I first met Allen the summer before I turned 14. I had been spending all of my summers in Yelapa since Buddy, my dad, had moved back there from Zihuatanejo in 1969. That sixth summer, like the previous five, was spent diving in the morning, home by one, put away gear, clean fish and myself, chill for awhile with lots of books in the hammock looking across the bay at the changing light on the beach. Buddy would drink a coffee and flip through a book, Kenneth Lo's Art of Chinese Cooking or Tales From the Mullah by Idris Shah; some Foo Chow Fish Soup and Side of Parables with jazz playing on our stereo. At that time the stereo was still a big novelty and, I believe, jazz may still be a novelty.
We had a Blaupunct car stereo hooked up to a car battery and once a week we would go across the bay to Hotel Lagunita where the battery would get charged by their generator, the only power in town. Dad would exchange it for one he left the week before, now charged. My first step of pangero apprenticeship was dropping him off at the beach, doing a few laps around the bay, then picking up Buddy holding the charged battery.
Anyway, when the afternoon breeze picked up at around 3:30 or 4, he would go next door to Ratza at Casa Vieja. This would require going over the seawall around the canoas that were tied up above the little playita that separated Casa Bari (the Mexicans could not pronounce Buddy, and, so, called him Bari or more specifically, Don Bari) or the Blue Note (for the Blue floor in our kitchen and the constant jazz drifting up the trail from the palapa. Years later
Maria Von Big Tit, as Buddy called her, took over his house and it is still there now bigger and presumably better with a watsu pool and another owner. That is another story.
Over at Ratza's, people would gather every afternoon when the breeze kicked up and in the summer, right before the rain would come down. Ratza, by the way, was not her real name. I guess it was as real as any name people take on, but her given name was Shirley. She took on Ratza when she and my dad's then girlfriend Ruth (sister of the first Nurse Christina mentioned in earlier blog) had briefly followed a guru of dubious repute.
There was a smallish wooden table off the kitchen under a piece of blue lamina that would let in light, but, as dad constantly observed, would heat up the kitchen in those late afternoons like a sonofabitch. Ratza would sit facing the ocean with her back against the trail towards Juana, the pie lady's house. To her left was the sink and beyond the window the root canal portion of the trail. My dad would sit there with a chairback to the ocean and another facing that trail.
Ratza would make pot after pot of coffee using a French Press, which at the time was the most technologically advanced gadget in town other than Eliadoro's Juke Box at the cantina! Ratza would lead discussions about higher consciousness and she would use certain phrases over and over. I would tag along with Buddy and if we were early and there was room at the table I would sit and learn that there are no accidents and what Jung would have said about this or that.
Ratza was like Yelapa's own Yoda. With her head tilted down, she would gaze up at you with her huge Betty Davis eyes (I swear) a joint in her hand and tell you something like Good God man, you need to wake up! Raise your consciousness...or some other shit to a kid like me. Somewhere between the second joint and the first toss of the I Ching coins more adults would show up and I would be bumped from the table which was fine, because , like my dad, I didn't really like that many people.
Some people I liked because I thought they were cool like Jim and Georgia Stanley, Casa Vieja regulars until their first child, Sunny Day, was born, the first gringo kid born in Yelapa. Jim was a professional gambler so I was impressed. Others were fake, full of shit and smelled weird, so I was relieved when I was relegated to the hammock where I could still hear Ratza, the thing of it is...and I could keep an eye on Las Palmas where my novia Emiliana would soon be making her way down to the playita in between Panchito's house and Las Palmas.
Emiliana lived in the white brick house above Panchito's brick house on the water. Panchito was a fisherman like all his brothers except Ramon who became a mason. The Mason. What these brothers had in common was their wives were the first pie ladies; Augustina and Juana. Las Palmas was the grove of Cocos with nice boulders for sitting that was in front of what is now Ronco and Ana Rosa's home and apartmientos.
Ana Rosa is Emiliana's aunt and when my family first moved to Yelapa in 1963, Ana Rosa, then 12 years old, became our maid and my nanny. I am honored that her first son is named David, mi tocayo. In those hot summer days, where the pier is now, all the young cousins in that neighborhood would go swimming in the afternoons to keep cool. Meanwhile the parents would sit in Las Palmas knitting bathing suits, doing needlepoint and swatting jejenes gnats.
I'd sit and watch for Emiliana walking down to the water. I could see her looking over her shoulder in my direction to see if I was coming and I would follow after a minute or two. I'd slip out of the hammock, jump the seawall, and be in the water swimming toward the pangas moored in front. I knew the adults were watching, so I'd swim up to Santos or Carlos or any of her other cousins and talk about what fish we caught that day while the girls would talk about boys while giggling and splashing each other.
Eventually one of us would drift off, dive down and end up on the windward side of a panga where the adults could not see us from shore. I would hang onto the panga with one hand with my feet pressed onto one of the ribs that run the length of the bottom of the boat and Emiliana would sit on my legs. My free hand on her back, we would talk about what she did that day or what fish I'd caught and so on. She would correct my Spanish and make fun of me and after about two hours of this there was an unseen signal and it was time to go. We'd have one quick kiss and that was it.
And so it was day after day with little change. All of my gringo friends lived on the other side of town or up river and if I went to hang out with them I would usually stay over night or until dark. This was before the Water Taxi, so, if I was upriver I was staying. There were lots of gringo kids. Tony and Giles, whose parents built Rancho Los Naranjas were my best friends and in the small world category, the brothers who built that house would later build the Rancho at the Point (now part of Verana) for Buddy's girlfriend Celeste's sister; Sara. This casa
was eventually occupied by my wife Josee, just long enough to give birth there to our oldest son Nico.
My other close friends were Tali Shapiro, Pichon and Reyna, Rick the Stick's kids and Todd and Letty, Ratza's grandchildren. Jeff and Dariah Elias and Monica Tillet and her crazy brother Marco were there, too, but they were older and we'd only see them occasionally at the beach or a gringo party.
One of those afternoons was different when we got to Ratza's. There were new people there at the table. There was a large man sitting to Ratza's right, facing the trail and a womann with her back to the ocean, facing Ratza. I held back and my dad went and sat in his chair by the sink. I went straight to the hammock, too early to see my girl but I could look out and pretend not to eavesdrop while I scoped out the new guy. Her was a big guy, tall with long dark hair and a big mustache. He looked like a pirate or Doug Henning. One would be cool, the other would be lame. I hadn't decided which he was yet. My dad sat down and there was some chitchat. I was deciding I didn't like this guy when my dad called me over. I got up and grabbed a chair by the door and pulled it over to the table next to this new guy across from my dad. As I sat down, I got my first glimpse of Susie Helschein. I had to look away because she was so pretty I blushed immediately. Damn, it was hot in here! It must be the lamina roof overhead.
I don't remember what the topic was that day, but I do remember Allen talking about what he did, something about diamonds. Yeah, right, whatever is what I thought. Who is this guy anyway? I was pretty much deciding he was full of shit when I took another glance at Susie. To that point in my young life she was the most beautiful person I had seen up close. She wasn't talking much but sat there with her serene look, occasionally gazing lovingly at her man. He was a total asshole in my eyes now. He didn't deserve, no, couldn't deserve her. No one could. I remember Susie's profile and her skin and her little mole. I don't know or remember how long I was looking at her and it wasn't until my dad kicked me under the table that I realized I had been staring at her.
I don't remember seeing Allen or Susie again until six years later when they met me at the airport after I was released from the PV jail. (another story altogether) Allen had come up with the money to get me and crazy Alan Curry out. It would still be a few more years until Allen and I became best friends. I love him to death but it took me that long to realize he is a pirate, not Doug Henning and, therefore, not lame.
Well, it is now 32 years later and I still stare at Susie, one of my best and most loving friends. Allen now kicks me (with his remaining good knee) when I need it, taking some place of my dad who has since passed away. Looking back, the best thing about the day I met Allen is that it is the day I met Susie!
