Detour to the Unexpected

A strange sight greeted us as we stepped out of the downtown metro station – no traffic on the Alameda, the city’s main artery, no roaring cars, buses, trucks, taxis and motorcycles. Nothing. Nada. At the end of the block, in front of the Moneda, the presidential palace, a series of barricades were detouring cars.

 I’d come with two sisters-in-law to attend a free noonday Sunday concert downtown. At the theater, we found all the doors closed, people wandering about with puzzled faces. We learned that the concert was cancelled because this was the route of a protest march to the general cemetery to commemorate “los desaparecidos”, the disappeared, victims of the military coup which occurred 42 years ago on a September 11^th.  We considered our options and then called a friend who lives downtown. She invited us for coffee.

It was my first visit to her apartment, located in a grand Bauhaus-style building built in 1928. The polished brass railing at the entry stairs gleamed. In the elevator, the metal grill door rattled shut. A trip to the past. Dora and her schnauzer Franca greeted us at the door, leading us into a spacious entry hall and living room, filled with antiques, paintings, art-deco lamps, enameled Chinese boxes and books in every room. We’d stepped into a museum. We made our way around the apartment stopping to take in interesting objects and asking their stories. Among her books lying about on table tops, two caught my eye. One very familiar. My memoir. I thumbed through another, biographies, photos and drawings of renowned women writers over the years. I jotted down its title. Dora then invited us to see her daughter’s apartment on an upper floor – white, modern, bare, minimalist.

We stopped for a bite to eat on the outdoor terrace of a nearby café. A tall, bearded, none-too-clean man in loose-fitting clothes entered and offered to draw our portraits. He said, “Such nice-looking ladies. A portrait?”

We smiled. “Thank you, but no.”

He wasn’t easily dissuaded. Looking at me, he asked, “How many boyfriends have you had?”

I flashed my ten fingers several times in the air. He laughed.

A good stretch of the afternoon lay before us. One sister-in-law suggested we explore a new, elegant boutique hotel across the street. In the lobby, we told a uniformed young man that we were just looking. He offered to take us on a tour. In a smooth, silent elevator we rose to the roof garden that included a pool and a bar. The elevator whisked us to another floor where our guide showed us several rooms, all in tones of black and soft grey. Below street level, we visited the spa. Leaving the lobby, our young man handed us brochures with special honeymoon offers. I left my copy on my husband’s night table to see when he returns from his two weeks in Italy.

Our next stop was the Museum of Visual Arts, just around the corner.

A sculptress, who lives in the same apartment building as one sister-in-law, had a major exhibit there, entitled “Tiempo de Piedras”, Time of Stones. The exhibit – a mix of installations, paths, and photographs of stones gathered from river beds and the seacoast – evoked in me the special love I have for stones. They connect me to nature. I couldn’t take my eyes off an exhibit of overlapping, wafer-thin charcoal grey stones arranged in a long horizontal line, simulating the ridges of the Andes. A soft overhead light shone on the ridges, which were suspended from the ceiling, projecting onto the wall the shadow of the bare Andes. Stone is the essential element, the raw material, of these mountains and the detritus carried from their ridges, smoothed and rounded by rushing rivers.

I came away from our downtown visit with two riches: not the memory of music, but of the beauty of stones and the name of the book that called to me from that table in Dora’s apartment, Stefan Bollmann’s “Women Who Write Are Dangerous.” I must have it.

Nesting Season

The morning is sunny and warm, an irresistible invitation to step out in the garden to notice the new green leaves on my potted rosebush and listen to the songbirds whose gay chatter tells me that they feel the approach of spring as I do. The hummingbird feeder needs filling, and I head to the kitchen to prepare their syrup. We still have four official weeks of winter left, but today is a sneak spring preview, the kind of day to leave windows and doors open.

Out for a walk, my eyes drink in the delicate pink party attire of the cherry trees. A magnolia across the street bursts in mauve and white blooms. An austral thrush is stuffing his beak with nest-building materials.

These days energize me. I’ve been making nesting plans of my own. In a few days hubby leaves for a 2-week cycling trip in Italy. Rather than take off on my own trip, I’m planning a Grand Spring Cleaning. Junk, old newspapers and magazines, overflowing cabinets and attic, out-of-style or too tight clothes, my boys’ old university textbooks – get ready. I’ll soon disturb you from your comfortable dusty niches and piles.

Spring cleaning involves lightening up, which is my intent with my own body. Stick faithfully to my exercise routine and shed a few pounds. Focus more on fruits and veggies. Sweets (my downfall) strictly banned in the house while I’m on my own. Hubby being away means I can eat dinner earlier, not at the sacred Chilean 9 p.m. I’ll imagine myself as a light, downy owl feather.

Renewal is at the heart of spring. At my age, I won’t be sprouting any new buds. But it’s a good time for inner growth, spiritual awakening and mind stimulation, reading the works of the wise, attending an art exhibit, a concert. I recently read an article in The Sun magazine, “Lost in Thought,” by Eckhart Tolle. I want to reread it to assimilate his deep, challenging thoughts and explore more into his works. And I’ll make time to read the weekly Brainpickings pieces that have accumulated in my inbox. And, yes, check out Ursula LeGuin’s latest blog posts.

Looking at my list of tasks, I realize they’re indoor activities. If the days continue like today, I must schedule outdoor time for walks and gardening. Daniel, our gardener, comes in a few days. I plan to be out there working alongside him (mostly directing).

These will be a very busy two weeks. If I accomplish even half of what I intend, I’ll be satisfied, ready to welcome spring and my husband with a light heart (and body).

Explaining the World to Children

Our three granddaughters, 10 yr.old twins and a 6 yr.old, draped on the sofa in our TV room, were absorbed in an animal program about orangutans. When it ended, we channel grazed. Anything else of interest? Across the screen spread the word “Apocalypse”.

“No, not that” said their father. Grandfather quickly switched channels.

“What was that? We want to see it.”

“No, it’s about a war.”

Changing channels, we unwittingly passed by“Apocalypse” again and a scene of bodies scattered about a field.

“Change it,” said their dad.

“But we want to see Apocalypse. What’s war?” asked one.

“Do people stay living in their houses when there’s a war?”

“Has there ever been a war here in Chile or the States?”

“No”, I answered. “People do stay in their houses (I omitted saying unless they’re being bombed). Soldiers go off to fight in other countries.”

I remember some time ago while watching TV with them (we DO engage in other activities besides TV), the news showed scenes of Syrians in a bombed-out neighborhood. One of the twins asked, “How can people live like that?”

What a difficult task the girls’ parents face protecting their children in this hyper-connected world, letting them be children as long as possible. I’m glad they ask these questions, questions that deserve to be answered. Issues like war need to be talked about. But why expose them to heart-breaking, graphic scenes of violence? How much do we tell them? They live with many fears as it is. Earthquakes, lightning and thunder, family deaths, stories of kidnapped children.

When my sons were growing up, we had no instantaneous cable news or live scenes of death and destruction filmed by embedded journalists. Although, they did live under a military dictatorship where bombs could sometimes be heard in the night. Even today, Chile is not free of violence, bombs placed by anarchists recently in the metro car and a metro station.  But this is nothing compared to what today’s children in the Middle East must endure. They are being deprived of their childhoods.

Later in the evening, my mood was lightened by Fareed Zakaria’s “Take” at the end of his weekly show, also published as a column in The Washington Post. He claimed that in these times we are ‘awash in pessimism’, so many public figures declaring the world ‘a dark and dangerous place’. He says, ‘ Mistakes are made when ‘acting out of fear’,  providing examples from the past. To those that claim that President Obama is naive, Zakaria answers that Obama, being of a positive disposition, is an optimist. According to him (and I consider him a wise and learned man who has done his homework), history has shown the optimists have been right.

Another Post headline caught my eye: “War with Iran is Probably Our Best Option,” written by Joshua Muravchik. I try to follow his complex arguments. I’m no Middle East expert, but for me war is the last alternative when all else has failed. We’ve seen the failed results of armed conflict over and over again.

I side with the optimists, and I’ll do my best to show to my grand daughters the great beauty and love that exist in our world. 

A Wise Old Owl

These grey winter days I’ve been reading up a storm on Kindle. I prefer the feel of a book in my hands, but, living in Chile, English books are not readily available. Usually, on my yearly visits to California, I return with a supply of books but this last visit was different. My husband and I hauled back fifty copies of my memoir in backpacks and cloth shopping bags. No space for my personal reading choices. The problem with a Kindle book is that I need to underline inspiring thoughts and beautiful words. Some books are very special to me. I call them “keepers.”

 Last night I downloaded a book that I know will be a Keeper: “The Wave in the Mind” by Ursula Le Guin. Some months ago I proclaimed her my blogger muse. I came across her name again on the Brainpickings website, a rich resource for introductions to the best in writing, writers, illustrations and books.

Le Guin starts out “Introducing Myself” with the words, “I am a Man.” That definitely captured my attention. Where would she go with this? Clearly, she hadn’t undergone a sex change. No, she went back to her growing years and further back in history to point out that women didn’t count for anything. Men were people. People were men.

Her words on aging resonate deeply with me, giving me courage and, yes, a sense of humor in the face of a youth-centered society. Le Guin, in her eighties, is funny and open whether talking about her ‘ten-hair beard’ and her ‘podgy’ body ‘with actual fat places’. She goes on to say that she allowed herself to get old and didn’t do one single thing about it. No face-lift. No liposuction.

I now want to join her to say with pride, “I am an old woman.” If only I possessed her wisdom, but I figure I still have time to work at it.

Views

It’s Saturday and my husband is off on a day-long cycling trip. I am faced with an array of choices. How will I spend this day?  I want to make the most of it. Do something novel, inspiring.

I stand at the window. The morning garden wears a grey, chalk-like pallor, brightened by blooms of pink azaleas and primroses. (I prefer the Spanish Orejas de oso, Bears’ Ears.) The sky is dove grey.

Orejas de Oso

After dropping off my husband at their designated meeting place, I snuggle back into my warm bed to read the newspaper in search for an art exhibit. I want to invite myself to an “Artist’s Date”, stimulation for my blogger muse who has been sleeping on the job lately. First on my agenda (after the news paper) is a brisk hour’s walk. After that, it’s “anything goes”.

Just back from my walk. Sweaty and thirsty, but first, straight to the computer. How could I have forgotten that long walks stimulate my creative juices, drawing my muse out of hiding? After days of searching, I came up with a title for a section of my new book. I’ll reveal no more for now.

My thoughts wandered back to an article in today’s newspaper about the detection by the spatial telescope Keplar of a new planet very similar to Earth and perhaps capable of supporting life. Astronomers have access to mind-blowing views, though they do not yet have the technology to analyze Kepler-454b, much less photograph it, situated as it is 1400 light years from Earth. It is also 1500 years older than our planet.

I seldom look at the nighttime sky here in Santiago. City lights and thick smog opaque the stars.  Only in southern Chile and in the northern Atacama Desert have I beheld the evening sky awash in a myriad of stars.

In those places, I struggle to wrap my mind around the numbers, the distance. Growing scientific knowledge once again challenges my deepest beliefs and concepts of the universe, creation, life and God. I find it incomprehensible. Man can never know it all – but will always keep on trying.

That’s where the wonder lies – in the unfathomable, the infinite uncertainty. 

Things are looking up

A welcome reprieve has been granted to the city’s discontent, gloom and smog. The Chilean national soccer team beat their arch rivals, the Argentinians, last weekend to win the America Cup. Fireworks, cheers, horn honking, euphoria filled the night air. For once, the underdogs from this sliver of a country at the bottom of the world won the prized trophy.

Now this weekend RAIN is forecast, in fact, a BIG STORM. The TV weathermen have announced it for days, giving lengthy, detailed descriptions, aided by maps, of the progress of the storm coming off the Pacific. I study the clouds. So far, just minor sprinkles have moistened our world and a light mantle of snow rests on the Andes. But heavy rain is due and I look out the window for its arrival, my ears perked for the wonderful patter on the roof. Such build-up and excitement for a climatic phenomenon we used to consider completely natural. I’m prepared: door mats and patio furniture put away and a thick book to keep me company while the rain cleanses and refreshes our thirsty, dusty world..

Gusts of wind scatter leaves helter-skelter. The much-awaited storm is announcing its arrival. I turn my chair to an angle for a better view. But, then – stillness. The storm is reluctant, advancing in fits and starts.

Night has descended. Outside the pavement is wet and rain dots puddles shining in the streetlights and tap-taps the waterspout outside my study. A gentle rain. No downpour – yet.

Whipping gusts of wind through the night and a steady rain. The scene in our backyard this Sunday morning – a disorderly riot of leaves (as if they’d had a wild party during the night) and a large fallen bough from our avocado tree. We lounge in bed, a breakfast tray between us, watching the rain and reading the morning newspaper.

I turn first to the international news, the travel magazine and Arts and Letters section. Isabel Allende’s latest book, “The Japanese Lover” is number one on the Chile’s fiction book list. The author is here now to launch her book and visit family. I missed by one day her book launch at the Book Passage Bookstore in Marin County, but I left her a gift. I put a copy of my memoir in a pink bag along with a letter to her and left it at the book store. I wrote that we had an old friend in common, now deceased, whose letters I'd bring when I traveled to Marin to mail to her. I told her she might find my memoir of interest as, in many ways, our lives were mirror images. She left her native Chile to finally settle in my home county, while I left Marin to live my adult life in Chile. We are also the same age. I doubt that, in her busy life, she’ll take interest in my book, but I wrote my email address in small letters at the bottom of the letter. I don’t expect to receive a response….but wouldn’t it be exciting if I did!

Just an Acorn?

These days it’s not difficult to fall into a Henny Penny mindset. Conversations dwell on the negative state of the country, or, for that matter, of the whole world – variations on Henny Penny’s “The sky is falling!” when an acorn dropped on her head. Sadly, an acorn is not the cause of the building worry and negativity.

A pall of discontent looms over this city in which we live as well as other regions of the country. Daily news reports of arson on farms and robberies at gun point in homes, on the street, in gas stations have propelled us into a state of insecurity. A Chilean version of the lawless days of the Wild West? Citizens complain, writing letters to the newspaper editors for greater protection and a stricter justice system (referred to as “the revolving door”, in the clink one day and out the next). Last night hubby and I joined a citizen protest known as a cacerolazo, in which you’re supposed to raise a big ruckus. We stood outside in the cold winter air at nine p.m. joining in with our neighbors banging on pots and pans. All around the night air reverberated with the clanging and banging and honking horns. I had some previous practice with this type of protest some forty odd years ago in the nightly protests for the food shortages during Salvador Allende’s regime.

Also weighing heavily upon us is the thick layer of smog and lack of rain. A series of air “pre-emergencies”, controlling the number of cars on the streets, has yet to increase the visibility or return the city to its true colors, no bright sharp greens or deep blue sky, and the Andes lie behind a curtain of thick brown gunk.  Today, if your license plate ends in 3 or 4, you can’t use your car, unless you’re willing to risk a fine. There’s talk that El Niño is headed this way bringing rain, but I’ve heard that before. On this grey, gloomy day, a few drops of rain fell – to tease us.

A welcome distraction from the discontent is the ongoing American Cup soccer championship taking place here in Chile. Saturday the Chilean national team faces the formidable Argentine team in the final match. Again a ruckus is in order as fans cheer on their teams with raucous outbursts of yells, chants and horn-tooting. We’ll be following the game on television. When Chile scores a goal, I, not much of a soccer fan, will jump up and shout with the entire neighborhood, “GOOOOL!!!!

Pre-game euphoria

Once behind us the excitement of the soccer matches, we’ll still be left with delinquency and drought. No short term, easy solutions are in sight.

It is times like this when small satisfactions bring relief. I prune my one rose bush and the hydrangeas, noticing their tiny new buds, promises of spring. I read an email from cousin Llew, thanking me for writing my memoir! Such sweet words. (I mustn’t come to depend upon daily praise to bolster my belief in my memoir). Every day contains small satisfactions. I just have to notice them. Perhaps it’s simply coming upon a shiny round acorn during a walk.