This painting is large and luminous, 30x24 inches...and has a great name. (see above) I am in a clandestine location 500 miles south of the US/Mexico border as I write this and the summer monsoons are already brewing down here... thus, the inspiration for this cool and ominous sky. I spent the morning with some of my wife's family. We had goat stew (birria) over at aunt Esther's. Uncle Miguel, who looks to be old enough to know, told me stories of back in the old days when gypsies would come through and heal people by rubbing them down...kind of a cross between a witch doctor and a chiropractor. Secret incantations and a lot of rubbing and pulling on limbs and joints seemed to cure you of whatever ailed you. The two stories that took the longest to tell were of the hunch-back that was cured and the healing of small girl who couldn't walk. They say that there aren't any as good as there used to be. On our way down here we stopped at a hospital where another dear old uncle is interred. He is in the ICU / emergency ward with about 20-30 other patients and bright fluorescent lights that are on 24-7 and several manual typewriters pecking out doctor's orders at all hours of the day. It was a scene as chaotic as a world war II army hospital replete with armed guards that escorted us in to see him for 3 minutes and ushered us out when our time was up. He has advanced cancer. We're hoping they let him go home today to be with his family since there is nothing they can do for him there. This man has been very good to me...known him for over 20 years. I think it was the last time I'll get see him. A fond and sad goodbye to tio Castulo. May you have a great reward in the afterlife! It's fitting that our girl Trinity will have a new name this week along with a new birth certificate that names her new parents. Pretty cool stuff for a little 12 year old who has dreamed of having a family for a long time and, if we indeed get the papers, (we've been week to week with this for a while) it brings our year-plus long odyssey almost to a close. Tonight we take the kids to a movie to see Indiana Jones use his best archeological Spanish. I'll leave a review here later.
