DANCING WITH TURKEYS – Spirits Take Wing at a Small-town Mexican Wedding (part two of two)

(CONTINUED FROM PART ONE, POSTED AUG. 7)

(I'm attending a friend of a friend's wedding fiesta in Santiago Tenango de Reyes, Pueblo. We've been invited to the home of the groom's parents for an intimate family gathering just before the bigger party begins.)

MY WORD!

Still working on the tamale course, I needed to take a break, and asked where to find the bathroom. Following the directions upstairs, I found myself with several rooms to choose from, each separated from the hall by a thick curtain.

For no particular reason I picked door number two and swept open the curtain. The young woman sitting on the toilet five feet in front of me scrambled to cover herself with a handful of toilet paper, but the damage was done. I exclaimed, backed gingerly away and waited nervously across the hall.

When she emerged, I gestured toward my heart with both hands and said earnestly: ¡Estoy tan embarasado! She seemed to accept my apology graciously, which must have been really hard for her, since—as I later found out—I'd just managed to forget about one of the most notorious false cognates in Spanish, and had exclaimed "I'm so very pregnant!"

I'd just managed to forget about one of the most notorious false cognates in Spanish, and had exclaimed "I'm so very pregnant!"

HOLY MOLE!

Eventually, we all returned to the main party and sat down at one of the long tables. As we made up for lost time with yet more bottles of tequila and beer, the volunteer servers brought each of us a gigantic bowl of chicken mole. (There must have been half a chicken in each bowl!)

The parents of the groom, sitting near us, were presented with even bigger bowls—each the size of a large casserole, filled with what looked like half a turkey!

The mole, with its complex blend of flavors, was very good, but none of us could even begin to finish such a portion. Apologizing, we were told not to worry; soon big plastic buckets were passed around and everyone just dumped in their leftovers. They offered us one of the buckets to take home with us, but we deflected the generosity to others whom we suspected would be far better able to use the food.

Now that it was dark, the mariachis wrapped up their gig and joined the party. Huge speakers and portable banks of equally loud colored lights had been installed right outside the dining area, under another big tarp. An endless flow of recorded popular and ranchero music started to blare, and people began to dance.

We'd heard somewhere about the wedding fiesta tradition of dancing with goats or turkeys, which then would be slaughtered for dinner.

We'd heard somewhere about the wedding fiesta tradition of dancing with goats or turkeys, which then would be slaughtered for dinner. (This, I guessed, might be a remnant of Mayan or Aztec sacrificial offerings.) Sure enough, after an hour or so of dancing, the floor cleared and four older men (I suppose they were the village's elders) walked out, each holding a huge live guajolote (turkey) in his arms.

A simple, rhythmic music started and each man danced with his turkey. It was a plain, elegant dance, just stepping, moving and turning with the music, and both the men and the spectators (and the poor birds for that matter) seemed subdued, even reverent.

STICKING YOUR NECK OUT

By this time, I'd had several beers and probably five or six tequilas. I was honestly beginning to believe that the people I'd been trying to converse with could understand me and vice versa. While waxing more and more “fluent,” I looked up and suddenly there was a turkey in my arms. Apparently one of the men had singled me out as the "elder" of our group. Before I could object, I was being pushed by the crowd out on the dance floor and did the only thing I could: I danced with a turkey.

With the sensation of the warm, damp feathers on my hands 
and arms, I let the both the music and my emotions move me 
around the floor.

ILLUSTRATION: Katy Farina

                     
The bird was surprisingly docile, given what must have been, for him, the otherworldliness of the situation. There I was, with the other three men, being watched by half the village, and the reality of the situation broke through the fog in which the tequila had shrouded me. While I was very much in the moment with the sensation of the warm, damp feathers on my hands and arms, I also felt a transcendent sense of peace and contentment as I let the both the music and my emotions move me around the floor. Then a very conscious thought rose through the raw motion: a prayer that I would never forget this magical moment.

Eventually, the loud music and less serene dancing returned, and the turkeys disappeared. A few minutes later, four young men crossed the dance floor, unceremoniously carrying the now limp bodies of the big birds by their necks. But, since everyone already had eaten dinner, I was left wondering what became of them. Still in my reverie, I never thought to ask.

TO SLEEP, PERCHANCE...

After the turkey dance, people seemed to look at me differently, with approving smiles, I thought. I did my best to engage in small talk, but couldn't make out much of what they said above the thunderous music and my re-thickening fog of inebriation.

About midnight, we decided that, after such a long day, we'd find the hotel Silverio had booked for us along the road back to Puebla. But one of the wedding couple's relatives wouldn't hear of it, insisting we stay at his home. So we got our bags from the van and ambled off with him down the street. The music abated long enough for an even noisier round of fireworks.

A deafening aerial bomb went off, rattling the few religious 
trinkets decorating the walls.

The house was relatively nice compared with most of the working-class Mexican homes I'd seen, with several sparsely decorated, apparently unused, small bedrooms. Kip and I shared one of them. The beds were quite nice, with decent mattresses, but, as in so many Mexican homes, the room cringed under the harsh light of a single bare bulb.

Just as we'd settled in, turned out the light and closed our eyes, the music started again at the party, blasting as if it were coming from the next room. At the same instant a deafening aerial bomb went off, rattling the few religious trinkets decorating the walls. Kip and I both burst into laughter at the amazing experience...and the obvious futility of trying to sleep.

DANCING WITH TURKEYS – Spirits Take Wing at a Small-town Mexican Wedding (part one of two)

My wife and I have taken a couple of tour-type vacations. You know, the ones where a guide takes a whole group of you around on a big tour bus. This kind of trip has a few distinct advantages, but experiencing authentic, unscripted local culture is not one of them. Generally, you're steered to events that appear to be staged especially for tour groups and, uncannily, they always manage situate you so you can’t get back to the bus without a trip through the gift shop.
     Traveling on one's own, especially if you can do so with someone who lives there, often proves richer and more memorable. For it’s one thing to witness the culture of a place and a people; it’s another to live it. It’s a rare opportunity, one that seldom occurs without a convergence of effort, connections, and timing. Oh, and sheer dumb luck.

                                                        *     *     *

FISH OUT OF WATER
The weather in Mexico City was sunny and clear, but for the usual blanket of brown smog pressing down on this, the sixth largest city in the world. It was clear enough, though, to see Popocatepetl, crowned with clouds. Popo, Mexico’s most active volcano, is only 45 miles away from the center of Mexico City and her 20 million inhabitants and about half as far from Puebla, with another two million. It is within striking distance of all of them, a cataclysm-in-the-making, since eruptive activity has occurred as recently as January, 2008.

I was traveling with my Mexican-American friend and Spanish tutor, Silverio, along with two of his other students, Anne and Kip.

Silverio’s friends, Ignacio (Nacho) and his wife Martha, picked us up in the van he’d rented for us for the week. We drove right from the airport about 80 miles southeast to the state of Puebla and the small village of Santiago Tenango de Reyes, where we were to attend the wedding fiesta for one of Nacho's friends.

We three unusually tall, unusually pale norte- americanos) walked in to what seemed only slight curiosity from the 100 or so locals.

As we drove into Santiago, we realized just how small a town it was—only about eight blocks long and maybe three or four wide. Its population couldn't have been more than a couple hundred. We parked the van and walked a couple blocks on nearly-deserted cobblestone streets before we came to a broad alley between two cinder block buildings. There the stark space had been converted into a cheery hall by a huge bright yellow-and-green-striped tarp strung between the second stories above.

        

The six of us (Silverio, Nacho, Martha and we three unusually tall, unusually pale norte- americanos) walked in to what seemed only slight curiosity from the 100 or so locals—evidently half the folks in town—sitting at long rented tables. Within a minute, though, Nacho was proudly introducing us to the bride and groom (the groom Nacho’s co-worker in Mexico City), to the groom’s parents and to the couple’s padrino (something like a godfather). Pony beers and tequilas were in seemingly endless supply, and for the rest of the evening were cheerfully placed into whichever of our hands happened to be free at any time.

LIKE FAMILY
A ten-piece mariachi band dispensed its energetic music from the far end of the hall. The charro, or lead singer, is one of Nacho's cousins. Before I knew it, he was announcing something into the microphone about guests from far away and then something more familiar: “...por Cheff, de Meeny-sota…” Suddenly, I was aware that all the guests had now stopped talking and turned to look at us.

The next song, apparently just dedicated to me by Nacho, was Como Quien Pierde una Estrella (Like One Who Loses a Star), my favorite of the songs Silverio had taught us in class. I always love mariachi music, but I was especially moved by this rendition and Nacho's thoughtful gesture!

I kept wondering if I'd be so generous and thoughtful if roles were reversed. 

After about an hour the parents of the groom asked us to join them. Leaving the other guests to their dinners, we walked about a block down the street to their home. Waiting for us inside were the bride and groom, still in their wedding finery, five or six other adult members of the immediate family and a few kids.

We sat down at the dining room table and were served what Silverio explained is a sort of appetizer course traditional for weddings: two types of tamales freshly steamed in corn leaves, two bright little gelatins which tasted like they might have been flavored by chiles, a sweet, crispy, deep-fried sort of cookie, and atole, a hot, creamy, corn-based drink flavored with chocolate, cinnamon or other notes.

It was already the experience of a lifetime just to attend the fiesta, but this—being welcomed like this into this dear family—made us feel deeply honored. I kept wondering if I'd be so generous and thoughtful if roles were reversed.

(WHERE DOES THE DANCING TURKEY COME IN? 
CLICK HERE FOR PART TWO!)

STROKES OF WONDER – An Ode to the Canoe

Travel a thousand miles by train and you are a brute; pedal five hundred on a bicycle and you remain basically a bourgeois; paddle 
a hundred in a canoe and you are already a child of nature. 
PIERRE TRUDEAU, Former Prime Minister of Canada

When I was ten, my cabin group at YMCA Camp St. Croix set out on what ranked then—and may still rank—as the longest canoe trip ever undertaken by the camp's trip program. In eight days we paddled 360 miles from Hudson, Wisconsin down the St. Croix and then the mighty Mississippi to East Dubuque, Illinois.

I'd canoed before—I spent my summers just a few blocks away from a
particularly quiet and beautiful stretch of the St. Croix further north. But the long Mississippi trip was the first time I'd learn the finer points of this, the most serene of water craft.

Those eight days, for a ten-year-old, might as well have been a trans-continental expedition for all I learned about buoyancy, balance, wind, waves, currents and navigation, not to mention the capacity of my own body and spirit.

I feel more comfortable sitting on that cane seat 
and paddling than I do walking on dry land.

MY TEACHER AND FRIEND 
Since that great adventure, I've been lucky enough to paddle many other rivers
and streams, as well as much of northeastern Minnesota's amazing Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCAW), a mostly wild network of more than 1,000 lakes and rivers, most of them interconnected with portage trails. There,
I've learned still more, handling rapids, beaver dams, knee-deep muskeg and June
snow squalls.

I've had my own canoe for 35 years. It's a Mansfield Osprey, a thirteen-foot wood-and-fiberglass fishing model made by the Stowe Canoe Company in Vermont back in the early 1970's. In the thousands of hours and miles I've spent in that sweet craft, much of it paddling solo, we've gotten to know each other very well.

This newer model of my Osprey has a portage yoke.

While I'm far from a competitive paddler, that canoe's taught me how to turn on a dime, go forward and backward, even sideways. I can paddle with barely a sound; wild critters walk away from me instead of bolting in terror. I can flip her up onto my shoulders, where her center thwart sits so lightly that I don't even need a yoke.

I can honestly say I feel more comfortable sitting on that cane seat and paddling than I do walking on dry land. The balance, the control, the movements have all become second nature to me.

MY LIAISON WITH NATURE
What other craft can you carry for a mile or more and plop down in waters otherwise inaccessible? Which will let you glide through places barely two inches deep? Does any let you drift silently, close enough to birds, animals and fish to practically touch them?

Is there another transport that offers a more fair and honest exchange of your energy for movement, one which treads more lightly and leaves no trace of your presence when you leave?

Swirly footprints mark her passage, then congeal back into glassy reflection.

If waterways are Nature's arteries, my canoe lets me feel their pulse. Their waves rock me—sometimes a bit too roughly; their upcurrents and eddies lift and turn me; their temperature seeps through the thin ash ribs so I can feel the cold and warm spots on my feet.

And then there's the sheer beauty and grace of a canoe. Those sumptuous curves, converging at the apexes of bow and stern. The way it gently parts the waves, presses them down and then releases them. Swirly footprints mark her passage, then congeal back into glassy reflection.

Two Men In a Canoe – Winslow Homer, 1895

WOOD IF I COULD
I've always preferred wooden canoes—or at least partially wooden. Aluminum canoes, though durable, are cold, noisy and heavy. Kevlar canoes are light, but their translucence is unnerving. The material's extremely tough for its weight—but only against impact, not abrasion. It can practically stop a cannon ball, but running it up on a gravel beach a few times will bring it to its knees.

Paddling a wooden canoe is like sitting inside a piece of fine furniture, one that transports you both physically and esthetically. Because much of its material comes from Nature, I always feel like a wooden canoe belongs in Nature.

In touch with the water, open to the sky, quiet as a breeze, I feel my surroundings embrace me—and I them. More than any other thing or place in my life, my little Osprey bonds me with Nature, reminding me not just where I truly belong, but who I really am.

IN A NEW LIGHT – Attached to the Moon

(With the moon coming full tonight (1 Aug.), may this reflection move you 
to get outdoors and experience the wonder in a new light. By the way, this early August full moon means the next one will be a blue moon!)

Sun shadows fall heavy on the earth—stark, stretched, hard-edged forms, so common we barely notice their attachment any more.

Moon, though, lays down her strokes gently, subtle shades of black 

on black. Now we feel the attachment more than know it.

BESIDE MYSELF – A Chat With My Alter Ego

One advantage of talking to yourself is that you know at least somebody's listening. ~ FRANKLIN P. JONES

I’m the son of German-American parents. Both were wonderful, multi-faceted human beings. But they taught me that whatever I did, no matter how well I may have done it, I could have done better. Those lessons have served me well in many ways. They helped instill self-discipline. They helped me get a first-rate education. They helped me become a good, thoughtful, thorough writer and designer.

It helped shape me into a generally honest and unassuming man whom, if he were someone else, 
I think I might admire.

Those lessons were also about modesty. Stay out of the spotlight; don’t promise what you might not be able to deliver; let your deeds speak for themselves. This part of it too, while somewhat more subjective, helped shape me into a generally honest and unassuming man whom, if he were someone else, I think I might admire.

But such an upbringing also has a down side. I live with a little voice—a very persistent little voice—that constantly provides me with critical feedback on just about everything I do. More often than not, that feedback sounds something like, Okay, sure, you accomplished that, but let’s not go and get all self-satisfied about it. How could you have done it better? What are you going to do next?

      

This is clearly the voice of someone else, not me—perhaps that of my parents; maybe of my older brother, who's afflicted by the same self-criticism and whom I idolized as a kid.

Sometimes, especially on the tennis court, the encouraging voice starts to turn a little more negative. Well, yes, you’re hitting some good shots, but what about all those absolutely horrible ones?

Even though my parents were seldom overtly critical and certainly never denigrated me, I’ve managed to throw in some mean language of my own, eventually turning that measured tennis voice downright abusive. You idiot! You just missed a shot a three-year-old would have made! Can’t you do even the simplest thing right? Does that sound familiar?

That voice, wherever it was coming from, went on for years, then decades. Little by little I came to realize it was dousing my light, laying a heavy, mucky layer of woe over the freedom and joy of playing my favorite sport.


EMBRACING THE ENEMY
A couple of years ago, I was having coffee with a friend who’s in the business of helping organizations and their employees get in touch with the spiritual aspects of what they do and what they want to do. I told him of my negative self-talk and how it was stifling my enjoyment of tennis.

He mentioned that one of his clients had decided to engage his self-critical inner voice in a conversation. He’d even transcribed the dialog as it played out to see what he might learn from it.

I decided to try it.

I was amazed at how surely and naturally my 
own voice and, even more amazingly, the other voice, started to flow.

You can imagine how lame it felt sitting down with pen and paper and actually venturing an introduction between me, myself and I. At first, it felt like the entities I was introducing were in different rooms. But I was amazed at how surely and naturally my own voice and, even more amazingly, the other voice, started to flow.

It wasn’t like trying to create dialogue for a novel or a play. I’ve done that, and it was clearly an exercise in imagination. I’d have to think about each line, deliberately crafting it as I went along.

No, my silent dialog with myself felt, from the very first exchange, like an honest, unscripted, real conversation. I would say (and scribble across my legal pad) something spontaneous, just like what I might say to someone with whom I felt I could become good friends. And the response always came instantaneously, seemingly without the slightest conscious thought or device of my own mind.

ADVANTAGE MR. WILLIUS
Long story short, since then my alter ego and I have had many rewarding conversations. We’ve agreed that he doesn’t mean to hurt me or make me unhappy. He acknowledges that, being an amalgam of my parents, my brother and possibly a couple of other important figures in my life, of course he loves me and, in fact, wants me to be happy.

I acknowledge my tendency toward frustration and defeatism. He admits to tormenting me sometimes, as an impudent teenager might, simply because he can.

As for tennis, we’ve struck a sort of meet-you-halfway deal. If he’ll back off on the criticism, I promised, I’ll try to do better at appreciating and celebrating my small successes. Often, on my way to the tennis center, I’ll remind him of his end of the bargain and he reassures me he’ll be good.

Recently, I’ve even upped the ante and gotten him to agree that, while the absence of criticism is certainly welcome, maybe he could try a little actual praise on for size. So far, this is proving quite hard for him.

After all, he rationalizes, he’s never had a very good role model. Oh, give me a break!

HOW TO BE IN THE MOMENT – 101 Little Tips

TIP #33 

Value learning more than knowing.

 

Certainty's such an ill-fitting garment. It may have suited you once, 

but you and your truths have changed.

Asking, learning and simply being are all cut of the same miracle cloth; they fit you and the present moment perfectly and always.

YOU'RE SO VEIN – Japanese Beetles' Lacy Leafy Art

Sour grape leaf, a favorite of Japanese beetles.
Like spoiled kids with crusty bread, they insist
on just the tenderest parts—unaware, I'm sure,
the bittersweet gift they leave the eye.