1.  Greg, the Artista

Robert came ambling around the sunset corner of the small park.

Here in Sanpancho the locals call it the “Old Man and the Boy” plaza. This is because of the marble statue of an old man seated on the bench with a boy next to him. They comfortably face the Dominican Church. According to legend, these two are timeless figures. In Sanpancho, Mexico, time is really not an essential thing. Some people keep time, sometimes they pass it. It is no real measure of the day….. So nearly all of future is but a dream, and all that is past is a legend!

Robert walked in from the past into a new dream. A self-proclaimed artist sat on his chair in front of his studio. Evening was nearby and it was a good time to sell art. Art is same as fish, it catches best at dusk.

“Hola Greg!” Robert saluted the artist. “Hola!”

“Como estas?”

“Bien Rob, bien! Just dreaming of Kans’ city! And you?” asked Greg. “Dreaming of Death!” said Rob.

“Oh! How is it, pretty wild?” Greg asked. “Nah, just above average yet!” said Rob.

“Well keep on it man. Should turn to be a knockout!” Greg advised.

 

Rob waited without a goal. The thought, the idea that death could be a bombshell beauty! He slipped standing, reached for the jackfruit tree next to him. For balance, for authenticity. The large spiked-skinned fruits spread aroma. They were high up. He was higher. This new stuff was cool.

 

Eduardo got it from the hills. Not the regular hydroponic shit. The kid is a classic. Hustler, smart, quick, short, this Eduardo. Dark. Diamond eyes.

Greg saw Rob was gone…. Inside his head, sideways up, quite far. Greg longed his legs out straight, folded right neat over the left. Triangled his hands behind his head.

“Rob, let go of the tree!” “What?”

Greg’s canvas chair creaked. “The tree! You’re gonna hurt it!”

“Oh yes!” Rob let go. Rubbed his hands, shivered his shoulders, got cold. Suddenly that tree was a ghost.

 

Greg smiled. He got a kick out of Rob.

 

The gallery lights were already lit behind him. Though real early in the evening…. This was because some turista lady had called earlier.

Interested in some of Greg’s pieces. Mainly bluish, some green. Yellow, black, orange, sprinkled here and there. Local landscape patterns of Mehico.

 

Rob looked down the stretch. The road suddenly fell into the beach inside Rob’s mind. Whoa! He winged his arms out. Regained balance. Sky purpled on teal Pacific water. Nothing else mattered.

“Hasta luego!” Rob walked on by.

 

Greg laughed.

 

Conscience is strange. Rob aimed to melt his body straight into that sunset. But he saw something out of the corner of his eye. A lovely figure exited Greg’s studio. Side door, tiptoeing onto the back alley. Lovely and young. Disheveled hair, chrome clouds, slippers in hand, darting out of view. Like a broken thermometer mercury jumping on gravel….

 

The turista lady came as scheduled. Man, rich people are always on damn time! Okay, alright, she was beautiful. Not just her three-rowed pearl necklace, and her pearl-drop earrings, and her matching bracelets, dressed in silk white, milk silver hair…….. Not just that. She was truly sensational, you

couldn’t take your eyes off her. She was regal. You know, stately.. , a

romantic queen! Straight out of 1920s’ movies. Not old, in her low sixties. Statuesque, marble breasts, mild perfume, great etiquette. Her daughter was equally pretty, in her late twenties, green eyes, calm and aloof but proper. She held her mother’s hand. “Allison, how about that one?” She pointed to a medium sized piece hanging on the wall….

 

Greg had money once. Money has a fragrance. He smelled it. But he had no clue about women. Purposefully so. When his third wife left him for his second wife, he understood. This life is a polymer. Stretch it, bend it, wash, reuse. He was shrewd though…. He didn’t try to kill himself or try to make sense. He donated his substantial wealth. Soup kitchens and animal shelters. Then he neatly crumpled up his life, like plastic for recycle, packed and left. But one cannot forget how money once was…..

 

He automatically fell back to his learnings. He nodded to the women. The younger girl nodded back. Money nods different. They walked the two rooms of the gallery.

 

“Tell me why you paint?” asked the mother. Greg was startled by her voice. Part windmill, part waterfall. Something of an echo.

“I don’t really know…” he said.

“Come now, we are buyers. We want to know. Modesty is unfit for creation, wouldn’t you say?”

Greg thought he was there. Preferred that he was not. Where is that damn Rob? Jesus, he could use a hit!

“Well, I have nothing else to do!” he said.

The lady smiled. Amazing. The gallery brightened immediately. She pointed.

“I want that one,…. that one,…” Greg hurried.

“No that one… ”

He looked back. “And yes that one!”

 

Rob turned from the beach. He walked back up the stretch. Left his state of mind at the ocean by the dark. A golf cart sped through his mind. It was Jimmy Chim, the local realtor, trademark Stetson hat on, Hawaiian shirt. He went waving. Rob raised his hand to wave. The hand got stuck on air. He tried pulling it down. No use. He kept waving as he walked.

 

Greg was carrying some pieces down. One looked huge. It could decorate all four walls of a room at once. Rob was there in four steps to help.

His hand came down just in time. “Oh hey gracias, Rob!”

“No problema, amigo! You be rich!” “Nah, I be thankful!” said Greg. “Where all these going?”

“To rich people places… I suppose!”

The two men leaned over. Carefully placed the pieces in the back of a humvee or something. Rich people vehicle. They drive on roads imagining terrain they would never travel. Poor people can raise a family in them! “No, the other way please!” came the command.

Rob looked back. There was the most beautiful woman he had ever known or seen! She looked at him. His existence became simple.

“Yes sure!” He complied, turned back and said, “My name is Rob!” The lady smiled. Rob felt he was part of her light.

“How old are you?” she asked. “Old enough!” Rob said.

“Can you lead me back to the passenger’s side?” Greg stood stuck to the street. The lady was blind! Rob took her hand. “Sure!”

“Nice and strong you are!”

Rob felt he was being flown by a graceful white butterfly. Rob vaguely recognized the younger driver. He had seen her somewhere recently…. It clicked, that broken thermometer mercury!

 

The SUV rolled out…. Then stopped.

The windmill, waterfall voice called. The two men approached from opposite sides….. as if the vehicle was a rock, and the two men, part of one stream.

 

“Mr. Artist, don’t ruin my daughter. I like that she loves an older man…. I am

legally blind, but I see!”

Greg felt he should have died.

“We live on Gringo Hill. You two can come and visit!”

“Sure… re!” The two men heard each other at the same time.

The vehicle lights arrowed out. Through the narrow bricked, restauranted street into the dark, out of Sanpancho. The two men stood still. Life was bustling around. The perros ran about. There was a slight chill.

 

For Greg it was an amazing fear. Rob just followed the light. All men are simple. Simple as they are sweet.

Women? They are collectors of men! Some they discard, some they keep.