Looking Back On 2019
Christmas Eve
While in Oaxaca, I had the good fortune of meeting a gifted guitarist, my soon-to-be friend Refujio "Cuco" Benitez. This chance encounter began a soul brother relationship that resulted in our duet -- "Refugio Cuco." And because Cuco played with a long-established rock-and-roll band, Túnel del Tiempo," I soon found my way into that group as well.
"Los maestros" and I enjoyed performing almost every day -- in Jardín Conzatti on weekdays, and on weekends in the Alameda de Leon in front of Oaxaca's cathedral. Some of that music can be heard at https://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2019/11/music-making-with-tunel-del-tiempo-and.html
In March, my North Carolina Spanish students -- Norma, Richard, Willard, Byron and Lisa -- spent a wonderful week with me. We enjoyed the artistry and culinary delights of Oaxaca's Historic District along with visits to outlying craft towns, archaeological sites and natural wonders like "Hierve el Agua" and the Tule Tree, more than 2000 years old. The Tule Tree is an ahuehuete and holds the world record for greatest circumference tree.
In Oaxaca, I also taught English-as-a-second-language and was delighted by my relationship with an unusually eager, enthusiastic student named Consuelo who, despite minimal formal education had such passion to learn English that she lit up like Christmas and her luminosity left me awestruck.
In June, brother Gerald and sister-in-law Betsy again bestowed their largesse by inviting the extended Archibald family to spend a month at "Masía Can Pares," a 300 year old Catalan hacienda in the hills above Barcelona. Our quickest access to the Mediterrean was the coastal town of Sitges, which we could see looking down from Can Pares.
A side note... While in Spain-Catalonia, I was struck to learn that Sitges was G.K. Chesteron's favorite vacation spot! http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/10/gk-chesterton-on-coming-peril.html
It is impossible to describe any reality. After all, "that which we say a thing is, it isn't." This may sound absurd. But the word "avocado" (deriving from the Aztec for "testicle") has precious little to do with the indwelling nature and sensory characteristics of an "avocado." No two people experience an avocado exactly the same way. Then there are, as night follows day, "The Two Camps": those who love avocado... and those who hate it.
Even so, our Catalonian adventure is particularly resistent to description.
Not only was it delightful to enjoy the daily presence of so many family members including Janet, Ger, Betsy, Ian, son Danny and Gerald-and-Betsy's good British friends, Richard and Sheila Jeffries who, for decades, have served as hands-on supporters of El Camino de Santiago (aka El Camino de Compostela), Europe's best known Christian pilgrimage route dating back to the 900s.
As was true in Andalucia in 2015, lifelong friend Frances Vito (with "spiritual" assistance from another lifelong friend, Jim Sanfilipo) charted our daily "explore."
Ay! Que riqueza!
Flamenco. The Ebro River delta. Tarragona, legendary birthplace of Pontius Pilate and an architectural wonder since its foundation as a Roman colony. Girona, a relatively undiscovered town so beautiful that "the authorities" post signs beseeching tourists not to move there since relocation upsets the local real estate market, depriving native-born Gironenses of places to live as their ancestors have lived for centuries. The beach/fishing towns of Cambrils and Casteldefels. Entire days exploring monasteries and convents dating back a thousand years and more. An all-day visit to the sovereign country of Andorra in the Pyrenees. My first ever Gay Pride Parade in Sitges - a phenomenal experience! Wineries. "Champaneries." Chocolate factories. A "just-off-the-boat" fish market where we were fortunate that our German-Barcelonan friend Aleksandra finagled special entry to the dockside bidding gallery. Big trays of fish, shellfish, octopus, squid, lobster on a neverending conveyor belt pausing but briefly while bidders electronically logged their "offers, and then... off the trays went to the ice packing room for customer pickup minutes later.
We took particular delight in Gaudi's Catedral de la Sagrada Familia; the monastery-church-funicular complex at Montserrate and The Wine Culture Museum of Catalonia in the town of Vilafranca where we discovered a delightful hole-in-the-wall restaurant (operated by Mom, Dad and "the kids") where we were treated like family and enjoyed some foodstuffs we had never had before. Then there was abundant sharing with delightful Catalonians, some of whom didn't speak Spanish but only Catalan. And, of course, our devoted support staff at Can Pares - cheerful, generous people from Paraguay, Peru, Russia and Ukraine. As a going away present, our Peruvian gardener, Jorge, gave me a liter of pisco, his country's national beverage. I must say that latino generosity astounds me without fail.
It was especially fun -- for all of us -- to have my Danny "on board" for the entire month. "Caribou" is a buoyant spirit, eager to be of service, fun to be around, and -- Dios mio!!! -- can he cook!
Just prior to meeting up at the Barcelona Airport, Danny spent two weeks on Great Britain's most challenging wilderness trail in northern Scotland (The Cape Wrath Trail) immediately after a month in London exploring the theatre scene, guided by his Colorado College theater professor Andrew Manley, an English native who had a career in London -- as actor and director -- before moving to the States to teach.
While trekking in Scotland Danny met up with a good friend and fellow student from my Liverpool School Of Tropical Medicine studies in the mid-'70s. Eileen Devaney is now professor of Parasite Immunology at the Unversity of Glasgow and I am deeply grateful for the convivial company and crucial assistance she provided Danny.
The only sad note about our time in Spain was that my Maria could not break away from her work with Grand Canyon Trust whose office is in Flagstaff where Maria lives, although Squeezer's work in "leadership development" with Native American young people has her "out in the field" much of the time - so "far out" that she spends many weeks each year beyond cellphone signal.
In less than three years Maria became a linchpin person at the Trust, received several promotions; was endowed with her own budget; and in 2019 led the organizational and fund-raising effort to make "Uplift" (a branch of Grand Canyon Trust) a freestanding organization. I cannot even imagine the gumption, grit and wide-ranging skillset which Maria brings to the table so that these visionary intitiatives reach fruition.
As I write this reflection, Maria and Daniel are "home" in Hillsborough -- along with friends Abi and Cindy Kamler who brought the galley copy of her soon-to-be-published book about growing up in an "international public health family," a way of life that imparted Cindy's passion for independence and exploration.
The book is subdivided into four more-or-less chronological sections detailing her work as a "first-wave" free speech activist at Berkeley; the establishment of Eastern Sierra Wildlife Rehabilitation in Bishop, California (where Cindy has lived for 20 years); her travels, with most attention given to a life-changing experience in the 1990s when a trip-around-the-world" imbued her with especially fond memories of Indonesia, Nepal, New Zealand and Kenya. Cindy concludes her book with poetry and other writing most of it to imbue young people with love for the natural world.
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