar reinforcement—solid, strong. The skeletons of old buildings were left in place, as morbid monuments to the hubris of a people building a city where five different faults intersected. They say the skeletons are still there, having survived their former occupants, that disaster, and the many that came thereafter. Death, it seems, endures.

We moved with my dad’s aunt, in another city, a humbler city full of simpler people and proud, stout little buildings put together when Spain was not the enemy but the motherland—colonial, they called it, as if one’s own slavery is anything to proclaim. We were there a couple of years, while the city (there is, after all, only one city when one is that little) was being rebuilt. In the meantime, we traveled a little; we studied a little and spent time with family. Those were restful times. Life took a little pause. The destruction, the death, all the evil, terrible things that happened were in the past and far away. Young minds do put such things aside so quickly!

Paulita, my dad’s aunt, was a single woman in her sixties, a retired teacher with impeccable manners and perfect handwriting. Used to quills and blotters, back when fine, linen paper was expected when mailing personal notes to one’s friends and relatives, she took life gently, slowly, carefully, deliberately—she did not rush it but rather lived it. I was her favorite. Dark and ugly like my dad—by far the darkest of the litter—she adopted me as her personal child, the one she never had. She cooked with me, for me; she baked the most delicious cookies; she took me on long walks along the lake and bought me candy. She taught me long words and long division. She taught me to slow down in a fight and to smile even when I am angry. We made whole armadas of paper boats of all sizes when it was raining, so we could release then into the flooded streets when the rain stopped. We finger painted. Despite having dedicated her entire life to the care of her older sister, left bed-ridden by a series of strokes in her early twenties, and despite having thus given up any hope of starting her own family, she was the happiest person I have ever met. She was completely at peace with the world and thanked God every day for each glorious sunrise. More than anyone I’ve ever known, I miss her.

The war came and the war went, leaving ten dead for every one that died during the earthquake. But we survived. My roses and my friends, we left. Home and country, we left. We traded all the dreams of life and future there for the uncertainty of this new land. It was the greatest gamble. My father bet his life that he could make it here, and he lost. My sister, sick and weak, and sweet and gentle, did not choose this harsh, unwelcoming world and she succeeded. This is the way of the world, that despite the greatest odds in favor, the strong will sometimes lose, and the weak will sometimes win. We want the weak to win, from time to time, for we see our weaknesses in them, and their strengths in us. Rivers flood, winds blow, rain falls, earth trembles, forests burn, and yet we build again; we try again; we do not shake our fists at God and curse Him, but rather pray for the wisdom to understand His way and endure yet one more trial—for trials are always coming.

Let them come, I say. I am made of stronger stuff than rain and fire. I will not simply live; I will not just survive; when the sun rises again on this wind-swept, desolate wilderness that seeks to engulf me, I will persevere!

How to Kill a Man

It’s easy enough to end a life. Humans are so frail, so weak, so gentle, that just about anything will cut the tender thread of life and leave a breath hanging in the air, as if a sigh. It hangs even in the hottest day as if it was condensing in the coldest winter night, just for a second, and then it is gone—the eyes that just a second prior held all the hope the world has seen glaze over with the peace that life can’t bring. The tightest, most alert muscles recover in an instant the placid softness of earliest infancy. The deepest frown relaxes into peace. For a moment, one might even feel one has done this man a favor—and in fact one just might have.

The hard part is not in the doing, but in the doing well. If one gets them young enough, it is said, the possibilities are endless. Here’s an example.

Let us say we get this child, the oldest son of a roads engineer in a third world country, building roads into the unforgiving jungle, leading from nowhere in particular to nowhere specifically. The engineer, a man who built his meager life from nothing by sheer force of will, has drunk all sense into despair and drowned all but the heartiest sorrows for they refuse to sink. Twelve hour days led to twelve hour nights and sleep came only on Saturdays—Sundays are God’s days. He never was what he’d always hoped he’d grow up to be, and so he sought revenge on the back of that child. But children’s bodies heal quickly, and defying death, he grew stronger.

Life was hard then, and there was never enough money to feed everybody well. Being the bread earner, the engineer got the lion’s share, and the kids and the wife got what was left. In those days, food was the measure of a man’s success, and the engineer was just not that good at it.

At eleven, the child dropped out of school. He didn’t have enough money to buy a bicycle, so he rented one from a man in town, bought kerosene by the 5-gallon tin and balancing two on the sides of the handlebar, he rode around town selling pints for people’s wood-burning stoves and lamps. When he broke his arm and couldn’t ride the bike anymore, he bought onions and sold them at the bus stop where people had make-shift little vegetable stands. When his father told him to stop, he went back to school—but didn’t stop working, only now he did it after school. He did his homework by candle light late at night, out in the back yard, where the light wouldn’t bother anybody.

On his fourteenth birthday, he woke up on a strange bed, beside a whore he’d rented to celebrate. No one else remembered it was his birthday. Back then, one celebrated only the first five years of a child’s life, till the highest danger of death had passed. His youngest sister did not make it long past the third. He was happy enough to have that much money.

He left the house and made his way in life, moving closer and closer to the capital, studying more and more, surviving by wit or trick or labor. He was not a great looking man, a lanky little indian boy too tall for his age, with a large, broad nose and a full and thick head of wild black hair—but he made up for it with a great personality, always happy, always smiling, always bringing sense and light to the darkest times. He won friends; he influenced people.

In his twenties, he had a wife who left him to work for the Voice of America. By then, he was well known, his humor shaping the way of many a radio soap opera so popular in those days, making great contrast with the melodramatic soaps of the past and making him a name. Soon, he was writing for the more famous comedians in the country, and then he, too, was one of them. Things were looking up.

He found a pretty girl who wanted a successful husband, and what should have been the beginning of great times turned out to be, in fact, the end. They never really liked each other. Marriages of convenience are so much more convenient when the parties involved are indifferent to each other. Animosity is rarely tamed by custom. This was the middle, the senseless plateau that comes from sheer exhaustion and gives the false sense that things are settling in, that it all might just work out…

In his thirties, he discovered politics. Being a man of the people, he took the people’s side and fought in silence like so many did then. The war came. Many of his friends died—some just went away. The war took his house, his wife, his country. In the end, all he had left were his children.

He had found happiness in his children. Yes, there were far more than those he’d had with just his wife, but that was ok, because that’s what everybody did. And he took care of them—all of them. He visited the ones he didn’t live with, and he paid their way. He had money now, and everybody ate plenty. When he left the old country for the new one, and he could only take the four he lived with, he cried. He cried for home and country—he cried for loves long lost—he cried for children he’d never see again.

Somewhere along the road, he lost his way. He erred, like many had before. He hurt those he loved most because he never knew how to show true love. He tried—he did his best—and if his best was not good enough, how could he be to blame? And yet the blame never left him; the guilt stayed with him to the end.

In the new country, he found times at once far more civilized than the childhood back in the days of home and far harsher. Men who’d been his friends now turned on him and on one another like hungry hyenas on the last carcass to be found, though they smiled and spoke softly and went to church all together. Men who had at home not been half as successful as he, now closed the doors that others had opened to them. For twenty years, he tried all the tricks he’d learned when young, and found they did not work in this new, undiscovered country. He tried to make a new life with a new woman, and she left—and the next one left, too. By the time he found the one who’d bury him, he’d given up—as often happens.

He lost his will.

Things started happening to him. He stopped happening to the world. The strong, happy, virile man that defied the strength of electric cable at the hands of a sadistic engineer since he could remember, could now not remember what it was to be a strong and happy man. He lived from day to day like practicing some masochistic 12-step program whose only aim was mere survival. He who for long had persevered, now merely survived. The end of the end came with a cough. What bullets couldn’t do, an enemy too small to see managed with ease. A viral infection of the heart tripled its size. The lack of activity in a man used to massive meals tripled his size. One day, a doctor told him to lose 150 pounds in six months or he’d die.

Three months later, he was dead.

He died on an easy chair watching Johnny Carson. A random day like many before, promising to be like many after, we all went to sleep and left him alone in the living room. Fat and heavy, he breathed easier if he slept sitting. Sitting there, I’m sure he wondered why he should fight so hard for the next breath. The doctor had given him twenty-five pills to take every day. His wife counted them out for him at the beginning of the week. When he died, we found hundreds of pills hidden in little corners of the house, where he’d put them so we’d think he’d taken them. He’d given up—and who can defeat despair? In his old age, he found himself superfluous, unwanted and unloved, taken for granted and tossed aside like so many old men do. He died because that was the better way.

In the end, one need not lift a finger to kill a man. One only need stop loving him.

The Day God Talked To Me

Yes, before going into much detail, I am insane. I am insane because I think God Himself descended from the Heavens and spoke to me—when in fact He didn’t. Or I am insane because He did and I still battle inside myself with the question of His existence. Either way, I’m quite crazy, demented, deranged, loony… and no, there will be no Patsy Cline puns today.

When I was born, 98% of the population of my country considered itself Roman Catholic. When I left, that number was down to about 90%. When I left, the population was down to 70% of what it was before: the rest had died or left.

After decades of dictatorship, and a war almost as long, spearheaded by people of little or no religious inclinations, the undercurrent of social development was one of mostly lip service to the church and to the God it brokered. After a while, the country had begun thinking of it (the church) as another western European or American (read estadounidense) franchise selling a commercially viable product to a needy consumer base. However, unlike Chevy novas, which gave a tangible (albeit hardly dependable) product for the cost, the God of this church took and took and took, and gave so little in return. Children’s fathers disappeared into the night, carried away by jeeps that never brought them back. Fathers’ sons were found dead outside the universities or movie theatres or dance halls where they congregated. Mothers and daughters fared no better, and God did nothing. “Pray,” the church said; and men prayed and children did not come back.

My parents were of the generation that grew up being taken to church on Sundays by their parents and felt little or no connection to the God that spoke only Latin and whose servants said mass with their backs to the crowd. By the time the Pope ordered otherwise, it was too late. My parents were a bit too worried with the practical requirements of survival in a hostile homeland to go back and make peace with a God that never made them feel welcome in His home. They never took me to church. I went of my own accord. They never took me to Sunday school. I snuck into the confessional one Saturday and asked the priest for help. From then, every Sunday I went to church and stayed an hour after mass to study whatever it is kids are supposed to study for First Communion. One of the things I learned was that, to pray, you need only say: “Padre Nuestro, que estas en los cielos…” I learned it was not proper to ask for anything specific, that God would look into your heart, know what was best for you, and grant you that. I learned you don’t ask God to heal your sick sister, to help with the test that’s coming up, to fix the car that’s broken. You say your prayers and the best will happen.

One Sunday, I got up and put on my nicest shirt and my best pants and left the house before my parents woke up. I got to church long before mass started and kneeled and started praying. Padre Nuestro… Ave Maria… Padre Nuestro on and on and on… And when the mass started I did everything as I had learned it. At the right moment I walked up to the altar and I waited in line for my First Communion. With hundreds of people who did not know how important that day was, I waited in line. With no one in my family smiling and taking pictures, I waited in line. And when I took my First Communion, there was only God and me and an old Spanish priest who taught me not what God was, but how to hear His word. God and I left the church and went home. God and I explained we’d gone to church to my parents when they asked. I don’t think my parents ever found out I had my First Communion. They never asked. I never told.

For reasons discussed on a previous post, I had already read the Bible from cover to cover twice by the time I took my First Communion. I was well versed with the God of the Jews, and the God of the Romans. All around me, though, there was a different God… a careless, uncaring creature that apparently was too busy willing every blade of grass to move to care that people were killing people, or worse. Ten years old is too young an age to find out that there are far worse things one man can do to another than kill him.

On Wednesdays and sometimes Thursdays and on Sundays I would go to church. I would participate in the mass, and I would pray. Confession on Saturdays; communion on Sundays. Prayer, prayer, prayer. And always the prayer went: Padre Nuestro, que estas en los cielos…

One would think that God would have something profound to say to a child whose life is precariously balanced on the edge of insanity. One night, after a particularly nasty fight between my parents, when my mother had broken a bottle on the wall next to my head and then lunged at my father with the full intention of cutting his throat, only to be beat into a pulp by him, I prayed. I wanted so badly to ask him to make them love each other, to keep them from hurting each other. I wanted to ask him for money, because they always argued about that despite having a lot of it. I wanted to ask him to take me away, to give me different parents that would love me like I saw my godmother love her children when we visited on weekends. I wanted to ask him to send an alien ship to recruit me as an assistant in their travels across the universe. I wanted captain Nemo to take me onboard the Nautilus to explore the oceans. I wanted to be the invisible man. I wanted to be Johnny from the Fantastic Four, to turn myself on fire and fly away. I wanted to ask him for so much. But all I could say in my head was: Padre nuestro que estas en los cielos… And then I must have gone to sleep. And in my sleep He came, a large figure with no face or shape, a bright light that did not blind, soft and warm. And I poured all my rage into this shape, and beat and bit Him. I screamed and cried and I asked and I begged for all the things I could not pray for. And all he said to me was “It is for the best.”

What The Fuck?

A child wants a hug. A child wants a kiss. A child wants a gentle caress and a “there, there…” What the hell does a child do with an “It is for the best”?

I don’t pray like that anymore. I have nice long conversations with The Guy when I go on long drives by myself. I look for His hand in all the beauty of nature. But I also know his hand is in all the ugliness of man. His is every ray of sunshine—and every drop of rain. His is every smile—and every tear. Today, I blame him for all the evil that men do, and for all the love and tenderness they sometimes have for one another. I have reached my teenage years in spiritual development, when I question the wisdom of The Father and wonder if His way is the best way. One day, I might outgrow this doubt, but for now I just know I paid dearly for the right to have it and I will cherish it.

But every now and then, just for the hell of it, to hear the old words in my mouth, I kneel and hold my hands in supplication, flat the one against the other in front of my face, and quietly say Padre Nuestro que estas en los cielos…

En Junio Como En Enero

The house was built some time after January of '75, but before November of '76. My parents went to see the models, made a modest down payment, and paid mortgage on two houses for a year before we moved. We we got there, a little before November of '76, my younger brother was a baby and my mom was about to burst--my sister was about three weeks late in coming. Everything was dusty, unpainted, new, exciting.

About a month after we moved, they were done building all the other houses, paving the street, installing street lighting... it finally looked like a real neighborhood. People started moving in, and my older brother and I started exploring, meeting the new kids, playing. We found a new school, new grocery store, new church. My dad had plants brought in, and we picked where we wanted them ourselves--kids of that age love helping out on all dirty chores. It was fun and exciting.

A year later, my dad decided he didn't like the severely sloping front yard, so he had a builder take the grass out, bring some dirt and build a nice, pink terrace where he could now host parties. Just about every weekend, we'd have a party, get-together, to-do, with the neighbors and my parents' friends. The adults would talk and drink and party till the early morning. The kids would play until they collapsed from exhaustion and were carried to bed by their mothers. On holidays, we'd try our hardest to stay awake till the sun came out, but that's so hard to do when you're so little.

When they built the terrace, they left a space of about two feet from the sidewalk, to be able to accomodate for the steps up to the house, and to plant some trees or grass--other neighbors were doing the same thing; the neighboorhood finally looked lived-in. Kids' bike crowded porches, swings hung from trees, dogs barked, smells of cooking wafted out to the street as one walked to church, or to school, or just went for a walk to visit with friends. I asked my parents if I could have that space between the wall of the terrace and the sidewalk to plant a little garden, instead of just getting grass. They agreed, as long as I took care of it. They asked what plants I wanted so they could buy them. I told them not to get any--I would get them myself. They looked a bit doubtful, but agreed.

For a couple of weeks, I walked all over the neighborhood, asking people for clippings of their rose bushes. I always picked the most striking ones, the ones with the strangest colors, the biggest or nicest ones. Some people politely declined, but by far the majority were more than happy to let me have some. A couple of the ladies were even nice enough to get them for me and keep them in water until they grew some roots before giving them to me. Most were more than happy to let me clip a few little branches here and there.

Roses are hard to grow from clippings. They're frail, finicky, temperamental. Once a they grow roots, though, they're very sturdy and forgiving of a young boy's neglect. I planted way too many, and a few kindly died so the rest could grow strong. In almost no time at all, I had the best rose garden in the neighborhood. People who'd given me clippings would walk on by and recognize their roses and say hi. Boys would pick them for their girls. Old women would always make a fuss when they saw me doing a little gardening.

When the war came, the bushes were old and strong, some so thick at the base they resembled my bony calves. I was very happy with the result. Some produced roses pale in color, but sweet and strong. Some produced roses with little smell, but bright red or yellow, or the fiery mix of both in orange tongues of flame from the ends of tall and well-kept branches. Water was scarce, but they kept flowering. Tanks tore up the street, but my bushes didn't die. The house got bombed and we had to leave. We were gone a couple of months, but when we came back, my bushes had only grown more, jealous guardians of the house that--by then--had become my home. We rebuilt it with our own hands. When the house was done, I set to rebuild my garden, and I did.

Some bushes didn't make it, and I went around the neighborhood looking for more clippings. Most of the neighbors were gone, replaced with strangers who had taken out all the plants and replaced their old gardens with slabs of concrete or bricks, or nothing but grass. Still, I got enough clippings to replace the bushes that had died (I insisted on not having two bushes that produced the same roses, so I couldn't just get clippings from the bushes left to replace the dead ones). It took a few months, but at the end, everything was back to normal.

But now there were no parties. Kids didn't go out to play. The world had suddenly turned far more dangerous and parents kept their families huddled around the nest. We still had get-togethers from time to time, but now only in the back yard, never as loud as before, and mostly friends and relatives, no neighbors. About a year later, we were gone.

We had moved out of the house, staying at my aunt's place for about a month. One night, we drove to the house, where we met a nice older lady who gave my dad an envelope full of money. My dad handed her the keys to our home. We got back in the car and drove away. I didn't take a rose--I didn't think of it at the time. I didn't stop to check on them. My dad cried in silence all the way back to my aunt's. Not knowing what to say, I said nothing.

It has been more than twenty years now. I wonder if my roses are still there.

De verdad, y de amistad.

When I was learning English, our ESL teacher used to play movies for us, which we would later discuss, or with which we would interact. One of the movies I remember most vividly was “A Man for All Seasons”, about Saint Sir Thomas More’s confrontation with Henry VIII when the king broke with the Catholic Church. Once he set himself as the head of the new Anglican Church, the king demanded an oath of fealty from anybody who was anybody in England, especially those in positions of power. Having refused, More is locked up, pending execution. As the movie develops, many of those who had been his friends come to him, practically begging him to accept the oath and save his life. At one point, one asks (I paraphrase) “will you not do this for me… for friendship?” More’s answer was (I paraphrase again): “and when I go to hell for not having followed my conscience, will you go with me… for friendship?”

This brought up 3 questions to mind even back then, which I have not completely answered to my own satisfaction and which I would like to discuss with others to resolve. These questions (in no particular order of importance or appearance) are: 1) Does the following of one’s conscience determine the nature of sin? 2) What is the nature of friendship? 3) What is the interaction between right-and-wrong (if there is an objective approach to this) and friendship?

As I have grown up, I have approached these individually—fearing my inability to address/resolve them together. The more I learn, the less I understand. Any help in clearing these points would be greatly appreciated, as this is a serious issue for me, and one I’d like to resolve (if not definitively, at least satisfactorily) before I can ask the One who knows. To that effect, here’s what I got so far:

1) There are definite layers to the nature of acceptable behavior. Needless to say, intelligent behavior is what separates us from animals. Biologically-dictated actions (eating, breathing) are inherently beyond the reach of this conversation and only the context in which they occur can be reviewed for probity. Still, beyond the natural restrictions to self-destructive behavior (for example) there are legal, moral and ethical restrictions. I make no distinction between religious ethical and purely secular ethical restrictions—suffice it to say “beyond moral”—morality being the temporary, socially contextual framework in which a group evaluates its members’ actions. While certain sexual behaviors are considered morally acceptable sometimes in some places, others are universally considered harmful (i.e.: relationships between cousins vs. relationships between siblings—and even these not always). Legal restrictions, permissions or requirements are far more transitory and subject to the local climate at the time of inception. Sin, therefore, would appear to me to be entirely a matter of ethics, and not of morals or laws. This said, even divine writ is subject to the interpretations of “enlightened” individuals or groups—being catholic, I think of the church. Nonetheless, I still purport there are some people who have nothing better to do with their time than subvert holy writ to their own self-serving (albeit eloquent) intentions. Coming from a culture in which tradition often turns ideas into truths, I am skeptical of anything being branded a sin simply because it now bears the label. As dangerous as it is to trust situational evaluations or (however unchanging) my own perception, I’ve settled on the idea that I’ll know a sin when I see it. Two inherent problems with this idea are that I set myself as sole arbiter of goodness, and thus above scrutiny form others—and I’m not really that self-important—and that it is contrary to the idea that redemption can only be gained through the man called the Christ, but rather can be achieved on one’s own merits—and this contradicts my observations from the Bible (can’t seem to make my views universal when I’ve only had a catholic upbringing).

2) I am a firm believer in the idea that most of what we are is based on calcium bridges connecting dendrites in the soft crust of the brain called grey matter. That said, I still hold a firm spiritual belief in the idea of a soul, and its transcendence over the merely physical nature of the vessels we use while on this planet. The first would lead us to believe we create friendships out of custom (exposure to the same individuals over time simply increase familiarity and breed friendship); the second doesn’t preclude the first, but expands it by suggesting pre-existing affinities based on shared “previous” experiences (together or separate). Either way, once the friendship exists, how do we quantify it? Can we quantify it? Should we? There are always people for whom we’ll do more than for others. I dare say that sometimes we might even find ourselves willing to make great sacrifices for people we hardly know (or not at all), based on some ethereal affinity. Some do these things for purposes beyond themselves—Gandhi? Mother Teresa? Some do altruistic things (for friends and strangers) for ultimately selfish gains (politicians serving meals at the mission on thanksgiving). Still others, like me, give a dollar to the homeless guy at the 7-11 only to momentarily shut up our conscience—call it a bribe.

But I think it is safe to say we do more for those we know, and even more for those for whom we care—friends, whether related or not. And I don’t think that blood is really thicker; I just haven’t seen enough proof of it. Friendship, then, is necessarily defined after the fact, based on anecdotal evidence, and only quantifiable when it is over. Fragile as a single flake of snow, enough of it can sink boats and block roads that lead away. Solid enough, it can split mountains in half, only to melt under the slightest fire. Subtle as the beating of one’s heart, one only really knows when it is done that it was there. Men have built kingdoms on its strength, and many have turned saints by its testimony. And yet, it is often so subtle and fragile, especially when viewed from the perspective of the previous point.

3) And now, to the crux of the matter. Being that right is often indiscernible from wrong, and that friendship is so difficult to understand from day to day, are there things that ought to be beyond the asking? Beyond the expectation? Can I ask a friend to do wrong for friendship? And if he does it, is it wrong for him? Asked in such simple terms, the question seems naïve or disingenuous. From time to time, I run into the internet description of friendship as: a good friend bails you out of jail; a true friend is sitting next to you, shaking his head, saying “f**k! we shouldn’t have done that!” And funny, irreverent and deliberately facetious as it may be, it begs the question of this post: “And when I go to hell, for not having followed my conscience… will you go with me… for friendship?”

Once again, I’m full of questions but have too few answers.

Help! I need somebody…

10,000 Razones

A veces es dificil hacer lo que a otros les resulta muy sencillo.

Anoche fui con unos amigos a Chico's--un bar gay. Esta era solamente mi segunda vez ahi, y fue tan decepcionante como la primera vez. Estaba demasiado lleno de gente (si, es necesario aclarar de que se llena el lugar, pues parece corral o chiquero), pero eso no es decir mucho de su popularidad: la unica y decrepita mesa de billar deja apenas suficiente espacio a su alrededor para pararse junto a un amigo a platicar, y eso si nadie quiere pasar, porque entonces uno estorba. Aun asi, la platica es casi imposible, pues los parlantes fueron diseñados en los fabulosos 70's y lucen lo que podriamos designar su espiritu de supervivencia exagerando sus habilidades al punto que la musica no se reconoce--lo que al fin no les importa a las locas que siguen solo el martillar de sus freneticos pero poco imaginativos ritmos.

Despues de empezar una cuenta, lo que no fue necesario porque al fin solo tomamos $60.00 entre los tres, lleve al agua de colores que me quisieron pasar por tragos a donde estaban mis amigos y a señas les pedi salir a fumar. No quisieron, sino que fueron a bailar, lo que yo no hago, y por eso me quede sosteniendo la pared al rato. La bola infernal con la que remplazaron the disco ball de los 70's daba vuelta tras vuelta cambiando de luz al azar, y por mala fortuna me daba en el ojo derecho justo cuanto la cantante pegaba con la nota mas alta. Tortura--y nada mas--era eso; Dios no queria que fuera ahi. Platique con un muchacho que conoci en ese momento, pero platica es mucho decir, pues el ruido (digo, musica) permitia solo un saludo.

Cuando regresaron mis amigos, los convenci a salir a fumar, o mejor dicho a acompañarme, pues ellos no fuman. Un cigarro despues, estaba tan aburrido que les pedi mejor irnos. No quisieron en ese momento, pero decidimos juntos solo tomar un par de tragos mas e irnos. Si de casualidad esta historia suena aburrida, es porque lo es.

Saliendo de ahi, nos fuimos a la casa de mi amigo, a unos 20 minutos por freeway, lo que hice en diez gracias a la hora (el trafico en los angeles es abominable). Me quede a dormir en su casa--detalles para otro post--y casi con pena reporto que llegue al trabajo dos horas tardes hoy. Me lo perdonan porque al fin y al cabo les regalo horas y horas cada semana, pero aun asi me siento mal.

Pero el punto de esto es que al final de la noche, antes de dormir, como siempre sucede cuando salgo, me volvi a ver en mi mente, culo contra pared, trago en mano, viendo a la gente bailar...y yo no bailo.

Eso sera para otra historia.

A Partir De Mañana

Estoy cansado. Voy a descansar. Mientras, pa' que pasen el rato, una de las que le gustaban al viejo.


A partir de mañana empezaré a vivir la mitad de mi vida;
A partir de mañana empezaré a morir la mitad de mi muerte;
A partir de mañana empezaré a volver de mi viaje de ida;
A partir de mañana empezaré a medir cada golpe de suerte.

A partir de mañana empezaré a vivir una vida más sana,
Es decir, que mañana empezaré a rodar por mejores caminos;
El tabaco mejor y también por qué no, las mejores manzanas,
La mejor diversión y en la mesa mejor, el mejor de los vinos.

Hasta el día de hoy, sólo fui lo que soy, "aprendiz de Quijote",
He podido luchar y hasta a veces ganar, sin perder el bigote.
Ahora debo pensar que no pueden dejar de sonar las campanas,
Aunque tenga que hacer, más que hoy y que ayer...
A partir de mañana.

Si a partir de mañana decidiera vivir la mitad de mi muerte
O a partir de mañana decidiera morir la mitad de mi vida,
A partir de mañana debería aceptar, que no soy el más fuerte,
Que no tengo valor ni pudor de ocultar mis más hondas heridas.

Si a partir de mañana decidiera vivir una vida tranquila
Y dejara de ser soñador, para ser un sujeto más serio,
Todo el mundo mañana me podría decir: "se agotaron tus pilas,
Te has quedado sin luz, ya no tienes valor, se acabó tu misterio".

Cada golpe de suerte empezaré a medir a partir de mañana.
De mi viaje de ida empezaré a volver a partir de mañana.
La mitad de muerte empezaré a morir a partir de mañana.
La mitad de mi vida empezaré a vivir... a partir de mañana.

Alberto Cortez