"Gang Aft Agley"

Certain cities remind us of certain people in our lives. When my dear friend, Celine, watches "CSI:Miami" she thinks of me. Since they have gone into syndication, she thinks of me quite often. Whenever I see or hear "El Paso" I remember a neighbor in VA Beach who I will refer to as Esperanza for purposes of telling this story. Esperanza had cared for a terminally ill husband at home, never leaving his side until his death. Her life, like many of our lives, contained trial, error, triumph and tragedy. Not too much happiness, however, so as to be able to recognize it when it lit on her shoulder. Her deceased husband's brother and his wife went to Puerto Vallarta on January 2nd every year for four months. Esperanza accepted an invitation to join them. They were none too pleased when she met a Latino on the beach there and didn't come back to the hotel for two days. Being the considerate soul she was, she did call them to say she was fine and would see them "sometime soon". How dare she do such a thing! Had she lost her mind?! Not her mind, no, her heart... to this Latino 25 years younger than she. Now her husband had worked hard and saved his money, made a few good land investments which turned into major shopping centers and left her without monetary worries. Could this charming, attractive, vivacious and loving widow have attracted a man, especially a younger man, without showing him her bank balance... ? Of course not, said the naysayers! Despite warnings and admonitions, Esperanza and Orlando married. The gossiping escalated. People were polite to the husband only until he turned his back... usually to do some loving or kind service for his wife. The newlyweds seemed to adore one another, but the town's gossips wouldn't own that. Finally the couple decided to move back to a town in Texas that Orlando knew well from his childhood... El Paso. El Paso and Esperanza are synonymous to me. I think of the city as the safe haven for her love, and in El Paso it flourished. When she moved from her VA Beach home, Bob and I moved in until construction of our new home was complete... about 6 months. During this time we saw her adult children frequently. There was a pool in the back yard and one of her children would bring the dogs by weekly to run full tilt off the diving board and into the deep end until they were exhausted. Once I saw a photo of Esperanza that I see now, clearly, in my memory. She and Orlando lived high above the city and the wall of one of the rooms... the room where they installed a sunken hot tub... was glass from floor to ceiling. In the photo, Esperanza was up to her shoulders in bubbles and smiling lovingly at her husband who was taking the picture. She looked like a girl in that photo and her contentment was palpable. For five years they lived the love affair everyone wants and then one night, Orlando spun out on wet streets, crashed, and died, in a car he had bought from Bob. On the day he died, he had phoned Esperanza to remind her for the millionth time that she was his life, he loved her to the end. El Paso... I was happy to see it for myself and given that I had been so wrong about my trip through Texas, I knew I'd love it. After a good night's rest I was ready to work, to take care of business that day and resume my journey the next. I turned on the computer and...... nothing. I had a screen but I couldn't read my email or log into anything requiring a password. I rebooted. I rebooted again. And again. Everything had been fine the night before... I thought that perhaps I should move to another part of town. My habit is to head for downtown in any city I'm new to. You can see a lot of the character of the residents by clues observed in any downtown area. The exit for downtown reads, "Gateway to Juarez, Mexico". I took it. El Paso's downtown? Grimy, ugly, rundown, security bars or doors on every business, high profile homeless population. (If you know me, you know I'm not advocating running the homeless out of town, just an observation.) There are fabric signs that read: "Downtown - Enjoy The Experience". Those signs should be hanging somewhere else. There were one or two bright spots, but a city's downtown is their calling card and the first impression, sometimes the only impression a stranger has. El Paso's card is dog-eared and dirty. If that weren't bad enough, the bloody computer wouldn't connect there either! The morning hours were wasting away. I moved back to I-10. A sign read "Sunset Heights Historic District". I was now high above the city and enjoying the view of the homes built going up the mountains. My spirits brightened. I parked the van at Caruso Park near the corner of Prospect and Randolph and got out to walk around with Danny. Small park, knockout panorama. (Pictures above) I felt warmth for El Paso again. A teenager on roller blades glided past me, said hello, and stopped to talk. "Are you lost?" "No, just taking a break and enjoying the view! I do have a question." "Sure!" "Is that a cross on top of the mountain over there?" "Yes, it's a crucifix with the risen Jesus.... that's Mount Cristo Rey, Christ of the Rockies". "It reminded me of Corcovado in Rio. How beautiful." "Yes, it's very beautiful, but don't go up there alone. There are groups that go up as a pilgrimage at Easter and if you want to see it, go with them. Where are you from?" "Miami." "You drove here all the way from Miami?", he laughed and introduced himself as Manny. "Well, no, I left from Virginia. I was there for the birth of my grandaughter,Ava Grace, who was born January 9th." I fumbled in my wallet for Ava's photo. "That's great! I have a little girl born January 6th, she's at home sleeping right now." He appeared to be going on 18, maybe. "Congratulations!" "And my nephew was born the same day as your grandaughter was!" "Why shouldn't I go to Mt. Cristo Rey alone?" "It's anapra." Anapra? Did he mean "anathema"? "It's all cardboard houses and the people who live there are bad, they will beat you and steal from you. They live there because they know they can hide and do bad things." We talked a little more.He wished me well and skated off. I took my photos and returned to the van, only now realizing I had parked too close to a metal box hanging from a building. I tried to manuver out without damage, but was struggling. Manny skated by again. "Let me help you," he called out as he sat down in the street and stripped off his skates. Carefully he manuvered the van away from the wall, said goodbye again, and left. Naturally I Googled "anapra". Anapra, a city on the Mexican border above El Paso. There are stories retold by tourists who were assaulted, robbed, etc. and one story I like alot. Here's part of it from the website of the American Institute of Architects.

The World Hands Project: Anapra, Mexico
J. Matthew Thomas

Across the border from El Paso, Texas, and 15 minutes northwest from Ciudad Juarez, sits a population of people with hopes for a better life. The streets of Anapra are dirt; the homes are combinations of wood pallets, concrete block, and plastic tarps. Electricity is present on a single line entering along the main road, with hundreds of cables spliced into it, haphazardly running down the roads, up the hills and out to the numerous dwellings springing up and around the Rio Grande River Valley and its mesas to the south. In the evening the lights of El Paso across the river give an altogether different picture of life. Ribbons of headlights along the interstate, high-rise banks and billboards sell the image that so many are seeking at this emerging border town. The World Hands Project is a small nonprofit, nondenominational organization that has sprung out of the work of Builders without Borders. Several homes in Anapra, Mexico have already been built, providing insulated, watertight homes for families that were living in spaces too hot in the summer and too cold in the winter. Our mission is simple: to empower individuals and communities by co-creating models designed for local cultures.

I looked at the map online. I was only 27 miles from Las Cruces, New Mexico and I had lost my favorite part of the work day to computer issues, so I drove away from Texas to a state I had never been in and new discoveries. Thank you, El Paso. I hardly knew you. The purple-ish mountains of New Mexico rose to meet me. I passed through Las Cruces, an unremarkable town, and made the turn onto 70 East to Alamogordo. I had to see Alamogordo. Shortly after looking at the radio station in Beaumont, TX, Bob had flown out to see another station... in Alamogordo. He liked New Mexico but was worried that the town couldn't support the station. My ears started popping and I wondered if Danny's and Nala's ears were affected also. At the peak of the mountain pass was a sign reading, St. Agustin Pass, 5,719 feet. On the downslope I looked in wonder at the majesty of the country below. At that moment I understood for the first time, really understood, that popular writer's phrase: "under a big sky". It is indescribable what I saw there. Miles rolled by. I was nearing White Sands Missile Range and the White Sands National Monument, on U.S. Dept. of the Interior property. Out of nowhere the road began to narrow into one lane and the speed postings dropped from 70mph to 35 mph. I saw a large metal building ahead, then the sign: "Border and Customs Station. Stop for inspection." What? A regular Army sentry was on duty. I pulled out my driver's license and handed it to him. A couple of questions and he waved me on. I entered Alamogordo at 4PM and began to look for a place to stay overnight. It's a small town built next to Holloman Air Force Base. In another coincidence ("There are no coincidences in life") my father was frequently sent here on TDY as a civilian systems analyst for the Air Force. People under the age of 30 say they are miserable. "There's nothing to do, nothing!" One girl even put her head down on a counter while lamenting her existence in "the (bleeping) desert!" If Fate had destined that my 3 daughters be brought up here, their bags would have been packed and ready on graduation day, but I could live here. Hear me when I say things like this. I am a loner and a wanderer by nature...there are many, many places I would like to live in...this is just another, but the Latin culture is strong here and that is the one thing that makes me feel that I am "home", for whatever reason. Maybe tomorrow I'll actually get a little work done. I feel so free, so happy.