El Ojo del Lago - March 2022 by El Ojo del Lago

Saw you in the Ojo

 D IRE C TOR Y 

Index...

PUBLISHER David Tingen

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Victoria A. Schmidt

COVER STORY

“Where is Little Martin?” By Sergio Casas

EDITOR EMERITUS Alejandro Grattan-Dominguez

Graphic Design Roberto C. Rojas Reyes Diana Parra Morales

Special Events Editor Carol D. Bradley Associate Editor Sally Asante Theater Critic Michael Warren Roving Correspondent Dr. Lorin Swinehart

Sales Manager Bruce Fraser Carmene Berner

ADVERTISING OFFICE Av. Hidalgo # 223, Chapala Mon. thru Fri. 9 am - 5 pm Sat. 9 am - 1 pm Tel. 01 (376) 765 2877, 765 3676 Fax 01 (376) 765 3528

20 “The Mountain That Eats People: The Nightmare of the Potosi Silver Mines”. By Dr Lorin Swinehart. Who paid the most for silver? 22 “Pepper” Linda Steele tells how a stray dog trapped in a fenced yard becomes a family pet. 24 “Tips For Coexisting With COVID”: N. (Abby) McKinnon 26 “The Exhibition” Bernie Suttle shares his rendition of an Exhibition. 38 “Mirage de el Dorado: The Eternal Lust For Gold” Bob Drynan continues his series. 42 “Hobo Signs”: Larry Kolczak writes of Hobo signs then and now. 44 “A Bone Voyage” Mary Lynn Winkler writes about this unique pet rescue organization. 46 “The Soldiers of St. Patrick” By Michael Hogan. Irish Friends of Mexico. 50 “Jazzing It Up In Magic Town! The Four Keys to Happiness:” Advice from the Lakeside Curmudgeon Don Beaudrea 56 “Bonus View” Poetry by Judy Dykstra Brown

Send all correspondence, subscriptions or advertising to: El Ojo del Lago www.chapala.com elojodellago@gmail.com

58 “House of Hope” A shining star in Sicily by Carol Bowman. 60 “Mature Dating” by Rico Wallace

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PRINTING: El Debate El Ojo del Lago aparece los primeros cinco días de cada mes. (Distributed over the first five days of each month) Certificado de Licitud de Título 3693 Certificado de Licitud de Contenido 3117. Reserva al Título de Derechos de Autor 04-2011-103110024300-102 Control 14301. Permisos otorgados por la Secretaría de Gobernación (EXP. 1/432 “88”/5651 de 2 de junio de 1993) y SEP (Reserva 171.94 control 14301) del 15 de enero de 1994. Distribución: Hidalgo 223 Chapala, Jalisco, México. All contents are fully protected by copyright and may not be reproduced without the written consent of El Ojo del Lago. Opinions expressed by the authors do not necessarily reflect the views of the Publisher or the Editor, nor are we responsible for the claims made by our advertisers. We welcome letters, which should include name, address and telephone number.

COVER IMAGE

VOLUME 38 NUMBER 7

El Ojo del Lago / March 2022

By Lorinda Tisdell

COLUMNS THIS MONTH

06 Editor’s Page 14 Vexations & Conundrums 16 Ramblings from the Ranch 18 Streets of Mexico 28 Profiling Tepehua 30 Front Row Center 32 Lakeside Living

Saw you in the Ojo

COLUMNIST

Editor’s Page By Victoria Schmidt

The Truth Is Out There

think that is a line from “The X-Files.” A trip through my daily emails has convinced me of one thing. Lies are all around us. Just hear me out. All. Governments. Lie. All politicians lie. All dictators lie. All drug companies, oil companies, and certainly all insurance companies lie. The world’s population is lied to at such a phenomenal rate that it requires a lot of digging to get to the truth. Everyone lies. And, yes, we even lie to ourselves. And now so many lies have piled up that it has divided the people in the world as never before. Lying is everywhere. Our daily news could simply be a roundup called “Today’s Lies” or “Breaking Lies.” We have been lied to about so much, by so many, that it is now almost impossible to discern the truth. This has been going on forever. It’s just come to the point where we simply stopped calling people, politicians, and governments out on their lies. And it has led to a world that is more divided than ever before. We have become complacent. We stopped speaking truth to power. This is not to be confused with speaking BS to power. There are a lot of good people in the world. I truly believe in the goodness of people. But I have lost my ability to trust what I would call those with agendas. I believe in asking questions and challenging the information I receive. But as a society, we seem to have lost our ability to question and challenge without the ugliness of name-calling and disrespect for alternative points of view. We too readily jump to conclusions about people. We have also lost the perspective about our own individual rights and responsibilities. And in doing so, we have slowed our ability to make change. And the need for change has never been greater. Nothing has proved this as much as the current pandemic. What we

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are seeing is a worldwide population that is reacting to the inability to trust the information from their governments and their health protection agencies. As a result, many make poor choices and suffer the consequences with illness or death. It has separated families and borders and interfered with international trade. No country has been immune to these challenges. I have no answers other than to ask that people do their own research. Read the books, not just the media. Because the media no longer has the objective of telling the truth. They have the objective of selling time on their station for ads, space in their newspapers. Read the little stories. Try to be objective. Back away from the fear and those who peddle it. Every day try to do something to make this world a better place. Be kind to one another. Don’t start arguments. Listen. Decide for yourself what is best to do for you and for the ones you love. Take personal responsibility for your actions. Read about how other countries are handling the problems of the pandemic and know that yours is not the only country that has problems to solve. Understand that viruses can mutate. That’s why they change the flu shot every year. Accept that there are good people trying their best to keep us safe. Realize that we are standing IN HISTORY. While we have had similar situations in the past. This goes further than the end of your face and has nothing to do with curtailing rights. It has everything to do with curtailing a pandemic. And climate change. And wars. We can be complacent no more. The world has changed. We can fight that change. . . and lose. Or we can change with it . . . to everyone’s advantage. Victoria Schmidt

Saw you in the Ojo

Where is Little Martin? By Sergio Casas

artin, my name is Martin, in honor of St. Martin de Porres to whom my mother asked for his intercession for my health because I was in a delicate situation. Two weeks after I was born, a respiratory complication forced me to be in an oxygen chamber. On the doctor’s recommendation, who was not sure if I would survive, my mother called the priest to have me baptized. “No one can die without having a name and a blessing,” people said. The morning is cloudy and quiet. There is no noise from the kids running to the school today, vacation time. At my three years old I don’t have to worry about it. While my mother works in the kitchen, I play with my plastic lion with tires on his feet that the baby Jesus brought me last Christmas. I push him through the hallway until he hits the door, then I push him from the door to the patio. La Monina, my cat, passes by and gives him a slap in the face. Hahaha. If he were a real lion, he would have eaten her by now. My sisters are attending my mom’s instructions. Some clean, some help with cooking. I don’t see my brothers; they must be outside. Soon, Mom calls for lunchtime, I sit at the table with my brothers and sisters. My father, at the head of the table, always quiet, gets the first plate. My mother is always concerned about my health. “Do you feel okay?” she asks. “Yes, Mom,” I respond. She checks that my chicken broth with rice and vegetables is not too hot and rolls a tortilla for me. Mealtime passes between jokes and laughs. My older brother always says something funny. My father is quiet, he finishes eating and leaves the table. Then we hear him practicing the French horn, and, as always, my mother is the last one to sit and eat. After I finish my food, I go and sit outside the door. “Hello, Martincito.” Neighbors pass by and greet me. There is a nice smell of wet earth. I see in one side of the street a little group of girls,

in the other side a group of boys. They tease each other across the street. Doña Maria is always looking out her door and watching every move in the barrio. The boys call her el occidental, “the human newspaper”. If you want to know what is going on in the barrio, ask el occidental. I have, in my pocket, a twenty-centavo coin that my godmother gave me, Mi Domingo, my Sunday, which is a custom, and I think It’s time to spend it. I go to the house close to mine where they sell candies. “Doña Amparito, I want a paleta de cajeta.” “Mijo, I don’t have any. Go to the corner store, maybe they have some,” she says. And here I go, walking in the black shoes my older brother grew out of, white socks, my brown short pants, and white shirt. I pass the welder’s workshop; sparks are shooting out like little stars. In the corner store the same answer. I keep walking, enjoying the walk, and for the first time I cross the street alone. On the way I am thinking and observing. I am on an adventure. I keep crossing streets. It seems not so complicated after all. I arrive at a park with gardens, trees, plants, flowers, and a fountain which I approach to touch the water. It feels cold. People pass by from one side to the other as if in a hurry. Fresh air feels cool on my back. The lights are turned on. There is little sunlight left. It is then when I look around me, nothing seems familiar. I realize I don’t know where my house is. There is no face that I know. It’s getting dark and everything looks different. I’m scared. I run looking to the sides. Where is everybody? Where am I? I can’t find any sign that tells me where to go. My tears don’t let me see clearly. I try to hold back the crying but I can’t. “Mom, Mom,” I call, as if whispering. I close my eyes hoping for a miracle, wishing that when I open them I will find myself in my house next to my mother. That is the place where I feel safe, so with my eyes closed I hear a deep and serene voice that tells me, Continued on page 10

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Saw you in the Ojo

From page 8 “Don’t worry. Everything will be okay. Soon you will be home.” I open my eyes and look behind me to see a figure in the shadows with a big head, bright eyes, and extended wings. I close my eyes again trying to ignore him, then I feel a hand resting on my right shoulder and I hear a voice say, “Are you alone? Where are your parents?” a lady with a dark dress and curly hair asked me. I answered in a breathy voice, “I don’t know. I don’t know where my house is.” With a soft voice she says to me, “Don’t worry. Everything will be okay. You will be fine. You will be home soon.” The same words I heard from the winged figure, like a dragon. I look behind again and it is not there. I can only see bushes in the darkness. “What is your name?” she asks. “Martin, my name is Martin,” I answer. She takes me by my hand and we start walking. “It is already dark, Martin. Tomorrow you will be back home, meanwhile we have to think about what we are going to have for dinner.” I just listen and walk, sucking my thumb. I look at the faces of the people passing by, hoping to recognize someone from el barrio, but it seems that I am transported to another world. Warm tears roll down my chubby cheeks. As we board a full bus, she asks me to hold on tight to the handrail. I have never been on a bus before. I can’t keep my balance. Jumps, jolts, lights flashing in front of the window, noise, conversations; inside it is so dark I can barely make out my black shoes scuffed at the toe. We get off the bus and walk with some haste. We arrive at a wide-open wooden gate. At the back of the cobbled front yard is a house, with a door and a window with a light on. One outside light shines on a big tree where birdcages hang. Then I hear the barking of a dog and the screams of children

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who come running. “Looks who is here! Your new brother,” the lady says. I burst into tears and think, I don’t want new brothers and sisters. I want my own family that are together at the table, where we share beans and lemon tea when there is no money to buy milk. I want my mom, clinging to her apron while she cooks, and my dad, with his no conversation and his music, the neighborhood kids and their noisy way of playing and my cat, Monina, that lulls me at night with her purr. The wind blows hard, hitting the top of the tree that emits a loud sound as if trying to say something. The lady says, “Let’s go inside, it looks like it’s going to rain.” The kids surround me and invite me in, trying to calm me down because I can’t stop crying. Once inside, one of them brings me a toy to distract me and tells me, “I lend you my doll, the saint, the silver-masked one, the wrestler.” I stay glued to the door wanting to see through the small window that is in the center but it is too high for me. Another one of the boys brings me a chair and helps me climb up to be able to see out. I hold on to the two small bars of the window. I feel the breeze and smell the scent of wet earth. The rain starts. “Maaaa, mom, mom,” I shout over and over again, as loud as I can but the crack of lightning and roar of thunder are louder than my voice. “Dinner is ready, Martin, come to the table, come on, you need to eat something,” the lady says. I listen but I ignore her. I still hope that my family will appear through that wooden gate to take me home. I don’t even want to blink. I keep repeating, “ Maaaa, mom, mom.” I don’t feel hungry or sleepy, I just want to be here looking out. I want to wake up from this nightmare. I hear them chatting at the dinner table and in my mind I can see my family sitting at the table, talking, passing the basket of tortillas. There are no better refried beans than the ones my mom makes, and I wonder what they are doing now. Has my mom run upstairs to the patio to pick up the clothes from the clothesline so they don’t get wet in the rain? Are they looking for me? I do not remember if I slept or not, or where and how. A rooster announces the new day with his song. “When you finish this, is time to go, Martin.” She holds out a glass of milk and a cema. She takes me by the hand again, walking in a hurry, people passing by greet her and ask, “Who is the boy?” She answers, “Is a long story.” We keep walking, people scurrying by. A man with a big basket full of biContinued on page 12

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From page 10 rotes on his head is riding his bicycle on the sidewalk because the milk delivery truck is blocking the street. Horns are honking; the city is awake. We stop, a wide-open door and a gendarme, a policeman, stands at the entrance. He is wearing his blue uniform; bloomers, an ironed shirt, black boots, his cap, and a baton on his belt. She talks to him for a few seconds and we enter. She sits me on a wooden bench, asks me to wait there, and goes to talk to the person at the desk. They both look at me and the person at the desk takes some notes. She comes back to me. “I have to go,” she says, “but you will be fine, everything will be okay. Soon your parents will come for you, Martin. Don’t worry. Goodbye,” she says, giving me a kiss on the forehead. I watch her moving out in a smooth motion like she is floating as she disappears through the door without looking back. A breath of air blows in my face. There is nothing left to do but wait. “Do you want a glass of water?” an officer asks me. I shake my head no. He pats me on the shoulder and walks away. I wonder, What if my parents don’t come? where will I go? where will they

take me? will the lady come back for me? will I sleep on this bench, or in the street? My head starts to spin around and around. I don’t understand anything. I just want a lollypop. I hear murmurs coming from the front door. Somebody is talking to the police. When I look carefully, it is my mom and dad. I sit still. I don’t know if I’m dreaming. They come in, and while my dad goes to the desk, my mom comes with watery eyes and hands clasped in prayer. She drops to her knees and cups her palms to my cheeks. She runs her hands around my limbs to make sure I am not broken. “Are you okay, my little brown boy?” she says in a broken voice, and she hugs me. I can feel her tears on my face. All I can say is, “Ma.” I have no more tears to cry and no more voice to scream. I hold on to her neck to make sure she will take me with her. My dad comes over and caresses my head and we leave the police station. Outside a cab is waiting for us; my first cab ride. On the way they ask me how it happened, how did I get lost, but I can’t talk, I keep holding on to my mom. My dad says, “A woman took him in for the night and brought him to the police station.” Mom says, “God bless that woman.”

Then they tell me about how the neighbors helped them in the search. Someone suggested that they bring a photo of me to the local TV station. That was my first appearance on TV. The kids also went out to ask around. As I listen to everything, I realize that a few hours after I left the barrio, the neighbors came together as one family of a hundred members, 20 fathers, 20 mothers, 25 brothers and 35 sisters. The cab stops at the corner of our block and lets us out, the meter is ticking. My dad takes me in his arms. Kids are playing soccer in the street. One of them, El Chino, nicknamed because of his Afro hair, shouts out, “Martin! Martin is back!” Everybody runs to meet us shouting and clapping, El Chino comes closer, “Don Pancho, may I carry him?” he asks. My dad nods his head and El Chino puts me on his shoulders and jumping and shouting we move towards the house. Boys and girls are jumping around, Doña Maria, El Occidental, comes out with her hands in the air calling for everyone to come and see. People are waving and smiling and I feel like I am in a parade. My eyes and my heart perceive in a different way, these same houses, the same people. My brothers and sisters come out to welcome me. They hug me and shake

my hair and ask, “How did you get lost? Where did you sleep?” and so on and so on. My older sister is carrying my baby sister, who doesn’t care that I have been found. I feel happy but a bit dazed. I can’t explain anything at this moment. Last night I thought I would never see my neighborhood, my people, my house, my family again. The sun is gone. I am sitting on the patio watching my sisters setting the table and my mother is cooking, wearing her checkered apron. “Dinner is ready,” she calls. I approach the table; all the family is here and like always the first dish is served to my father. My mother makes sure that my food is not too hot. She serves me and looks at me and I can see a shine in her eyes. She takes a moment to caress my hair and gives me a tight hug and whispers so only I can hear, “Oh, my little brown boy.” The jokes and laughter happen at the table. The beans taste like a little piece of heaven to me today, as if the hand of God himself rolled my tortilla and served my tea. It’s time to sleep. My mother pulls the covers over my shoulders in the bed that I share with my brother. I put my head on the pillow and look out the window at a starry sky. Some clouds are shining, reflecting the light of the full moon. They look like the big-headed, winged figure I saw in the park, like a dragon, his eyes are two stars. I can hear in my head his voice saying, “Everything will be okay.” I take a deep breath and smile. My cat, La Monina, jumps on the bed. I grab her and cuddle her to my chest; it feels good, her purring. My family is sleeping. I can hear their hearts beating, like singing a song, a love song. The dragon is right, everything will be okay, I am where I belong. Yes, I am home. Sergio Casas

El Ojo del Lago / March 2022

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How to Murder Your Social Life

think it all started with the pod concept. Covid required us to check out companions who had similar risk assessments for avoiding the disease. If they shared our precautions, which were very strict, we formed informal “pods.” Typically, one would only have one pod, a household, but we needed more than that. We had three pods. There was one

fourth pod out of state, but we could only see these family members rarely due to distance. If we violated socializing limits and “broke pod,” then we had to count five days before we could see our other friends. Everything was based on trust. Disclosures of deviations were required. We turned down many invitations because people were more casual in

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lifestyle than us. Here was a typical example of how conversations went: Dear friend: “Why don’t you come and dine on our terrace, outdoors, this Friday? It would be so lovely to get together!” Me: “Oh! That sounds like so much fun!” (Pause, lump in throat, realizing I must ask The Questions) “Have you been Covid safe?” Dear friend: “Oh, yes! We are very careful.” Me: “So are you seeing adult working children?” Dear friend: “Well, yes.” Me: “Do they mask at their jobs?” Dear friend “Uh, no, that isn’t required.” Me: “How about the grandkids?” (Thinking: Unvaccinated) Dear friend: “You know, we aren’t really as careful as you. Let’s wait until things calm down.” In the two years of Covid, I had conversations like this often. I was left with the feeling that I had offended my friends, asking my probing, damning questions. I may have seemed “holier than thou” with my inference of our superior medical hygiene. Very few people could pass our due diligence test. Sadly, many of them eventually contracted nasty cases of Covid. There were one or two dips in caseloads, and I hurriedly made quick plans for an outdoor lunch or two to mend my social fences. Vaccinations and then boosters allowed a slight easing up on restrictions. Then came Omicron. We returned to being extremely cautious. Conversations changed. Here were friends’ comments responding to my social reticence: Friend A: “You do know we are all going to get this, right?” Friend B: “You are just delaying the inevitable. We want to get this, so it becomes endemic!”

They looked at me with sad eyes, like my intelligence was waning due to prolonged isolation. I was the only one to mask if we had a brief encounter, such as an exchange of a gift. I refused to join in group activities outside of pods. My medical gurus on television were asked questions about just these issues. Esteemed doctors claimed that these positions of disease acceptance were not advisable. There was a risk of what is called “Long Haul Covid,” where symptoms don’t disappear after the illness clears up. For example, sense of smell can disappear for up to a year. And the doctors pointed out that if one got the disease, they risked spreading it to vulnerable individuals. One doctor gave a great explanation of why one didn’t want to catch the milder Covid variant, Omicron. He said he would recover from the pain of a broken arm. Still, he didn’t want to break his arm. In the same vein, he didn’t want to catch Covid and be sick, even for just a few days. I have worked hard to develop a robust social life, which I nurtured for decades. I wrote countless notes of appreciation for lovely dinners and worked hard to find creative host gifts. I tried hard to be a guest that lent sparkle to the table. Now I have turned into the Grand Inquisitor, and it feels like no one wants to face my interrogation. When the next dip in caseloads comes, I plan to have a whirlwind of gathering opportunities to revive my comatose social existence. This Grim Reaper is ready to morph into the fairy in the tale who waves my wand and turns the clock back, so that everything springs to life again, like the Before Katina Pontikes Times.

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COLUMNIST

RAMBLINGS FROM THE RANCH By Christina Bennett

uppies are fragile little creatures. And even the best shelter isn’t an ideal environment for them. Without intervention, up to 30% of pups die. The Ranch has faced an overload of puppies in the last few years, perhaps due to the COVID-caused reduction in spay/neuter clinics. In 2021, The Ranch admitted 505 dogs, about half under the age of five months. Sixty-two were between five weeks and two months of age. Puppies who leave their mother before eight weeks are at a much greater risk of illness or death, as mom’s milk provides them the best nutrition and immunities. When possible, The Ranch will only take puppies after this stage (and hopefully after they’ve received vaccinations!), but, unfortunately, many litters are dumped before they are ready to leave their moms. Regardless of how long they are with their mothers, all of the puppies have parasites. Most are born with them as it’s very easy for the mother to pass them to the puppies before birth. Parasites in pets are becoming stronger all over the world due to climate change and our area is hard hit by them. Puppies affected by parasites can go from looking perfectly healthy to death in a matter of hours. The Ranch has had great success with proactive and innovative actions to reduce puppy mortality. This year, only eight puppies have been lost (out of over 250). What has The Ranch done to achieve this remarkable statistic?

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Dr. Laura Medina Gomez visits The Ranch twice a week and has recommended several protocols. The puppies are de-wormed at the age of one month. Dr. Laura also tests one puppy from each litter weekly. The puppies are then treated with medicine for the specific type of parasite. Lately, the most virulent has been Giardia. While these treatments are quite effective, the strong medicines wreak havoc on the puppies’ tender digestive systems and kill the good bacteria. Enter another hero — goat yogurt! Dr. Laura and her husband operate the goat farm Galo de Allende, located near Mezcala. (You may know their artisan products from local markets.) The goat yogurt is an excellent source of probiotics and has greatly improved the health of our puppies. Dr. Laura says the word “probiotic” literally means “pro-life.” In addition to providing great nutrition, the goat yogurt contains live cultures of Lactobacillus. These good bacteria help the puppies to digest their food. They also affect the pH levels of the gut, making it more difficult for parasites to survive. Puppies who come to The Ranch too young to eat kibble are now fed with goat milk and goat yogurt instead of the formula available at veterinarians. The goat milk is high in calcium and is a closer match to the dog-mama’s milk. A wonderfully simple solution to an agonizing problem. Along with this life-saving discovery these little fur-balls depend on friends like you! Are you able to foster puppies? Or come to The Ranch to socialize them? Or donate to keep all the dogs, young and old alike, fed? Contact us at adoptaranchdog@ outlook.com or donate through our website at Theranchchapala.com.

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COLUMNIST

Streets of Mexico By David Ellison The Saint Patrick’s Battalion (Los San Patricios)

ere they turncoats or heroes? As with all martyrs, it depends on whom you ask. In the mid 1800s, after the Potato Famine (and British apathy/antipathy) had murdered as many as a million Irish, a million and a half desperate survivors emigrated to the United States. There they faced anti-immigrant, antiIrish, and anti-Catholic prejudice which doomed them to even further misery. Thousands joined the army hoping to earn respect and citizenship. They were usually disappointed, however, since so many nativist officers treated Irish recruits with harsh disgust, and even forbade them to practice their

Catholic faith. Then, in 1846, citing its “Manifest Destiny” to extend “from sea to shining sea,” the United States invaded Mexico. Future U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant, who’d served as a captain during this, the Mexican-American War, minced few words afterward: “I do not think there was ever a more wicked war . . . I thought so at the time, yet I lacked the moral courage to resign.” Many Irish soldiers apparently found that courage. Perhaps they saw too many similarities between a predominantly Protestant United States engaging in a war of conquest against a much weaker Catholic Mexico and what Anglican Britain had inflicted on

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their Catholic Irish Isle in 1169. Or, maybe they could not bring themselves to abet the expansion of American slavery. (Mexico had outlawed slavery, which at least partially explains why Texan slave owners had recently demanded their independence.) Citing “the advice of my conscience,” one Irish soldier named John Riley led approximately 50 of his comrades to desert and to fight for Mexican sovereignty. Eventually, his Saint Patrick’s Battalion (known affectionately in Mexico as “Los Colorados” because of their red hair and ruddy, sunburnt complexions), would swell to several hundred mostly Irish soldiers (but included other Catholic immigrants and even escaped slaves). Specializing in artillery, and fighting beneath a green flag emblazoned with an Irish Harp above the Gailic “Erin Go Bragh” (“Ireland forever”), Riley’s San Patricios became among the most feared vanguards of the Mexican Army. Riley was promoted to captain, and received the prestigious Angostura Cross of Honor. But Riley’s and Mexico’s was a lost cause. On August 20th, 1847, the Saint Patrick’s Battalion made its last stand in the Battle of Churubusco, just outside Mexico City. When they ran out of ammunition, Los San Patricios resorted to their bare hands, and three times prevented Mexican officers from raising a white flag to surrender. After the slaughter finally ended, and the Mexican General Pedro María de Anaya was ordered to turn over his remaining ammunition, he famously replied, “If I had any . . . you would not be here.” The United States Army put the surviving San Patricios on a sham trial for desertion (denying them lawyers and refusing to keep transcripts) and then condemned 50 of them to death by hanging, even though the gallows had been forbidden by the Articles of War. It became the largest mass execution in U.S. Military history. In a particularly merciless gesture, the U.S. Army saved 30 of the hangings for the final battle of the war, the fight

for Chapultepec Castle, where Los Niños Héroes also made their heroic last stand. The condemned San Patricios were arrayed in nooses on a hill across from the castle and told that, as soon as they saw the Mexican flag finally fall, so too would they—on ropes short enough to prevent their necks from breaking, so they’d have to strangle slowly. This was the legendary moment when young Mexican cadet Juan Escutia, in order to prevent his flag from falling into the hands of the Americans, wrapped himself in it and plunged off the castle ramparts to his death. Thus, one of Mexico’s greatest acts of nobility occurred simultaneously with one of the United States’ worst acts of ignobility. John Riley survived. Since he had deserted before the Mexican-American War had been officially declared, he was spared execution, but received 50 lashes, a vicious brand of “D” on both cheeks, and a sentence of hard labor in prison. When released, he returned to Mexico and served again in its army as major until his retirement. He’d long believed, “You will not find in all the world a people more friendly and hospitable than the Mexicans. The United States military suppressed the story of the Saint Patrick’s Brigade for generations. Many modern folk musical groups, though (such as The Chieftains, The Elders, The Street Dogs and The Fenians), have resurrected their inspiring tale. MGM made the movie One Man’s Hero in 1999 starring Tom Berenger as John Riley; but, fearing a backlash, the studio canceled its distribution in the United States. Mexico has no such qualms about honoring Los San Patricios. Every September 12th on the Plaza San Jacinto in Mexico City, dignitaries such as former President Ernesto Zedillo commemorate the Patricios’ service and sacrifice: “Members of the Saint Patrick’s Battalion were executed for following their consciences. They were martyred for adhering to the highest ideals. . . . We honor their memory. In the name of the people of Mexico, I salute today the people of Ireland and express my eternal gratitude.” Indeed, Mexico sent to the Irish city of Clifden, Riley’s birthplace, a statue of John Riley. And every September 12th, Clifden reciprocates by flying the Mexican flag. Turncoats or heroes? That’s debated only in the United States. Many thanks to Dr. Michael Hogan who insisted I include this captivating story in my forthcoming book, Niños Héroes: The Fascinating Stories Behind Mexican Street Names.

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THE MOUNTAIN THAT EATS PEOPLE The Nightmare Of The Potosi Silver Mines Dr. Lorin Swinehart

n the “Inferno”, first book of Dante Aligiere’s Divine Comedy, the lowest level of hell is reserved for those guilty of treachery. While many times and places may vie for the title of hell on earth, those who are victims of such a dolorous state of affairs are not necessarily guilty of any offense. One such location that would qualify as a living hell would be the former silver mines at Potosi in what is now southern Bolivia. Those were the days when the Spanish dominions encompassed nearly all of Latin America except Portuguese Brazil and some British and French enclaves along the Caribbean coast. Bolivia as such did not exist yet, not until Simon Bolivar and his armies drove the Spanish off the continent and he gave his name to one of the newly born republics. One never knows for certain where fable ends and fact begins. The legend is that somewhere around 1545 a man named Diego Gualpa was wandering along the heights at around 13,000 feet while searching for a vanished llama when he stumbled and grabbed at a small bush to break his fall. The alpine soil being shallow and tenuous at best, the small plant came out by its roots, revealing what would later prove to the history’s greatest silver strike. The ledge upon which Diego stood was atop a vein of silver ore one hundred feet long and thirteen feet wide. This and other strikes satisfied a global hunger for silver as feverish as any craze for gold then or since. China provided a huge market as its own supply of minerals became ever more depleted. In order to address rampant inflation caused by the production of coins made of cheaper metals, the Chinese were desperate to obtain all the silver available at the time. Thousands of prospectors, utilizing the advanced technology of the local natives, began smelting the valuable mineral over fires kindled from dry grass and llama dung. By the 1560’s the population of the area had swollen to over fifty thousand. So, the rush was on. By 1611, the population had ex-

panded even further to 160,000, and Potosi was the world’s most wealthy city. As is typical of boom towns, Potosi attracted the lawless element. Corruption, drunkenness, prostitution and dueling in the streets flourished, even full scale battles between spear wielding members of rival ethnic groups. Potosi was crowded with unruly arrivals and always on the tipping point of violence. In 1974, the sociologist ElDean Kohrs coined the term Gillette Syndrome, named after Gillette, Wyoming where large scale coal, oil and methane extraction fostered community disintegration, typified by rapid population growth, skyrocketing prices, epidemic levels of alcohol and drug addiction and soaring crime rates. As Mark Twain once observed, a boom town is a good place for a man to lose his religion. Bad situations have an uncanny ability to always get worse, particularly where human greed is involved. Eight hundred miles across the frozen heights from Potosi lay Mount Huancavelica, rich with mercury deposits. Earlier, the Spanish had learned that mercury could be used to purify silver, a much more efficient process than reliance upon slow burning fires. In addition, the use of mercury enabled miners to extract silver from lower grade ore. At the time, the combined use of silver and mercury was labeled “The greatest marriage in the world,” by promoters. Little or no thought was wasted on the potential consequences for laborers. With diminished use of Native American technology, indigenous people could then be considered a source of labor only. Local people were required to provide as tribute weekly numbers of laborers for the silver and mercury mines. At one point, an esti-

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mated 4000 Indians each week were forced to labor in the two mines. While estimates vary, it is safe to say that thousands—some say millions—died from their labors. Hundreds of African slaves were also imported to struggle and die in the mines. For a while, six companies in Argentina exported African slaves to Potosi. However, why waste money on imported slaves when thousands of Indians could be secured for free, worked to death and then cast aside like so much rubbish. As bad as conditions in the silver mines became, they were even worse in the mercury mine. Mercury is widely known to be toxic, the culprit behind the so-called Minamata disease that many years ago caused widespread blindness, paralysis and retardation among the citizens of a Japanese fishing village where local shellfish, a major food source, had been contaminated by a factory upstream. Inside the narrow tunnels of the mines, the heat of the earth vaporized mercury and other minerals like sulphur and arsenic, causing workers to inhale a fog of toxicity. Native laborers were forced to serve several two month shifts each year. Rather than see even their children recruited for the mines, native parents often mutilated them in order to keep them safe. The demand for silver was so great that the Spanish Crown largely ignored pleas for the mines to be closed, and most reasonable health and safety precautions were never instituted. It took eighty years to even provide some ventilation tunnels into the deeper, darker, hotter shafts. It has been reported that sometimes when the graves of local miners were exhumed, puddles of mercury were left behind. Native workers struggled under slave-like conditions in the heat and darkness. For light, they wore candles on their foreheads. They toted loads of a hundred pounds of silver ore up and down rope ladders, two men to a ladder, one climbing on one side while another descended on the other. Miners suffered and died in droves from Tuberculosis, silicosis, and other respiratory ailments like pneumonia. Some simply expired from asphyxiation. Spanish overseers beat workers with whips and rocks for failing to meet demanded quotas of ore. It was reported by one priest that if twenty Indians entered the mines at the beginning of the week, half would emerge crippled by its end. Like other native peoples who have been trampled beneath the iron boot of European invasion and occupation, those throughout South and Central America were subjected to forced religious conversion, compulsory labor and violent treatment.

The horrors of Potosi took place at a time when the debate among European powers over the very personhood of Indians raged fiercely. To settle the matter, an assembly composed of fourteen prominent theologians was ordered to be formed at Valladolid by Spain’s ruling monarch Charles I. There the Spanish priest Bartolomeu de Las Casas debated fiercely with the humanist philosopher Juan Gines de Sepulveda over whether Indians even had souls. Sepulveda argued that Indians were inferior persons and, thus, natural slaves, sadly not an unusual argument among those who first seek to deprive their intended victims of their humanity before treating them as mere commodities to be used up and eliminated. Sepulveda maintained that it was the duty of the Spanish to “civilize” and “Christianize” native peoples. Having witnessed the methods utilized by Spaniards to civilize and Christianize the peoples of the Caribbean, including beheadings, burnings, decapitations, and torture, Las Casas refused to budge an inch. Fortunately, Las Casas carried the day, causing the King to enact laws forbidding Indian slavery. However, given the distances between South America and the mother country, such good intentions often proved unenforceable, and the mass of human rights violations continued largely unabated until the rich veins of silver were exhausted and the mines were finally abandoned. What is the lesson to be learned from the centuries long horrors of Potosi. None that become evident, no more than the lessons to be learned from the Atlantic slave trade, the Holocaust of World War II, or such less well known episodes of human skullduggery as the genocide meted out to native Tasmanians by invading white Australians. As one grisly chapter of human history ends, yet new ones arise to take its place. It is challenging to conclude other than that humans are capable of absolutely anything and that they will use any excuse to justify their bad behaviors; profit, progress, religion. While the silver mines at Potosi are closed, mute reminders of the cruelties of the past, slavery has not vanished from earth. According to one BBC report, there may be as many as 27,000,000 million persons living under slave-like conditions. Many are women and young girls held in sexual bondage. This contemporary reality should be a blotch upon the consciences of us all. Lorin Swinehart

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PEPPER By Linda Steele

few months after my back surgery, I was finally allowed to walk on a flat surface with a companion every day. My daughter, Trudy, and I decided that we would walk in the parking lot at the high school just a few miles down the road. It was June and school was out. The parking lot would be empty so we wouldn’t have to dodge speeding teenagers in their jalopies or kids texting on their phones during our walks. Her Lakeland Terrier, Zoe, was happy to accompany us. One Sunday evening, soon after our walks began, our lives changed dramatically! I looked up the slight grade to the fenced-in running track and saw

a pretty Border Collie looking down on us. “Look at that dog!” I said. “Every time we circle the lot, she meets us and walks along beside us until we turn the corner and then she stands and waits and watches us till we come back around!” “I think she is flirting with us or with Zoe. Look how she bows her head and then sways it from side to side when she walks,” Trudy laughed. “Next turn let’s walk closer and see if we see a human with her,” I suggested. So, we hobbled along for one more turn in the parking lot. As we approached the entry gate to the running track where the coy, flirty dog was trapped, we noticed a large sign. Gate Closed 10:00 pm Friday through Monday at 9:00 am. We did not see any humans inside of the gate. “Good grief! That poor dog has been locked up in there without food or water since Friday night! Somebody must have dumped her here at the school and then she wandered into the track area and got locked in. Poor dog!” Trudy sighed as she jiggled the lock. “How can people be so cruel?” The dog stuck her nose through the chain link fence and looked hopefully into my eyes with her tail wagging. “How are we going to get her out of there?” I wondered out loud. “Let’s call the police!” Trudy sug-

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gested. Minutes later a policeman arrived. If he thought we were a couple of eccentric dog lovers, he never let on. When he jiggled the lock, the dog ran to the other side of the track as fast as her legs could carry her! “Looks like she’s afraid of the law,” the policeman laughed. After an attempt to climb the high fence, the policeman said, “I can’t get in there and I don’t think I’d better cut the fence. Let me call the school’s head maintenance man. He should have a key. Shortly after that, an old red pickup truck rattled up through the lot and an ancient man wearing baggy khaki shorts with skinny legs and cowboy boots approached us. “Got a dog locked up in there? Bet he could use a drink of water. I brought some and a little pan. It was 104 degrees today and yesterday wasn’t much better. It’s a wonder he ain’t dead by now!” The man unlocked the gate and stepped inside, bent down, and put the bowl of water down for her. The dog remained on the other side of the track, watching until Trudy, Zoe and I stepped inside the fence. First, the dog ran towards us and as she got closer, she moved more slowly. Finally, she crawled to us on her belly. Trudy slipped a braided loop leash over her head and moved the water closer. The dog looked at us but didn’t drink. She smiled the most awkward and adorable crooked smile! We waited and watched and waited some more, but she still didn’t drink. It seemed obvious that she wanted the water as she looked longingly at it. I said, “Come on, doggie, it’s okay.” Instantly the thirsty black and white dog with the most beautiful golden eyes drank and drank. The policeman said, “I hate to tell you this, but the shelter is closed until Tuesday. Can you keep her till then?” Hmmm. I seemed to always be bringing some creature or other home. My husband told me once, it was a

good thing he was there, or our house would be filled to capacity with stray people and stray animals! Zoe was interested in our new friend. She was welcoming. We opened the car door and both dogs happily jumped right in. My husband met us in the garage with a smile on his face. Because his frequent cry was, “Don’t bring anything else home that eats!” I was quick to start explaining. “We found this great dog! She’s a good one! We just have to keep her till the shelter opens on Tuesday.” “Pepper left the car reluctantly. Those serious golden eyes looked up at him fearfully as he crouched down in front of her and stroked her bowed head. My husband, who had been on his own since age 14 said in a quiet voice, “Don’t worry, I know what it’s like to be thrown away and homeless. I’ve been there. It’s gonna be okay.” The next day we had her scanned at the vet’s office for a chip and, there was no chip. We took her picture and made posters and placed them in the school parking lot and at the running track. We also placed an ad in the weekly newspaper that came out on Thursday and decided to keep her until we exhausted all avenues to find her owners By Thursday we cringed every time the telephone rang. We didn’t want anybody to take our Pepper Pie away from us. Yes, we had already named her Pepper and lovingly called her Pepper Pie. The whole family had fallen in love with the sweetest, most polite dog we ever had the privilege to know. Some folks thought her overbite made her look silly and other folks thought it made her look cute. We thought she was beautiful. After three weeks, happily, nobody ever claimed her and we wanted to keep her forever. We asked the vet and the folks at the shelter both if we could call her ours and they agreed that she could definitely be ours. I think this is where I should tell you that we all lived happily ever after!

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Tips For Coexisting With Covid By N (Abby) McKinnon neilmcki2@gmail.com

s someone who has lived a long and toothsome life, I frequently receive letters seeking advice on proper behavior and etiquette during the time of COVID. I have selected a few of the most irrelevant for these pages. Dear Nabby: Is it OK to dance with a stranger as long as he or she is wearing a mask? Faceless in Chapala Dear Faceless: It’s okay in three circumstances. 1) You’re in your own living room, 2) You know why a stranger is in your living room, and 3) You do not try the hokey-pokey until you’re sure your partner is an Arthur Murray graduate. Dear Nabby: Should I sanitize my hand after my wife takes it while we’re crossing a busy street?

Clingee in Joco Dear Clingee: It’s probably a good idea but I would first check if she’s carrying a sharp object in her other hand. If so, encourage her to sanitize the sharp object before she uses it. Dear Nabby: I met a wonderful man recently and would like to have sex with him. Unfortunately I don’t know him well enough to ask if he’s vaccinated or not. Do you think it proper to go behind his back and ask his wife? Hesitant in Ajijic Dear Hesitant: No I don’t. A little mystery never hurt any relationship

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Dear Nabby: With plenty of time on my hands during the pandemic, I decided on self-improvement. I’ve taught myself 5 languages, learned ballroom dancing on the internet and created a wildly successful app that matches people with a shared passion for wild cow milking competitions and classical music concerts. Meantime, my husband has spent the time watching Dr. Oz reruns, eating pizza and scratching himself in inappropriate places. My problem is that I like Seinfeld but he refuses to change the channel. What do you suggest? Married to a scratcher in San Antonio Dear Married: Your differences are irreconcilable. I suggest you create an app that searches out people that speak Urdu to each other while they’re ballroom dancing and leave the potato to his couch. Dear Nabby: My husband refuses to get vaccinated. He says that the vaccine contains microchips that allow the government to track his movements. On top of this, I think he’s cheating on me. What should I do? In a Quandary in San Juan Dear Quandary: You have to convince him. Tell him the vaccine is incredible stuff you scored on the street. Then, after he is vaccinated, get his tracking information from the govern-

ment. It will be useful in the divorce proceedings. Dear Nabby: One of the individuals in my book club refuses to get vaccinated which makes us all uncomfortable. He says his religion doesn’t allow him to put foreign substances into his body. How can we convince him to take the jab? Reader in Ajijic Dear Reader: I know the person you are referring to and have, on different occasions, personally watched him shovel sashimi, menudo and steak tartare into himself. Each time he washed it down with cheap tequila. So, I understand your frustration. However, you must remember that he is a warm sentient individual who has feelings like we all do. Notwithstanding the fact that he is also a thick skulled idiot with the IQ of a sponge whose selfish and unprincipled behavior has caused innumerable deaths, immeasurable suffering, job loss and incalculable debt, you should consider one thing before you approach him: Is he holding a sharp object? Dear Nabby: I heard that some wealthy individuals who don’t want to get vaccinated are paying poor people to get the jab in their name, making the rich ones eligible to fly to other countries on holiday. I live on social security and could use some extra money. How do I get in on the action? Hard Up in Chapala Dear Hard Up: Before taking this lucrative step, there are a couple of things you should know: 1) More than 100 booster shots is not good for your health and 2) the needle marks on your arm may be misinterpreted. Dear Nabby: When will I have herd immunity? Puzzled in Guadalajara Dear Puzzled: You have he(a)rd immunity after a full week has passed with no one asking, “Have you he(a)rd the one about the traveling salesman and the farmer’s daughter?” End

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The Exhibition By Bernie Suttle

he Korean War was the reason I got a College degree. Work towards a four-year university and avoid the Draft and Korea. Owen and I decided to go to Citrus rather than Pasadena City College, “Cuz that was a ‘Sosh’ place” and the two of us had decided to be good students, not distracted by frivolous activities like fraternities, dances, girls. Keep your grades up. Get a draft deferment. We would sit up front and raise our hands to answer all questions, not in the back of the classroom with the slackers. Of course, to pull it off we had to crack a book, but it was worth it. We knew we had it wired when Carla Blaha, the English Lit Prof at Citrus asked a question of the class. As usual, Owen and I, sitting in the front row, shot up our

hands to answer before she finished speaking. Smiling, she nodded to us and said, “I know you know the answer. Let’s give the rest of the class a chance this one time.” Victory! During the final days of our last semester at Citrus, Owen and I were killing time in the student union between classes when Forrest, our favorite target for banter aimed at his gullibility, showed up. Forrest was a good guy but a clueless, poor student who was always deep in self-inflicted woes. He began as soon as he saw us. “I’ve had it. I’m flunking Betty Beck’s biology class with an F minus and there’s no time to bring my grade up. With that failure I’ll lose my Student Deferment, I’ll

be drafted and sent to Korea. I might as well be dead.” Smug in our conceit we felt like cognoscenti. We were ripe for a pigeon and here he was. Our message built ad hoc to Forest was of course preposterous but it held out a slight glimmer of hope for the poor soul to overcome the real problem he was facing but not prepared for. “Can’t make up enough to pass, eh”? Owen asked. “No way. She told me a month ago it was then or never and I just didn’t get around to it.”. I chimed in with false compassion, “That’s tough, Forrest, lots of guys I know enjoy being in the army.”. “I’ll hate it. I’ll probably be killed too.” He was really down. He needed some hope. We could give it to him. I offered, “Have you thought about providing the Exhibition for Ms. Beck?” “What’s that? Is it like homework?” “Easier, lots easier.” Owen jumped right in. “It might already be taken and I don’t know if Forrest is the guy for The Exhibition.” “What is the Exhibition,” Forrest asked with guarded interest. “Well, near the end of each year, Ms. Beck selects a volunteer for the Exhibition from those failing the Biology class and when successfully completed he is given at least a pass and a B if done excellently.” Now Forrest was attentive. A pass would mean two more years of school, no draft, no Army and no Korea. A Draft Deferment could save him. Forrest, normally a “doubting Thomas” wanted to believe. “From F to passing, maybe even a B. What do I have to do? Do I have to build something?” “No, nothing to build, no work to do. Just show up. Just be you.” “How do I apply? What do I do?” I said, “Well, at the end of the semester when the biology class studies human reproduction, that’s when you’ll be needed.” Suspiciously, Forrest muttered,

“That’s coming up but what do I do?” Owen smoothly answered, “Remember those sketches in the back of the Biology book of the human male with words printed to the side and arrows pointing towards organs that were part of the reproductive system?” “Ah, yeah? “That’s where you come in. Betty Beck subscribes to the Reality School of education, not just text books and pictures.” “What do I do?” Forrest shrieked. “The day of the Exhibition you don’t sit in your regular seat.” “No?” “No, that would identify you as the Exhibitionist. You wait in the hall outside the classroom door. You’ll be wearing a robe - only a robe.” “What!” “Don’t worry. No one will know it’s you. You’ll be wearing a kind of bag over your head to hide your identity. Don’t worry; you’ll be anonymous. When the class is all seated, except for you, Ms. Beck will open the door to the classroom and guide you up onto the platform in front of the class. And that’s it. Oh yeah, the robe will be left at the door. You don’t have any identifying tattoos do you?” “No, but won’t it be cold in there?” “Not as cold as Korea. You can wear your shoes,” Owen said, comfortingly. He continued, ”Ms. Beck will point out the various organs - your organs that are part of the reproductive system. She’ll use her wooden pointer.” “Ahee! A wooden pointer?” Forrest exclaimed. “It’s rubber-tipped; don’t worry. There’ll be a short Q & A session and that’s it.” “That’s all?” “You’ll pick up your robe. She’ll drop her pointer and you exit the way you entered, no longer worried by the draft or anything else. You could try it. Ask her. It’s up to you.” “You’re kidding; I can’t believe my grade will go from F to passing, even a B, in just one 50-minute period”. So said Forrest, and we knew we had him hooked. This appeared to be the toughest decision Forrest had ever faced. Could he believe it? He needed something to save him; this could be it. What happened finally with Forrest I can’t say. Did he make his proposition to Ms Beck? Did she see it as a boyish ruse or did she throw him out a window? We only knew that his eyes were brighter. He held his head up higher but he never counseled with us again. Bernie Suttle

El Ojo del Lago / March 2022

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COLUMNIST

PROFILING TEPEHUA By Moonyeen King

President of the Board for Tepehua

moonie1935@yahoo.com

n the first month of this year Tepehua lost another child, we heard about it because of media, they gave young Jose his moment of fame. The home he shared with his parents burnt and he was trapped and died from his burns after reaching the hospital. His parents could not be found when the story went to press. Unfortunately little Jose began to die before that by abuse and neglect reported the neighbors. Sadly there are many Jose’s who raise themselves, not because both parents are working but because both parents lack the tools that education brings. Education opens the mind and helps parents make better choices. How many more Jose’s do we have to bury before the world wakes up to the fact Education is as essential to survive as water is to life? THIS IS A NATIONS RESPONSIBILITY and should be free to everyone. Or how as a society can we grow? We don’t need a Nation of Professors / Lawyers and such, we need a fully educated middle class, The rich and those under the poverty line rely on the middle class, they are the hub that keeps the wheel together. Is Jose in a better place? Of course not...he had a right to life. The joy this author feels when 15 years down the line a young person in a position of pride asks “ Do you remember me?” and you find you are looking at a child from a shelter or scooped up from the arms of poverty now enjoying the fruits of life that only education can bring. Why not be part of that and help a child?... just one child and you have made a difference. It is a fallacy the schools are free, after the cost of registration, books, shoes, bus fares for some, it is staggering for parents under the poverty line and impossible to send all their children to school, if they do send one it is the boy and the girls are left to early Motherhood because lack of education makes bad choices or no choice at all. Having a child is one of the miracles of living, but not

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when it is children having children. You can change that by sponsoring a child. Contact Moonie and one of the Education Directors for Tepehua will contact you. We reach out to all children not just to our neighborhood. This is a year of recovery and promise, you can see it in the growth of the New Downtown Riberas. Since Ajijic has become almost impassable, from Chapala to Walmart has come alive with new buildings and establishments, mid-Riberas has become secondhand Alley with fascinating little stores, plus those like the Tepehua Treasures Thrift store, that offer you interesting art or clothing at a reasonable price in return for helping the poor by your purchase, plenty of room to stroll and park and move at a slower pace. Another benefit is the regular bus runs that stop at the wave of a hand, leave your car at home for the day. There are new furniture stores, restaurants and nurseries preparing for Spring. Spring is at the door and the birds are coming back with the warm winds. So let’s embrace it and start to live again. Try the Chapala Malacon at Sunset...mariachi bands and families strolling, children playing...so much to do and so little time...leave fear of COVID behind and with precaution enjoy what our paradise can give you. Looking on the bright side of 2022 this author believes the sap is draining from the beast we know as COVID. A quote from Kathleen O’Meara’s poem written in the 1800’s that this column printed in full in May 2020. ‘.....and when the danger ended and people found each other grieved for the dead people and they made new choices and dreamed new visions and created new ways of life and healed the earth completely just as they were healed themselves.’

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COLUMNIST

FRONT ROW CENTER By Michael Warren Silent Sky by Lauren Gunderson Directed by Suki O’Brien

his play is a semi-factual biography of Henrietta Leavitt whose measurements and discoveries revolutionized astronomy at the beginning of the twentieth century. The playwright Lauren Gunderson has also written about other female scientists in history, such as Ada Lovelace and Marie Curie. It’s an interesting topic, but it lacks dramatic force or conflict. Action centers on the intellectual curiosity of “Henrietta” who is on stage for almost the entire play. Debra Bowers is excellent as the dedicated and quirky woman who is determined to find out the how and why of the universe. Her sister “Margaret” (played by Lynn Gutstadt) stays home and gets married, and from time to time interrupts the dialog with phone calls from Wisconsin. The scene moves to the Harvard Observatory offices, where Henrietta is employed as a “computer.” This menial task involves measuring and cataloging stars shown on slides from the observatory. She is not allowed anywhere near the telescope, because she is female. Her friends and fellow computers are “Annie Cannon” and “Williamina Fleming” who are both brash and witty. Kathleen Morris plays Annie with plenty of spunk, while Donna Burroughs is a Scottish harridan. The author gives them some amusing lines, but we know little more about them than is necessary to the story of Henrietta.

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Next, there is the astronomer “Peter Shaw” who is introduced as a love interest for Henrietta. By the way, this is entirely fictional and I guess Lauren Gunderson thought it would make the play more interesting. Randy Warren does his best with the part, speaking in a gruff monotone as a not-very-convincing suitor. Finally, we get to the discovery of Leavitt’s Law. Henrietta was excited to be assigned the study of the Cepheids. These are stars with varying brightness with a regular period and she noted that the brighter variables had the longer period. Later, after further research, she published a definitive paper in 1912, showing a mathematical relationship between Cepheid brightness and periodicity. This important discovery gave astronomers a measuring stick, and later enabled Hubble to show that the universe is expanding. Then the author tidies up the Peter Shaw story line by having him married off while Henrietta is away in Europe. She doesn’t seem too surprised or upset. It’s a sad fact that she died of cancer in 1921 at the age of 53. Though she had to struggle in her early years at the observatory, her contribution to astronomy has been well recognized. In fact Henrietta was nominated for a Nobel Prize in 1925, before the Committee discovered that she had died three years earlier. So this was a story about astronomy rather than a play. Suki O’Brien used some beautiful special effects to convey Henrietta’s awe of the stars. And the staging was clever, with different portions of the stage representing different locations. Deborah Elder was stage manager while Joyce Matchett and Sharon Kinsey were her assistants. Congratulations to all! Michael Warren

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Carol D. Bradley

Email: cdbradleymex@gmail.com Phone: 33-2506-7525 The Lake Chapala Society hosts Open Circle every Sunday at 10AM, a popular community gathering in Ajijic, to enjoy a diverse range of presentations. The presentations will be on the south lawn, close to the gazebo, the entrance will be by the side door on Ramón Corona, chairs will be socially distanced. Gate opens at 9:30. We recommend bringing a hat and bottled water, and please remove containers upon departure. Attendance is limited to 80 persons, please make your reservation if you want to attend https:// opencircleajijic.org/reservation_form.php Use of masks and temperature checks on entry is mandatory. Lake Chapala Society LCS, is seeking to update its list of charitable, social, and support organizations. These groups could include environmental, social issues, animal welfare, support groups, etc.—any group that contributes and gives back to the Lakeside area. If you are involved with a group and want to ensure the group’s inclusion in LCS’ inventory, please contact Diana Ayala, LCS Development Director development@ lakechapalasociety.com March presentations include: March 6 - Foodbank Lakeside marks it’s anniversary and presents: “Food Poverty in the Lakeside Communities and What is Being Done to Address It” The Mexican government’s National Council for the Evaluation of Social Development reports that more than 44% of the country’s residents live in poverty, which the Council defines as living on less than the equivalent of $111 USD/month and the lack of access to at least one or more “social rights”, one of which is food. The leadership team of Foodbank Lakeside (FBL) will discuss the specifics of food poverty in the Lakeside communities, describing the situations in which the organization’s recipients live and the challenges they face. They will explain what is being done to alleviate hunger in the local area by the large community effort that is Foodbank Lakeside. The all-volunteer organization provides basic pantry items to needy families monthly and the food for Kids Kitchens run by Poco a Poco in poor, indigenous lakeside communities. March 13 - Intro to LCS Annual General Meeting That is on March 15th, in person and by Zoom March 20 - David Truly: Outlook on the Community Dr. David J Truly is a researcher/consultant, musician, and educator who lives in Austin, Texas and Ajijic, Mexico. He is a popular guest speaker/ lecturer and is considered an expert on international retirement migration and senior living in Mexico. He has taught at major universities in both the US and Mexico and is an accomplished guitarist/songwriter who has performed throughout the US and Mexico. There will be an unveiling of Don Aiken plaque after OC - with lite refreshments. Dr. David J Truly March 27 - Steven Nousen a returning favorite, Open Circle welcomes back Dr. Benjamin Franklin for the March 27 event. We ask you to turn your imagination back to June 1775. You are citizens of Philadelphia. The city is alive with talk of war in New England. Dr. Franklin* has called Philadelphia home for more than half a century. During his tenure here he built a profitable printing business, performed famous electrical ex-

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periments, authored Poor Richard’s Almanac, and he has been the driving force behind many of our civic improvements. For 15 of the last 17 years, Dr. Franklin has represented our colony in London attempting to find common ground with our proprietors and the British Kings. Since his return six weeks ago, he has remained silent as he served us in the Continental Congress. Today, Dr. Franklin is breaking his silence to tell you how three tyrants have shaped his life. He is going to explain how this moment marks a crossroad in history. This is the Time to Choose between our current system of government or to take a new, independent path. * Steven Nousen appears as Franklin. He has performed this role in numerous venues across the United States including the Library of Congress and the National Geographic Society. Concerts in the Park Series: Tuesday March 15th: a benefit to Foodbank Lakeside. US2 performing Decades music from the 50’s through the 90’s at 3:00 Show. US2 Rocketman & Dancing Queen, the music of Elton John & Abba tribute at 5:30 show. Two Performances: Dr. Benjamin Franklin Tuesday, March 15, 3:00 and 5:30 PM The concert will be held in the lush LCS Garden The LCS Concert in the Park Series Continues on March 20th, Seth Sikes performs his Me and My Gals show. This concert will be a benefit for Foodbank Lakeside. Seth will sing some of our favorites from the Gershwins, Judy, Barbara and Liza as he keeps alive the great American song book. Two Performances: Sunday, March 20, 2:30 and 5:00 PM The concert will be held in the lush LCS Garden Please consult Opencircleajijic.org for more information. Bare Stage Theatre’s March production is These Shining Lives, a drama by Melanie Mamich and directed by Phyllis Silverman. One hundred years later and still relevant, the plot revolves around the true-life circumstances of women in the 1920’s, just newly accepted into the world of work but still considered expendable. A story of love and survival in its most transcendent sense, as the women refuse to allow the company, that pays them to paint glow-in-the-dark watch faces using radium, to kill their spirits or endanger the lives of those who come after them. Cast includes: Linda Goman, Frank Lynch, Graham Miller, Gisele Phipps, Louise Ritchie & Darlene Sherwood. Dates: March 25th, 26th & 27th. Tickets are $200. Showtime at 4:00pm We are located at #261 on the mountain side of the Carretera in Riberas del Pilar across from the Catholic Church. Door and Bar open at 3:00 pm. Seats are held till 3:50 pm. All Covid 19 protocols will be in place: Audience limited in size; Masks are mandatory; Proof of Vaccine or Negative test; And curtains will be open for air flow. Ticket sales are brisk so don’t wait!

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Reservations: barestagetheatre2018@ gmail.com. Please Like, Follow & Share our Facebook Page: www.facebook.com/barestagetheatre2018/ The next Mainstage presentation for Lakeside Little Theatre is: CAKE WALK by Colleen Curran. Director: Collette Clavadetscher, Producer: Margo Eberly, Stage Manager: Sally Jo Bartlett. Show Dates are March 25-April 3, 2022. Evenings at 7:30 p.m., matinees: 4 p.m. Five unlikely contestants clash in a Canada Day cake-baking contest, in which each character gets his or her just desserts! Cake Walk is a farce that revolves around a small-town baking competition held in 1984. The grand prize is a trip to Paris for two. You’ll have to come to LLT to see who takes the cake in the laugh out loud funny Cake Walk. Review: Billed as a comedic dive into the cutthroat world of small-town cake-baking competitions, Cake Walk comes flying out of the gate and continues at the same breakneck pace until the show ends, only pausing for intermission. THE CITIZEN Tickets are on sale on line at www. lakesidelittletheatre.com. Masks are required.

score to Apollo 13 and John Williams’s moving theme to Oliver Stone’s JFK and all the music being complemented with video projections. Since its inception in October 2018 the Lake Chapala Community Orchestra has sold out every concert well in advance and this promises to be no exception. This enterprising concert will take place on Friday March 18 and Saturday March 19 both at 3pm at the Lakeside Presbyterian Church located at 250 San Jorge, Riberas, Chapala. Due to covid restrictions seating is limited to only 70 people per performance so early booking is highly recommended. All attendees must be fully vaccinated against covid. Tickets are $250 and can be reserved by emailing LCCOtickets@gmail.com. Michael Reason (Conductor) Lake Chapala Community Orchestra mjrmusic01@gmail.com

PAGES FROM HISTORY For the first time in more than 2 years the Lake Chapala Community Orchestra is back to full strength and gearing up for an exciting concert presentation on Friday March 18 and Saturday March 19. The audience will be taken on a musical journey through history. Entitled “Pages From History” the concert will feature orchestral works written to

Lakeside Published Writer’s Group is back at El Gato Feo Cafe + Roastery with their “Meet the Authors” event. There will be 3 authors reading from their works and answering a live Q+A at the end of each reader. Authors will have copies of their books for signing. This event will take place the second Wednesday of every month. Next one: March 9th. Readings start at 11. Come early: coffee is available and enjoy live music by Sergio Casas playing from his Personal Selections. Meeting held in the lovely salon of Estrellita’s Bed & Breakfast. (Where El Gato Feo Cafe is located) Open to the public.

Cast: sitting L-R, Dir. Phyllis Silverman & Graham Miller standing L-R, Linda Goman, Frank Lynch, Louise Ritchie, Giselle Phipps & Darlene Sherwood

commemorate famous historical events. “Before film music gave us a musical background to history, composers such as Beethoven and Tchaikovsky composed orchestra works depicting significant historical events” says Michael Reason, the orchestra’s conductor. 1812 by Tchaikovsky is perhaps the most famous of these but Finlandia by Sibelius and Egmont Overture by Beethoven are equally appropriate in their respective appraisal of history. Reason believes that an orchestral concert should appeal to a wide audience and his ability to program concerts with works from diverse musical genres is a hallmark of the orchestra’s presentations. Guest artists include the orchestra’s principal clarinetist, Susanne Bullock, in Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto and Christy Caldwell Carter singing a World War 2 song medley. Music from the cinema will feature prominently with James Horner’s magnificent

Cast: Sofia Randall, Maloy Murdock, Pamela Johnson, Georgette Richmond, Barbara Pruitt, Tracy Foy, Glenn Kay.

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“The Lake Chapala Society (LCS) is holding a two-day Art Fair on March 18 and 19 from 10am to 4pm each day. This “LCS Art Fair” is being hosted by LCS to provide an opportunity for local artists and artisans to showcase their art and handicrafts for the last time during the high season. It is also a fund-raising event to support LCS programs that have suffered during COVID. Enjoy a walk through the relaxing gardens and grounds, while browsing the art and handicrafts of over 60 local artists and artisans – plus the LCS Children’s Art Program. Because this is a fund-raising event, there will be an admission fee of $50 pesos. This will be the only event occurring at LCS for these two days. All COVID protocols will be followed, but proof of vaccination is NOT required.”

Speaking of Writers, the longstanding Ajijic Writers Group meets in the garden of La Nueva Posada on the first and third Friday of each month at 11AM. Local writers read from their works in progress. The audience is invited to offer constructive feedback and comments. Stay for lunch to meet the writers and enjoy the inspiration. Sign up to read your original work. La Nueva Posada is located on the lake at #9, Donato Guerra in Ajijic. Open to all levels of writers.

Ajijic Writers Group at La Nueva Posada

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Mirage de el Dorado The Eternal Lust for Gold By Robert Bruce Drynan

n 1594 a favorite of Queen Elizabeth I, Sir Walter Raleigh, an experienced soldier and adventurer, mounted an expedition to South America in pursuit of a legend of a city of gold, known as Manao. His expedition first landed on Trinidad where the Englishmen captured and destroyed a Spanish settlement and taking prisoner its governor Antonio de Berrio. With Berrio as his captive Raleigh set off through the delta of the Orinoco River into the hinterlands of what is today known as Venezuela. Berrio had made earlier ascents of the river seeking the City of Gold. In the course of the expedition Raleigh’s party reached and followed the Río Negro encountering towering table mountains, known in Pemón, the

Sir Walter Raleigh local indigenous language, as tepuis. They may have been the first Europeans to view the world’s highest waterfall, its modern day sobriquet, Angel Falls. In any case Raleigh is credited by later scholars for having discovered the Roraima Tepui that today occupies the point where the borders of Venezuela, Brazil and Guyana meet.

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The Englishmen did not find Manao, but as he departed, Raleigh left two men behind with the mission to obtain more information about the city that promised fabulous riches for the English crown and a base to contest Spanish dominance of the South American continent. Raleigh, (who is best known to Americans for his 1585 expedition to North America and the disappearance of the Roanoke Island colony that he left behind) returned to England to obtain financing from the queen to mount a larger expedition that would establish a permanent Anglo presence. He dispatched a second expedition under his lieutenant Laurens Keymis in 1596 to retrieve his two spies. Keymis learned that one had been killed and eaten by a panther. The second had disappeared (the man became a Spanish prisoner). Nevertheless, Keymis obtained further evidence of the City of Gold. He described Manao and traders that venture from it in his journal: “It lieth southerly in the land, and from the mouth of it unto the head they pass in twenty days; then taking their provisions, they carry it on their shoulders one day’s journey; afterwards they return to their canoes, and bear them likewise to the side of a lake, which the Jaos call Roponowini, the Charibes Parime, which

is of such bigness that they know no difference between it and the main sea. There be infinite numbers of canoes in this lake, and I suppose it is no other than that where Manoa standeth.” Raleigh in the meantime found himself confronted with the problem that Elizabeth, despite her virulent enmity for Spain, could not be convinced to invest in a return expedition. The queen died in 1603 and James VII, the Roman Catholic king of Scotland, became James I of England. One of James’ first acts was to make peace with Spain. Accused of treason and conspiracy to assassinate the new king, Raleigh was imprisoned in the Tower of London and remained so until 1617, when he somehow managed to convince King James to underwrite another expedition in search of the City of Gold. With royal backing, but under the caveat that he was to provoke no clashes with the Spanish, the English adventurer set sail with 14 ships and 500 men. Arriving off the Orinoco Delta the force under Raleigh’s ever-present lieutenant Keymis entered the river. The Englishmen encountered Governor Antonio Berrio, who having been freed by Raleigh on his previous venture, established Santo Thomé, a settlement designed to interdict any further English incursions into Spanish territory. In the ensuing confrontation the invaders captured and destroyed the settlement. In the battle, Raleigh’s son, Walter, was killed, provoking a falling out between Keymis and his patron. Nevertheless, the clash doomed the expedition; ending it after only twenty-six days. Raleigh returned empty-handed to England. King James again imprisoned Raleigh, and in 1618 following demands of co-religionist Spanish King Philip III and with the assistance of an executioner, Sir Walter Raleigh’s not-so-fruitful relationship with his head was severed. Robert Drynan

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The Woman By Juan Sacelli

who knows what choices we’re called on to make that mark the faint line between fate and mistake that fly out of season and lead us to fall that seem to be reason, yet keep us in thrall but the call of a woman is the sound of the knell that sounds all the notes in the length of the scale for when she has called you, you’ll give up your will if she calls you and leaves you you’re left like a shell if she calls you and wants you you’ve no chance at all for you’ll go to the call and you’ll fail and you’ll fall into love, into life into death, into hell for the face of the flesh hides the face of the skull and a woman is two-faced - the false face, the true face

yes, a woman is two-faced and so are we all now the woman who marked me and taught me my soul was nothing much more than a slip of a girl whose blood was the tide and whose breath swept the world or so i believed as i stood at her door unknown to myself and as cold as a stare as hot as a fire, as warm as a prayer and just as i looked at her, knew that i wanted her knew by the sight of her what i must dare: there was silk in her skin, there was smoke in her hair and what i moved in was a thickness of air full of grace and of sin, full of roses and gin full of fight and of frenzy and fear. her breasts were like brands which smoked in my hands her eyes smoldered thickly, her thighs were a flame that burned me to fury and pierced me to shame and i loved the pride in her the wild night ride in her the musk scent all over her as deep and inside of her i mounted and died in her swollen and goaded i went . . . and thought i might never come back . . . yet when i returned from the black her eyes were like coals of remembrance of times that we’ve passed through but never lived in her aura etheric and thin as she told me she knew one last sin . . . then once more she called to me ensnared me, enthralled me though all the old glory was spent and though i could sense her intent she sang siren songs to me spun tales of old wrongs to me and as she called to me one more time, one last time, i went. and as she implored me to hear all her story her face split before me and sent my sense down into deepest descent her skin scarred in agony, showing the nag of a scrofulous aging, the crone and the hag her flesh grew putrescent her features all pustulent rotting away like the plague revealing the skull and the scrag and the nail and the powdering bone of an ancient cadaver serrated from soul which to myself seemed but my own without disguise and now framed in my eyes like a lust which had met its last mate or a mummy wrapped ancient in fate all that remained of our love and our hate and though i know by the nightwind ten thousand such ties are loosing and binding in troths and in sighs unto morning and mourning, both equally lies to have loved or not loved, all equally dies and life is the crime, and the criminal time for the face of the flesh hides the face of the skull and a woman is two-faced - the lewd face, the bald face the new face, the old face - the false face, the true face yes, a woman is two-faced and so are we all

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Hobo Signs By Larry Kolczak

y wife is from Iowa. I moved there from Chicago back in the ‘70s and lived there for about ten years. Not many people move there. Even the Iowans used to say Iowa was a great place to be from—the sooner the better. Iowa is not what you would call a tourist destination. It is not on anybody’s bucket list. There are no majestic mountains. No grand vistas. The official monument marking the highest point in the state is actually in the middle of a hog feedlot. During the decade I lived there, not one of my relatives ever came to visit. The closest anybody got was when my brother was sent on a business trip to Kansas City, Missouri. He

complained that there wasn’t much to do there in the evening. What could I say? Kansas City is where Iowan’s go when they are looking for a good time. Nobody really wants to go to Iowa . . . except maybe presidential candidates. They show up once every four years and bloviate about how much they have in common with Iowans. They don’t, of course. The only thing politicians have in common with Iowans is a mutual interest in pork. Most people don’t know that Iowa

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hosts another convention of people seeking election. The National Hobo Convention is held every August in the small town of Britt, Iowa. For more than 100 years, the hobos have gathered there to elect the King of the Hobos. My wife and I actually attended the convention back in the 1970s. We camped out with the hobos, sang songs around the campfire. Ate mulligan stew. And listened to the tall tales of grizzled men with monikers like Steamtrain Maury, Fry Pan Jack, Virginia Slim, and Mountain Dew. Not all of these guys were still hopping freights. Some of the old-timers were shuttled in from local veteran’s hospitals and county rest homes. In fact, the town of Britt had actually set aside a few cemetery plots near the tracks just for hobos who needed a final resting place. The night we were in the hobo camp, we all drank a toast to those who had, in hobo parlance, “caught the westbound.” My wife told the gathering she remembered her grandmother’s stories about hobos coming to her farmhouse back during the Great Depression. They would offer to chop wood or paint the shed. After all, these were hobos, not bums. Hobos were willing to work for a meal. Whether or not she

had any chores for them, she always gave them a sandwich or piece of pie. Fry Pan Jack nodded and said her house was probably marked with a hobo sign. He explained that hobos used to carve special markings on trees and fence posts. They had signs telling each other where there was a safe campsite, or a mean sheriff. Where there was good water, or a bad dog. Where you might get work, or where you might get shot. Grandma’s gate, he said, bore the hobo sign for “kind lady.” I suspect that tradition has found its way down here to Mexico. Our gate must be marked. We get them all. The old man with the gangrenous leg, the lady with no leg at all, the woman with four kids and no husband, the one-man band playing his trumpet, drum, and cymbal. Somehow, they all find our house. I never see them knocking on our neighbors’ doors. We’re the lucky ones. And don’t bother trying to get rid of them by pretending you don’t speak Spanish. That only works on Jehovah’s Witnesses. The beggars have all got hand-scrawled notes in misspelled English. One week, they need milk for the baby. The next, their child needs school uniforms. Then, their mother needs surgery. Then, their mother died and needs a funeral. Each of these people seems to have a cradle-to-grave supply of notes. The amputees need prostheses. The diabetics show you their prescriptions. The one-man band needs—I don’t know. Sheet music? It goes on and on. I can’t really say I mind all that much. In the broad scheme of things, I won’t miss a few pesos here and there. And who knows? I might be gaining a little karma for the day when I have “caught the westbound.” I just wish that, back when we were camped with the hobos, I had known to ask Fry Pan Jack one question. What is the hobo sign for “Please don’t ring the bell while I’m in the bathroom.”

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Bone Voyage (Lakeside’s homeless dogs fly north to Canadian and American homes thanks to the tireless efforts of their volunteers.)

By Mary Lynn Winkler

oe Howell is a frequent flyer. His loyalty offers a great reward; escorting Mexican rescue dogs to loving, forever homes in the United States and Canada. Joe is a “flight angel,” as they are affectionately called, for Bone Voyage Dog Rescue, a non-profit group based in Ajijic. He has been a volunteer for 18 months and has certainly earned his angel wings, flying 20 times with approximately five to 10 dogs each flight. An enthusiastic supporter, Joe, 60, who resides in Ajijic, got involved with Bone Voyage through word of mouth. He says the work is “super rewarding” and has now taken on other responsibilities such as booking spaces on flights and handyman jobs. He says there are so many people who give their time and energy to Bone Voyage, that he is impressed with the impact the group has had on reducing the homeless dog population here at Lakeside. A lot of the credit goes to the tireless efforts of Bone Voyage dog res-

cue founder and animal advocate Cari LeClair. The 52-year-old Canadian, who lives in Ajijic full time, established the organization four years ago while volunteering at The Ranch dog rescue. She says she learned that some dogs had been in the kennel for 10 years. “That broke my heart and I started to look for rescue partners.” A dog sitter from way back, Cari took a two-month dog sitting assignment in Ajijic about five years ago. “I just kept going from house to house on dog sitting jobs; so many people need dog sitters here.” Not surprisingly, when Cari answered the phone for this interview, she was walking dogs. A little out of breath, she says she is currently fostering 25 dogs. “Oops, it’s just 22; three flew to Seattle today,” she says. The focus of Bone Voyage is moving adoptable dogs to the USA and Canada, and that takes a lot of effort from dedicated volunteers. “We work with the local shelters as well as with people in the Lake Chapala area that have many street dogs in their care. We also assist individuals that find street dogs and don’t know what to do with them.” Cari says she relies heavily on volunteer Annette Thompson. “She has been with us for two years and has become my right-hand woman. She has been taking on more of my roles and we discuss everything before making decisions.” Since August 2018, Bone Voyage has flown and bussed more than 3,000 dogs from here to their new homes. They fly dogs out of Guadalajara and Puerto Vallarta airports. Some have gone on the Rescue Express bus, on loan to Bone Voyage from owner Mike McCarthy. The specially-equipped bus provides travel flexibility. “We can plan trips wherever we like. We have done four trips so far and are hopeful to do another one the beginning of April,” Cari says. The bus can transport 74 dogs and hundreds have

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travelled this way, including to Calgary, Alberta, among many other destinations. Bone Voyage works with rescues in Portland, Las Vegas, Phoenix, San Francisco, Chicago, San Diego, Colorado, and Vancouver, Canada. It’s even working to expand into Toronto. Cari says when people ask, “Why send dogs north when so many people here could adopt?” she responds, “Because we do not have enough adopters here in Ajijic or there’s just not enough interest. Adopting a four-legged, furry friend is not a split moment decision and obviously adopting is more than just ‘Oh, I want that dog because it has big sad eyes,’” she says. Bone Voyage receives many adoption applications from Canadians and Americans and she believes it has become very “fashionable” to adopt a rescue. Cari says she is grateful and appreciative of the volunteers she has but is searching for more recruits. “I have a handful, about 12 good, reliable volunteer fosters, and we also pay about six or seven Mexican families to take in dogs as well.” However, she explains, the gringo volunteers really do know better what kind of training dogs need to live with folks in the north. Foster volunteers meet Cari at the veterinarian clinic. “We don’t just give a volunteer a random dog.” She explains they can request a small dog or a female if that’s what they desire. They train and socialize rescue dogs, getting the abandoned or injured canines from the street or local shelters ready for adoption. A foster will leash train, crate train, and potty train the rescues over a period ranging from three weeks to two months. “Over time the foster tells me how the dog is doing and gives me a report. Not all rescue dogs qualify for adoption; some are just too skittish,” she says. Flight angels don’t need to do any dog training for this job or fill out an application. “If you will fly, we would love you. We just need your time and patience,” Cari says. “All you have to do is give me your plane reservation code and we book dogs on your ticket. We can drive flight angels to the airport or meet them there, and check the dogs in for you. We have to be at the airport early,

so we do ask you to sacrifice your time,” she adds. “We ask angels to take five or 11 dogs, depending on the airline (one under the seat and the rest in cargo). Flying to Seattle is easy as all the dogs come out on the other side of Customs, so the dogs do not have to be moved by flyers at all. If we fly elsewhere, we may reduce those numbers depending on what the airline is willing to do.” Joe says being a flight angel is “super easy.” Asked about any funny experiences, he chuckles and tells the story of Toro, the escape artist. Airline staff called Joe to take care of a dog that was loose in the belly of the plane. “I was hoisted into the belly to get Toro, who,” he says, “was a very sweet pit bull, back into his crate.” Toro had managed to chew through the ties on his crate. He says this is a very rare situation and that 99.9 per cent of trips happen without a hitch. Originally from Seattle, Joe says many Bone Voyage flights go from Gua-

dalajara to Seattle. Once landed, the Ateam, described as a passionate group of 12 to 15 dog rescuers, meets flyers. At Peace Arch Park, the A-team hands the pooches over the border to the Canadian adopters. “This has worked wonderfully during the pandemic. They just have to be careful not to put a foot over the border,” Cari says. During the last nine days of January alone, 58 dogs were booked to fly there. Asked what inspires her to remain devoted and committed to helping dogs in need, Cari says, “Seeing where they come from and where they end up keeps me going.” To learn more about volunteer opportunities, adoption opportunities, or to make a donation, visit bonevoyagedogrescue.com. Bone Voyage also has a presence on Instagram and Facebook; Bone Voyage Rescue and Bone Voyage Happily Ever After. The organization is a registered charity in Canada, and in Ajijic it is listed as one of 15 charities on the Lake Chapala Charities website. Just click on the Bone Voyage tab to make a donation through PayPal.

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The Soldiers Of St. Patrick By Michael Hogan

t. Patrick’s Day is very special in Mexico because it is a time when Mexicans remember the San Patricios, or the Battalion of St. Patrick. One of the leastknown stories of the Irish who came to America in the 1840s is that of this Irish battalion that fought on the Mexican side in the U.S.-Mexico War of 18461848. They came to Mexico and died, some gloriously in combat, others ignominiously on the gallows. United under a green banner, they participated in all the major battles of the war and were cited for bravery by General López de Santa Anna, the Mexican commander in chief and president. At the penultimate battle of the war, these Irishmen fought until their ammunition was exhausted, and even then tore down the white flag that was raised by their Mexican comrades in arms, preferring to struggle on with bayonets until finally being overwhelmed. Despite their brave resistance, however, 85 of the Irish battalion were captured and sentenced to bizarre tortures and deaths at the hands of the Americans, resulting in what is considered even today as the “largest hanging affair in North America.” In the spring of 1846, the United States was poised to invade Mexico, its neighbor to the south. The ostensible reason was to collect on past-due loans and indemnities. The real reason was to provide the United States with control of the ports of San Francisco and San Diego, the trade route through the New Mexico Territory, and the rich mineral resources of the Nevada Territory, all of which at that time belonged to the Republic of Mexico. The United States had previously offered $5 million to purchase the New Mexico Territory and $25 million for California, but Mexico had refused. Before the declaration of war by the United States, a group of Irish Catholics, headed by a crack artilleryman named John Riley, deserted from the American forces and joined the Mexicans. Born in Clifden, County Galway, Riley was an expert on artillery, and it was widely believed that he had served in the British army as an officer or a non-com in Canada before enlisting in the American army. Riley turned this new unit into a crack artillery arm of the Mexican defense. He is credited with changing the name of the group from the Legion

of Foreigners and designing their distinctive flag. Within a year, the ranks of Riley’s men would be swelled by Catholic foreign residents in Mexico City, and Irish and German Catholics who deserted, once the war broke out, into a battalion known as Los San Patricios, or “Those of Saint Patrick.” The San Patricios fought under a green silk flag emblazoned with the Mexican coat of arms, an image of Saint Patrick, and the words “Erin Go Bragh.” The battalion was made up of artillery and was observed in key positions during every major battle. Their aid was critical because the Mexicans had poor cannon with a range of 400 meters less than the Americans. In addition, Mexican cannoneers were inexperienced and poorly trained. The addition of veteran gunners to the Mexican side would result in at least two major battles being fought to a draw. Several Irishmen were awarded the Cross of Honor by the Mexican government for their bravery, and many received field promotions. At the Battle of Churubusco, holed

up in a Catholic monastery and surrounded by a superior force of American cavalry, artillery, and infantry, the San Patricios withstood three major assaults and inflicted heavy losses on the Yanks. Eventually, however, a shell struck their stored gunpowder, the ammunition park blew up, and the Irishmen, after a gallant counteroffensive with bayonets, Continued on page 48

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From page 46 were overwhelmed by sheer numbers. They were tried by a military court-martial and then scourged, branded, and hanged in a manner so brutal that it is still remembered in Mexico today. In September 1847, the Americans put the Irish soldiers captured at the Battle of Churubusco on trial. Fortyeight were sentenced to death by hanging. Those who had deserted before the declaration of war were sentenced to whipping at the stake, branding, and hard labor. Fueled by Manifest Destiny, the American government dictated terms to the Mexicans in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848. More than two-thirds of the Mexican Territory was taken, and out of it the United States would carve California, Nevada, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Wyoming, and parts of Kansas and Colorado. Among all the major wars fought by the United States, the Mexican War is the least discussed in the classroom, the least written about, and the least known by the general public. Yet, it added more to the national treasury and to the land mass of the United States than all other wars combined. After the conflict, so much new area was opened up, so many things had been accomplished, that a mood

of self-congregation and enthusiasm took root in the United States. The deserters from the war were soon forgotten as they homesteaded and labored in the gold fields of California or, as the 1860s approached, put on the gray uniform of the Confederacy or the blue of the Union. Prejudice against the Irish waned, as the country was provided with a “pressure valve” to release many of its new immigrants westward. The story of the San Patricios disappeared from history. For most Mexicans, solidarity with the Irish is part of a long tradition and they remembered the help they received from the Irish and their friendship. In the words of John Riley, written in 1847 but equally true today, “A more hospitable and friendly people than the Mexican there exists not on the face of the earth… especially to an Irishman and a Catholic.” Riley sums up what cannot be clearly documented in any history: the basic, gut-level affinity the Irishman had then, and still has today, for Mexico and its people. The decisions of the men who joined the San Patricios were probably not well-planned or thought out. They were impulsive and emotional, like many of Ireland’s own rebellions, including the Easter Uprising of 1916. Nevertheless, the courage of the San

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Patricios, their loyalty to their new cause, and their unquestioned bravery forged an indelible seal of honor on their sacrifice. Each year commemorations are held in San Angel, in Mexico, to honor the Irish who died in the war. A marble plaque in the town square reads “In Memory of the Irish Soldiers of the Heroic Battalion of San Patrick Who Gave Their Lives for the Mexican Cause During the Unjust North American Invasion of 1847,” followed by the names of 71 of the men. A color guard of crack Mexican troops marches forward with the Mexican and Irish colors to a spine-jarring flourish of drums and bugles. The “Himno Nacional” is then played, followed by “The Soldier’s Song.” Students and dignitaries place floral tributes on the paving stones, and an honor roll is called of the fallen soldiers as the crowd collectively chants after each name, “Murió por la patria!” (He died for the country!). In addition, a bust of John Riley has been presented to the people of Mexico by the Irish Embassy. In Clifden, County Galway, the birthplace of John Riley, a similar ceremony is held each year. Recently a special dedication of a John Riley memorial was held by the Mexican Ambassador to Ireland and the revised edition of The Irish Soldiers of Mexico was presented to the Irish

public at Trinity College Dublin and the National University of Ireland in Galway. This February the audio version of The Irish Soldiers of Mexico was finally released, and many people are ordering it for St. Patrick’s Day. In addition, there have been commemorative events in Guadalajara, Mexico City, and Chicago. Michael Hogan is the author twenty-five books, including the Irish Soldiers of Mexico, one of the major historical works on the San Patricio Battalion which encompasses six years of research in the U.S., Mexico, and Ireland. As a permanent resident of Mexico, he was the first historian to be granted complete access to Mexican archives and military records. For more information or to order Irish Soldiers go to www. drmichaelhogan.com In addition, friends of the San Patricios, including Shaun Cassidy, a descendent of an Irish soldier who fought with the battalion, help maintain a site on Facebook which contains more of the history, as well as Irish music, Mexican and Irish cultural events, and updates on films, movies, and articles related to both countries. w w w. f a ce b o o k . com/Irish/Mex Michael Hogan

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Jazzing It Up In Magic Town! The Four Keys to Happiness: Advice from the Lakeside Curmudgeon Don Beaudreau wbeaudreau@aol.com

hen I was 12 years old, I took up the sousaphone—an oversized tuba that wraps around the body and is named after John Philip Sousa, the man who was obsessed with writing marches. I didn’t choose to play such a concoction of plumbing, but was asked to do so by Mr. Zucker, the junior high school band teacher who looked like Groucho Marx. “You are big for your age,” he told me. “In fact, you are the only seventh grader who can pick it up without getting a hernia.” In 1957, I didn’t know what a hernia was, but I knew I didn’t want one. And even if I really wanted to learn to be a trumpeter, I agreed to Mr. Z’s request. I always did the right thing, even if I didn’t want to. Ours was not a marching band, so I didn’t have to actually walk around with the thing very much. Except when I had to fetch it from its shelf in the music storage closet and carry it to the sousaphone chair—a straightbacked device with various adjustable metal rods, screws, and sundry gizmos attached to it that made it look like an electric chair. I had to make sure to carefully place the big horn into correct position in the chair and then tighten the screws so that the restraining devices would hold it in place. Once that was done, I had to get on my knees in front of the contraption, crawl into it head first, and know exactly when to twist my body into position so that I would end up facing forward and be able to sit in the chair. I sometimes felt that I was a spy who had been sentenced to be electrocuted. Other times, I felt like I was attempting to get back to the womb. Nevertheless, I learned to play the instrument better than anyone else I knew, which was easy to do because I didn’t know anyone else who played it. Six months later came the annual spring concert, when we band students could show off to our families and friends. I was assigned to play a sousaphone solo in the middle of the “Flight of the Bumble Bee.” As always, I

was jittery about performing before an audience. And that spring evening in 1958 was no exception. Picture it: The clarinets were buzzing, the bass drum was attempting to egg them on (and was terribly offbeat in the process), and my three-measure solo was fast approaching. The beads of sweat on my forehead were starting to run into my eyes; my hands were so clammy that I feared they would slip off the sousaphone keys, even if there were only three keys. Faster and faster the music went, with those little pre-pubescent clarinetists’ fingers dancing over the buttons, often missing them and often squeaking. I am sure had our musical piece de resistance been the “Minute Waltz” we would have finished it in 43 seconds! But my time to star in our current musical offering was getting closer and closer. My heart was about to pop. Two more measures to go. Then one. Mr. Zucker looked at me hopefully. Then two more notes. I took a deep breath, instinctively leaned forward in the electric chair, and blew so hard that the chair tilted forward with me and the plumbing, and in an attempt to prevent from toppling over, I leaned back too far, and the chair and big horn fell backward on top of me, causing my larger-than-average shoes with their built-in arches to go up in the air. I felt like Bozo the Clown. The rest of the “orchestra” ceased playing. And after a collective gasp from everyone in the auditorium, there was only silence. Everyone was in shock. But then the first little chuckle started somewhere in that audience of culture vultures, followed by another, and then another until the entire room was having one big guffaw at my expense! Oh, I was not hurt physically, but my pride was snuffed out that day. Lying on the floor trapped in the electric chair, with the sousaphone on top of me, I remember trying to laugh with everyone else, but deep within me, I was humiliated; I was crushed. I just wanted to run away. But I was stuck—literally. ***** Eventually, I got unstuck. But it took years. I kept playing the sousaphone in Continued on page 52

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From page 50 junior and senior high school (including being showcased for four seconds on national television while marching with my plumbing on a very frigid day during the Philadelphia Thanksgiving Day Parade in 1961). Still, I never wanted to play the damn thing in the first place. And yet: I always did the right thing, even if I didn’t want to. Even if I really wanted to be Keith Dinger, our drum major, and the leader of the pack. I wanted to wear his fancy, well-tailored uniform with the golden sash and coordinating epaulets, buttons, and tassels. I wanted to don his high hat with the flowing plumes. And blow his whistle. And thrust his golden mace into the heavens. I wanted to be six feet tall and imperially slim. I wanted to have perfect teeth. And be cocky as hell because of it all. I despised being in the back row. Lugging around the plumbing. Being the oompah guy. Getting my lips stuck on the frozen mouthpiece. Having my back “go out” because of all that excess weight. Being invisible except for those four seconds on television, according to Mrs. Boyle, our next-door neighbor, who was the only person who saw me that day. Then again, Mrs. Boyle loved her cocktails and saw lots of things nobody else did. But I continued to do the right thing during the parade and for decades after it. I followed the beat. I blended in with the rest of the group. I played the notes as written. I followed the composer’s work as interpreted by the conductor. I did what others told me to do. Even if I didn’t want to. Musically that included learning to play various instruments and to sing, but always obeying the directions of others. Even if I suspected that maybe I wanted to march to the beat of my own drum— musically or otherwise. Then, one day I dropped the sousaphone (symbolically) and auditioned to be the high school choir’s piano accompanist. I won the audition hands down. No longer was I the oompah guy in the back of the band. I was the front man on stage. People knew who I was at last. I was even voted the “Most Talented Boy” by my graduating class and got my photo in the high school yearbook as one of the “Senior Ideals.” I was getting unstuck! ***** Fast forward six decades to Lakeside. I now play professional jazz piano. At long last, I feel that I am doing the right thing. This means that I am mostly unstuck these days. I express who I want to be musically. This freedom makes me very happy and comes

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to me because I am being creative, not merely imitative. I am my own band director and drum major. The four basic aspects that constitute the jazz I play are also ones I apply to the life I now lead. Here they are: The Four Keys to Happiness: Advice from the Lakeside Curmudgeon . . . 1. Syncopate: Put the accent on beats you might not normally accent. Be offbeat. Sometimes things do not go according to plan. Sometimes there are reasons that make sense, sometimes there aren’t. One’s understanding of “how it’s supposed to be” might not fit here. Life can be like that anywhere, but in this vibrant, diversified, and growing community we live in, we cannot always keep the beat we are used to. 2. Be polyphonic: Create your individual sound while harmonizing with the individual sounds of others. It happens in classic jazz bands. No one performer just does his/her thing. Each musician contributes to the community of sound. Each shares a common purpose: to express unity in diversity. They blend together. And often, individual performers are showcased for a few measures while the rest of the band supports them. 3. Improvise: Make it up as you go along. Ad lib. This implies freedom to question, to explore. It is about change, process, fluidity, growth—rather than sameness, stricture, entrenchment, and stagnation. It’s the same in jazz music. You have to trust yourself, your acquired and innate skills. Listen to that deep, intuitive self. Hear what your instinct is suggesting to you. 4. Distort: Deliberately alter the pitch (key) and timbre (sound). Jazz performers—and their audiences as well as those who follow the beat of their own drum—have been labelled by detractors as reprobates, radicals, and “heretics” (a word of Greek origin meaning: one who is free to make choices). Such “heretics” feel compelled to alter the key and sound. And sometimes everyone else has to do so as well. Yes, this is a time in world history that is requiring all of us, wherever we live on the planet, to adjust to ways we never expected we would be asked to do. I am thankful that there is music to help us in this process (for me, jazz in particular). Indeed, I agree with the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche who wrote: Life without music would be a mistake. So, c’mon, Lakeside, let’s be about Jazzing It Up in Magic Town!

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Rah! Rah! Sis-Boom-Blah! By Tom Nussbaum

’ve never participated in organized team sports and only took part in individual sports when bribed by friends or threatened with a starting pistol at my temple. But I am a sports fan and watch a lot of ESPN and weekend afternoon television. I have found, however, there are many slow-paced sports that are as much mental as physical. As a result, they might be boring to the average viewer. Therefore, I recently asked myself, while watching golf, “You know what would make this more exciting?” Cheerleaders. Yes. Cheerleaders. They perform a public service probably more vital to the American way of life than Walmart

greeters, public restroom attendants, and roadside sign spinners. But they have been grossly underused. For decades, cheerleaders have been limited to football and basketball, with little opportunity to expand their visibility. When I was in high school during the 1960s, for example, and our baseball team vied for the league championship, the school’s pep squad was at a loss how to deal with it. “We have to do something,” they said. “It’s the championship and our team needs our support.” But, alas, they had no appropriate outfits or cheers. So, the girls attended the game, sat in the front row, and thought about what they’ll wear to the prom and day-dreamed about losing their virginity during the first week

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of college. Male members of the squad attended, too. They, also, did not know what to do. They, however, could have gone commando and worn pants so tight fans would have been torn between which bats and balls to focus on. Individual urgings from the stands could have been turned into group cheers. “Batter Batter Batter!” could have come alive with suggestive choreography, perhaps to the score of The Bad News Bears. Jeers like “You’re blind, Ump!” could have been rhymed with nice rump. Golf, like I said, needs something to make it more exciting and cheerleaders are the answer. They wouldn’t support individual players, but would root-on all the golfers. But how many cheerleaders are appropriate for professional golf? The answer is obvious: Fore! Lined up behind the player, to avoid disturbing tee shots, sand trap blasts, or putts, they would wear green in order to blend into the verdant environment. “Hole in one!” they could whisper. And “Par, par, par.” The aforementioned “Fore!” could be yelled an appropriate four times as a warning when an errant golf ball sails toward distracted spectators who are texting friends that they are watching the world’s Tiger Woods wannabes. And what about tennis? Certainly, like golf, the cheer squad would have to work in hushed tones. And probably between points. But their uniforms could match the neon-yellow of the tennis balls and could feature two large, breast-high ball appliques, to remind spectators they are, in fact watching tennis, not jai-alai. Their routines could be simple. They could merely raise their arms and sway them back and forth, like stereotypical tennis onlookers’ eyes, during volleys. Or they could chant “Ace” when the ball is served well or “Ass” when a losing player smashes his racquet during a temper-tantrum. They could personalize their yells, calling the names of individual players when encouragement is needed, monikers, especially Eastern European ones,

that explode from mouths like morning phlegm, names like Krejcikova, Sabalenka, and Basilashvilli. Crowds could replace rah-rah and olé with Pavlyuchenkova, and Van de Zandschulp. Alpine sports, too, could use peppy cheer squads. Downhill and crosscountry ski courses could be lined with scantily clad young women frantically shaking their mammary mountains to prevent the silicone from freezing. Males on the squad could wear Speedos stuffed with tube socks to disguise shrinkage. And the cheers—well, it wouldn’t really matter what the cheerleaders chanted as they’d be shivering so severely no one could understand them. But they could try to yell “Shuss. Shuss. Shussing,” “Faster. Faster. Faster,” and “TREEEEEE!” Bowling, I believe, is another sport that demands cheerleaders. They would wear, of course, bowling shirts, perhaps lowcut to accentuate their bowling valleys. Chants could include “Strike! Strike! Strike!” which, of course, would send management into a tizzy. And the squad could do the splits when the seven and ten pins are left standing. If there are ten cheerleaders, they could perform between frames at the end of the alley, in triangle formation, trying to avoid getting knocked down or knocked up. And finally, there is ice hockey. Oh, how that elegant athletic endeavor cries for cheerleaders. Of course, the squad would be required to have missing teeth and facial scars. The primary chant, appropriate to yell at any time, particularly during televised games, would be “Puck! Puck! Puck!” This could, of course, throw television censors into a state of apoplexy. Apoplexy? Doctors treat apoplexy. You know where cheerleaders are needed? Operating rooms. Examination rooms. Yoga classes. Courtrooms. Yes! Courtroom cheerleaders could wear mini-skirted judge’s robes, red or blue ones depending on the area’s politics. The squad could chant “Defense! Defense!” “Go, Bailiff, Go! and “Order in the Court” until they are the only ones out of order. And, instead of pompoms, they could shake color-coordinated gavels. Blue state courtroom cheerleaders could chant “Lean to the left. Lean to the ri…left. Fight. Fight. Fight!” while red state ones could yell “Lean to the right. Lean to the right. White! White! White!” But I digress. Sports. We’re talking sports, like at the Olympics. Oh, my god. The O-L-Y-M-PI-C-S … Tom Nussbaum

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Bonus View By Judy Dykstra-Brown

The sun was at its zenith and although I ventured bare out to my jacuzzi, I had no intent to share a peepshow with my neighbors, for tall bushes masked the view from their high terrace to my bedroom, and my hot tub, too. I’d forgotten that leaf cutter ants had lately been to dine upon the hedge between us, depleting leaf and vine. So when birds perch upon it, they’re exposed from tail to plume. I can see them from the terrace and see them from my room as they feed upon the flowers against a bright blue sky, exposed there as they lately are to every human eye. In addition, I’d been duly warned by neighbors recently that since the ants had visited, they can’t help viewing me as I go about life’s duties on my terrace, in my yard, and if my drapes are open, they had found that it was hard to deflect their eyes from bedroom views. I’d been duly alerted that if our mutual embarrassment was to be averted that I should be more careful until our hedge filled out lest I inadvertently forget and walk about in fewer clothes than usual or pursued private actions not intended to be shared for neighborly reactions. So, when I left the hot tub seeking to slake my thirst and headed for the kitchen, I, too, witnessed the worst. Through bare branches, void of leaf, male neighbors stood askance viewing me against their will as I took the chance naked as a jaybird, to scurry to the house devoid of any raiment—swimsuit, pants or blouse. Now this might have been exciting when there was less to see in my earlier years, preceding seventy-three, but I fear the scene they viewed was more a shock than titillating. Certainly not the scene that they had been anticipating as they strolled out with their guests for a visual interlude. I’m sure they’d no intent to view their neighbor in the nude!

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The Wearin’O’ the Green

“O Paddy dear, and did ye hear the news that’s goin’ round? The shamrock is by law forbid to grow on Irish ground! No more Saint Patrick’s Day we’ll keep, his color can’t be seen For there’s a cruel law ag’in the Wearin’ o’ the Green.”* The Seventeenth of March each year. We’re puttin’ on the green In sympathy with Ireland, dear, Opposed to King or Queen. Sure, join in the hilarity, Enjoy a pint or two And drink to solidarity With Paddy and his crew. We welcome then Saint Patrick’s Day From every town to Galway Bay. Mark Sconce *Anonymous Irish street ballad, 1798

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A House of Hope

By Carol L. Bowman

he sat at the top of the stairs, her big ebony eyes peering through the banister slats at the commotion below. Mia stuck her tongue out in pure playful innocence, made a funny impish face, then squealed with laughter and put on her small red and white speckled sunglasses, as if to hide her glee. The tiny four-yearold, in her white and orange striped dress and her black, shiny bobbed hair, seemed to be looking for action. Her absolute delight revealed a child relishing in the joy, safety, and love she felt in this country farmhouse in Biancavilla, Catania, Sicily. Her older brother stood one step

above, wearing a round Styrofoam ring on his head like a crown, teasing and taunting Mia with his own bag of mischievous tricks. These two must be a handful, I thought, wondering how anyone keeps up with their inquisitive energy. The siblings’ excitement centered on the group of 13 Overseas Adventure Travelers, myself included, who shuffled inside the front door of Casa di Maria. I was eager for our scheduled visit to this Grand Circle Foundation support site. The Foundation currently sponsors 109 desperately needy projects in 59 countries, using a percentage of every traveler’s tour fees for funding. The mantra of

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the Foundation is this: We are giving back to the world we travel because travel has the power to change the world, one school, one village or one person at a time. The Foundation, supporting Casa di Maria since spring 2018, has already donated funds to purchase a wheat grinder and a rotary plow. Our group had the privilege of having lunch at this foster family home for refugees and displaced children, teens, and adults. The foster kids, numbering 10 at the time, emerged from every corner, bounced with enthusiasm, and approached us with wide-eyed curiosity. Resident teenagers handled their assigned tasks upon our arrival and carried trays of snacks from the kitchen. Our hosts, Sergio and Carmela, foster parents of this heaven-sent project, greeted us with open arms. Carmela managed to hug a few of her guests despite holding a little child who needed a cuddle during this noisy intrusion. We sat in a circle as Sergio explained the origin of Casa di Maria. “For many years, Carmela and I lived in metropolitan Catania with our four children. But in 2009, after many discussions as to how to make our lives more meaningful, the concept of the Casa di Maria was born. We decided that the way to give service to the weakest comes from the roots of the strongest, which in our case was our faith. So we moved here in the countryside near Mt. Etna into this old Sicilian farmhouse and took on the tremendous responsibility of providing a temporary foster care home for children or adults who needed a refuge from terrible troubles.” A heavy sigh left Sergio’s chest and I sensed the struggles the couple must endure to provide a loving, caring environment, plus the basic personal needs like food, clothing, and health care to 10 or 15 distressed individuals at a time. Referrals for temporary foster

placement come from the Court of Minors in Catania. Sergio and Carmela provide safe haven for unaccompanied underage foreigners, mothers and their children who have been victims of domestic violence, political refugees and children with mental or physical disabilities. Carmela emphasized the focus of their program, as she stroked Mia’s hair to calm the wiry child. “We try to make everyone feel loved. Each day we face challenges linked to the tragic circumstances of those we serve. Mia and her brother are Romanian refugees and we hope to fill their void until their mother can resume her parental role. Carmela looked up to a young 15-year-old who waited atop the open staircase. “That’s Hope and she has been practicing to tell you her story. She’s so nervous, but so courageous,” Carmela said with a comforting smile directed toward the girl whose name summed up the atmosphere of this home. Hope edged down the stairs and began her tale of horror in halted English, her words uttered in a soft, trembling voice. With poise and grace, she related the story of her terrifying experience. She told of her life in Nigeria, of being oppressed and abused. She told of making the frightening crossing from Tunisia’s coast across the Mediterranean to the edges of Sicily in a rubber boat. She told of the flimsy vessel capsizing in rough seas, of some of her friends drowning, of the joy of finally stepping onto free land alive. She told of being immediately forced into sex trade activities against her will by the cruel men who organized the voyage. She told of the nightmare of mistreatment and abuse yet again. But then she told of a God-sent opportunity, one moment when she was able to call the police and reveal her capture. Officials rescued her and other girls, and now she said, “I am in a place of safety and a home of love and I am so grateful for Casa di Maria.” She looked at Sergio and Carmela with sad eyes that had seen too much for a 15-year-old, but a tinge of hope, like her name, seemed to radiate through the memories of terror. I asked Sergio how they financially support the needs of their large Sicilian family. He proudly announced the success of the catering business they started which not only provides income for the project, but also acts as a training tool for the older girls. They learn how to cook for large groups and to serve food at social events. They demonstrated their skills at lunch, as our group feasted on Serrano ham appetizers, homemade pasta and bread, homegrown

olives, dessert and topped off with delicious red wine made from grapes of the vineyard on the property. Over the past few years, more than 700 volunteers, ranging in age from 14 to 70 have descended upon Casa di Maria’s farmhouse in small troops for two-week retreats. It’s like Habitat for Humanity, however these youth and church groups are not building houses of bricks and mortar. They are fostering character, trust, and patience in the disadvantaged residents who need attention, guidance, and distractions from their difficult situations. Carmela called these unselfish helpers, ‘the small army of God.’ After lunch, the kids’ excitement swelled. Some remembered that OAT travelers never came to visit them without surprises. After we gathered in the large comfortable sitting room, Mia grabbed a basket that equaled her size. She and her brother shared the task of taking the basket around the room and their eyes grew wide with anticipation as each guest deposited crayons, coloring books, games, and goodies into the container. Carmela wisely removed the brimming coffer to be shared at a later time in small portions. After whimpering her distress at having to

wait for the treats, an exhausted Mia crawled onto the lap of one of the guests and fell into an angelic sleep. Before leaving this house full of hope, I asked Sergio about their greatest need. He didn’t hesitate, as this problem and the enormity of the solution plagues him day and night. “We need an artesian well dug on the farm, so that we have a plentiful supply of clean drinking water for those who dwell in this house, no matter how many. It may cost upwards of 80,000 Euros. It is my dream,” Sergio said with longing. Strange how this man didn’t wish for anything for himself, but desired only that which will help the multitude of those he and Carmela have chosen to serve. When my husband and I returned from Sicily, I reached for my checkbook. Who knows what might happen, one traveler at a time? Grand Circle Foundation gives 100% of tax deductible donations to the school or organization of your choos- Carol L. Bowman ing. foundation@grandcirclefoundation. org www.casadimaria.org

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The Ojo Crossword

Melody’s Mature Meeting By Rico Wallace

ACROSS

DOWN

1 6 10 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 23 25 26 27 30 34 35 36 38 39 40 42 43 44 45 48 49 50 51 54 55 58 59 61 63 64 65 66 67 68

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 22 24 25 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 35 37 40 41 43 46 47 48 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 60 62

Aggressive feelings (slang) __ and span Altar of ancient church Main bread ingredient South of the border crazy On top Used the oars in a boat Top point Dashes Possess Wading bird Cherry Soon Unrefined metal Of the Andes Predictive calendar Uproar Trounce Watch chain Black Scrambled food Adios West by north Lotion ingredient Winged animals Soviet leader Boris Snare Set Dueling sword Assault Patriotic symbol Freudian term Wound U.S. Air Force Rage Vegetable African nation Cut of beef Perceives with eye Cob Comforts

Hairstyle Shine Surgical garment Regret Common Killed Dads Winter hazard Conceited man Desolate Decorative needle case Bergen Niche __ fire Time period Long time Some (2 wds.) Lumpy What a boring speaker does Element Sled On fire Dorm dwellers Cafe President George Deny Coin Insane __ (pl.) Horse-like animals Thai Government agency Mischievous Famous cookies Rice wine Beget Syllables used in songs (2 wds.) Self-esteems DNA component Mined metals Spied BB association

El Ojo del Lago / March 2022

ighty year old Melody was ready for the dating scene, again. Still sharp as a barbed whip, she sat in the coffee shop waiting for her, Mature Online Dating, contact. An old-timer entered wearing a rumpled gray suit, no tie and sunglasses. He looked around and said to Melody, “I’m Riff. I hope you’re my date.” “Yes I am,” Melody said. “Have a seat. I want you to know from the start, I don’t neeed a maaan. I have a beautiful home with a view. I’m happy with my space and I know you don’t live here full time. If you did I would be sure to know you. I know almost everybody in this town. If I don’t go out, how am I supposed to meet people?” Riff’s jaw dropped and a little drool

rolled out the corner of his mouth.” I will now reconsider that,” he said. “ I have the option to go full time.” “You do?” Melody asked as she batted her eyes. “I have a lot of money, too,” she blurted. Riff smiled, real big, flashing his crowns and implants. “I’m calling my real estate agent, asap,” he said. “I like you already.” The rest of the conversation went like this: Melody: “My last boyfriend kept falling down. I had to drop him. He-he.” Riff: “I’m good on my feet.” Melody: “You got money?” Riff: “Money can’t buy love.” Melody: “What do you know about love?” Riff: “Everything still works.” Melody: “You’re a real card.” Riff: “They used to call me Ace.” Melody: “How do I know you’re not a con man ?” Riff: “Honestly, to tell you the truth, I’m not. Believe me.” Melody: “You speak with a snake’s tongue.” Riff: “From your luscious lips to mine.” Melody: “This smells a little fishy.” Riff: “You would be a good catch.” Melody: “I buried 3 older men already, with good life insurance.” Riff: “I buried 2 younger women with good life insurance. You got insurance?” Melody: “‘You’re a little rough. I can’t make a silk purse from a sow’s ear.’” Riff: “I hear ya.” Melody: “You’re suffocating me already.” Riff: “You take my breath away.” Melody: “I smell a rat.” Riff: “You’re a little nosey.” Melody: “I never want to see you again.” Riff: “OK, I’ll see you later.” He gave her 2 thumbs up. Melody left the coffee shop, went home, telling her friends the date went really well, although the guy seemed a little hot and bothered and she had to throw some cold water on him, but that said, they may get together again, sometime, after things cool off a little bit.

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Service

* ADVERTISING / DIRECTORY

* ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS Pag: 57

* ANIMAL CLINICS/PET SHOP - SOS CHAPALA DOG RESCUE Pag: 40 - LAKESIDE FRIENDS OF THE ANIMALS AC Pag: 15 Tel: 376 765-5544 - MASKOTA’S LAKE Pag: 38 Tel: 376 766-0287, 33-3448-2507 - PET PLACE Pag: 26

Pag: 24

* ART GALLERIES/HANDCRAFTS - DIANE PEARL COLECCIONES Tel: 376 766-5683 - FINE ART FOR SALE - GALERIA ALFREDO Tel: 376 766-2980 - KIMBALL & URZUA GALLERY - LA BELLA VIDA Tel: 376 766-5131 - TANGLED THREADS

El Ojo del Lago - March 2022

Articles inside

Lakeside Living

Profiling Tepehua

Ramblings from the Ranch

Editor’s Page

Front Row Center

Vexations & Conundrums

Streets of Mexico