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Growing up in California we learned a little about the 5th of May but time has dulled it. Seems the date is like many in the states devoid of meaning or context and only an excuse to party, not that that's a bad thing, kinda like St Patrick day.
Of course the little taco truck that has been in downtown Talkeetna last couple years opened today for the season, picked up six and had them with the Boss on the back deck of the Roadhouse soaking up some spring sunshine. We didn't talk Mexican history, I decided a few weeks ago that I wanted to go back to not drinking so no beer, mostly we talked about spring chores that didn't get done last year do to my broken foot, when and how we could open up the restaurant post coved, and twenty other details.
The Boss is that black Irish, decedent of a Spanish shipwreck off the Isle a few hundred years ago, black hair streaked with silver, lean near to sinew now that there is only her and crippled I, no more fifty employees, they don't make women like this anymore, five foot zero and tougher then any three men. I'm only saddened by knowing she will outlive me a decade or two but perhaps it is how God wills it, she will have a much needed respite from a decade or two of living with an OCD airplane mechanic control freak who practices guitar for hours every evening.
Thinking I've been fortunate although none of my relationships have been everlasting even the worst ones have had endearing qualities, a couple of them I ruined with selfishness or just plain inexperience. One I let go because it was what she needed to overcome some ugliness I won't explain. Ok perhaps I should.
I think of her on occasion, wonder if she found piece or a little happiness, I recall crying for a few days, we had hardly been together long enough to find any faults, she will always be perfect in my eyes. Funny, met her in Tulsa, she lived in a comunity with an entrance gate where one drove under a sign: WHITE CITY. Told her I was going to come back with my truck and rip the ****er down. She asked me not to, she said please. I suppose the sign still stands.
We never made love. I never saw her nude, but one day she came over when I was in the bath mid day on one of those muggly Oklahoma summer days, I stood up and could see in her eyes she was all mine, but I was too much of a gentlemen to take her in that way. She had been violently raped down in collage, Austin I think, she was a music major, had played violin in a couple big city orchestras. When I had met her she was just a couple months short of going back to university and regain her life, after we met she talked about staying, about staying with me, I was a year shy of a tech degree. I let her go. I cried for days.
HR
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I prefer my flamenco guitar spicy, doesn't have to be fast, should have some meat on the bones, can be raw or well done, as long as it doesn't sound like it's turning green on an elevator floor.
Richard, She was a saint. You’ve told me this story before.
Yes, she was.
There’s much more to the story—the truly heartbreaking part—but it’s not for here, how she survived injustice with her spirit intact, as beautiful as her person. I don’t remember how much of it I told you. The whole story would have taken too long. I think there’s only one person besides me who knows it.
Maybe some of the orphan children she cared for and taught at the Hospicio still remember her.