OFF TO PORTUGAL

I will not be posting for the next two weeks. Why?

I'm off to Portugal today. It is a last minute change. Annie Gunn, the girl of sun and song, invited me to accompany her on a two-week excursion through Serbia, Montenegro, Albania and Macedonia. She is not the traditional tourist who visits England, France, Italy and Spain. She wants to lose herself in a sea of Slavic faces.

I thought about going along for the ride because I need a break from Brownsville, but I'm almost seventy and she's in her late twenties. I enjoy taking her to La Pampa for dinner and drinks, but I don't have the energy to keep pace with her over a fourteen-day marathon. Her libido surpasses a man's. She imagines that she is a slab of concrete and she expects the performance of a jackhammer, oftentimes insisting on morning, afternoon and evening poundings.

I can't hit a fastball anymore. In fact, I can hardly swing a bat. She appreciates me enough that she will occasionally lob me a slow-pitch softball and I can drive a liner into the alley, but I'm simply not in her league. I find release in women who experience an orgasm with a peck on the cheek. Sex is a young person's game.

Instead, I'm flying to Lisbon to meet Estanislao Contreras, the infamous author of Chicano Fuck Songs. He is writing his Hispanic manifesto: The Tomato Picker. It's a satire about all the Mexican-American politicians who believe working in the fields during their youths qualifies them to be public figures.

"While my buddies were leaving school in the late spring and not returning until the autumn when classes had already started, I was playing my guitar and hanging out at the Island," remembered Estanislao.

"I was blacker than they were at the end of summer, but it didn't come at the expense of an aching back. My dad had a tendajo and my mother worked at a school cafeteria. We didn't have all the finer things in life, but besides mowing a few white people's lawns, I hardly broke a sweat.

"As a result, I never became a hypocrite. These politicians we have now have forgotten their roots. It was one thing working for gringo masters back then, but it's pretty sad when they continue to work for gringo masters today. Of course, they are well-compensated for selling their souls."

Be that as it may since my amigo is an iconoclast, some might say it's a sad statement when I would rather spend time with an old buddy instead of  a young thing. But if you have the money, there are many attractive and inexpensive Brazilian prostitutes whom Estanislao claims only charge $50 and they're never in a hurry. And my bro adds that it's a great way to practice Portuguese.

Estanislao is renting a small apartment off Avenida da Liberdade near Restauradores Square. He has been there a month and he claims that Lisbon is an easy city to learn and the public transportation is excellent.

The culture, the history, the architecture and the cuisine are second to none he insists. He says he has already become a regular at a couple of bars in the Alfama District where the best Fado singers perform.

I plan to spend four of five days with him, then I'm going to take a two-hour train ride to Coimbra, the country's ancient capital and most famous internationally for its university. Coimbra rises on the banks of the Mondego River that empties lazily twenty-five miles later, in the Atlantic at Figueira da Foz, a hot spot that is more locally oriented although it is quite popular with the English.

Estanislao counseled me that I can buy an inexpensive guitar over lugging one across the pond. He says that I won't have any problems finding a venue because the Portuguese love to listen to English. I expect to cruise between Coimbra and Figueira for three or four days.

I will finish my trip in Porto after another two-hour train trip, this time from Coimbra. Many foreigners who aren't attracted to the southern beaches of the Algarve argue vociferously that Porto is their favorite place in Portugal. Whether it's taking a cruise up the Douro River and visiting the wine country or enjoying the night life in one of those cities that never sleeps, it's a happening ambience.

I have studied Portuguese for years and have interesting conversations with myself by merely substituting a few Portuguese words for Spanish words. I listen to bossa nova all the time, so I have this delusion that with minimal effort I could defend myself in Portuguese.

I have thought that I might want to be an ex-pat in Portugal. But I have one unconquerable obstacle: I have a fourteen-year-old son who needs his daddy. And his daddy needs him. There are many who call me a "culero," but I'm also "culeco." As it is, I'm going to miss his first two football games as a freshman at Veterans, but I discovered a deal that I couldn't pass.

As I mentioned in the introduction, I will be off-line during my travels. I will take a notebook and a pen that glides across paper like a skater on ice and explore my own literary creativity. When I return after Labor Day, I should be ready to take my place in the vanguard of the powerless rising against the excesses of the powerful.

Bon voyage.