A semi-chance encounter with Padre Felipe

I recently had the pleasure of meeting Padre Felipe, a Uruguayan priest who is also my dear friend Joshua’s spiritual advisor. We met in the plaza near my house, where we talked about everything from the tragedy in the Andes (he counseled the survivors and their families) to cold Chicago winters, the worldwide financial crisis to the difference between Evangelicals and Episcopalians.

He asked me not to hold on to his arm as we strolled along the rambla--he claimed it made him feel like an old man--, and I realized in that instant that I was in the presence of Grandpa Tress' Uruguayan doppleganger.

I enjoyed our encounter so much that it inspired me to write this poem. Enjoy!

Padre Felipe

It felt like chance
When I saw him waiting for me
At the edge of the plaza,
Right hand in his pocket,
Exactly where he said it would be.

He smelled of serenity
And ambrosia,
The stuff divinity is made of.

A river runs through Carrasco

I hope I´ve convinced more than a few of you to pull out a map over the past couple of months, if nothing else to confirm just one more time the coordinates of this tiny, faraway country called Uruguay. If you have, you’ve noticed that the capital fans out from the banks of the Río de la plata, which keeping within the parameters of the marvelously real, supersedes the limits of any normal river. In all actuality, it´s an estuary. But no one ever tells you that: it´s referred to here as either river or sea (río or mar), even though everyone knows perfectly well it is neither. And in a country that shuns all things extreme—in politics, natural disasters, love—the Río de la plata represents a sobering exception to the rule.

With a body of water as wide as the one that entrenches this former military stronghold turned port city, it´s easy to find tributaries. In fact, the neighborhood where I live—Pocitos—was founded along the banks of one of the city´s many streams, where immigrant women from Italy and Spain would come to wash their clothes.

More recently—last Saturday, in fact—I became part of a rambling human river that cut through the heart of Carrasco, a wealthy neighborhood to the Northeast of the city center. Donning dark-blue shirts with at least four written references to the race´s sponsor—Reebok—five thousand Montevideanos (and at least three Americans, a Swede, and a Peruvian) congregated to run the city´s first of many spring-season 10k competitions.

The levee wall broke at exactly 5pm, releasing a body of seasoned and less-than-seasoned runners out onto the normally quiet, residential streets. From a distance, we must´ve looked like a river, running through the city, defying logic and the basic principles of engineering as we passed over the Bridge of the Americas.

To maintain my flow of energy, I focused on the ripples, watching the heels of those in front of me as they beat against the river bed, and then rapidly kicked back up--churning the stream, propelling it forward.

I tried my hardest to keep my running face on (which permits even less emotion than poker´s equivalent) during the entire race, cursed my joints and then quickly blessed them for holding out, and sailed past the finish line no less than six miles and an hour and seven minutes later.

And although Carrasco´s river won´t appear on any map you´re likely to find on the Internet, I´ve come to expect the unexpected from Uruguay—this, the most moderate of countries--, which unpretentiously turns rivers into seas over the span of generations, and bodies into currents in the matter of an instant.

Just in case you were wondering, only one person stopped me to ask if I was really from Kentucky.

I found this as I was backing up my laptop, which is finally working again. Yay!!

(Nighthawks, Edward Hopper)

Isolation refracts
against reflectionless
glass walls,
caging the hawks
from the night.

Solitude is
sipped slowly,
kissed by lonesome lips,
silenced in
voiceless throats.

They sit
waiting in mute anticipation
for the new machinery of urban life
to produce better,
more efficient answers

to the question of seclusion,
the new industrial solution
to loneliness.

The fragments of my day, connected by commas and semicolons

*Today I: counseled a friend on my living room couch, went to the ciber café, researched the “Constitución de Cádiz” in fit of mania and nerdiness until 1am, sent birthday wishes to a friend; slept, woke up early (too early), continued sleeping; woke and got up, retrieved dog from walker and thought for a second that both are adorable; *café con leche y pan*… just like every morning; called Florencia to tell her she´s a goddess; another day without my laptop, another second-long, grade-five panic attack; studied, pondered the significance of my name, dressed for gym; lifted . weights, laughed at my orange gym pants; listed to radio, showered, dressed; fixed lunch of fish and potatoes (but not fish and chips); collected coins for thus bus, rode to town; listened to private Tom Petty concert: “She was (I am) an American girl”; resisted urge to sing (typical), tapped feet instead; bought barrettes and headband on street, saw a shirt that read “angle” instead of “angel”; went to favorite ciber and laughed with employees, printed a bunch of articles but forgot them there, resisted urge to blush when I returned; *BLUSHED*; read articles at library for a class I refuse to get credit for, took a 5 (er… 45) minute break with Dave Brubeck; drank coffee while staring at mate machine, read about the philosophical dimensions of suffering; *phantom phone ringing*; read revolutionary pamphlet while waiting for class, left early; kissed a friend on the cheek and gave her three sips of red wine because she was nervous about a boy and poetry; laughed with abandon at bad rhymes, landed job as a graphic designer for a literary magazine called: Paréntesis (______); met up with a friend for beer in the barrio, sang tango, held my breath, and said Good Night to September.

*By "today," I mean yesterday.