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Letter I. The Pilgrim reread his life and tells her story.
in exile. Sunless morning of February 6.
My good friend Don Alvaro Ripol:
Two nights ago I had a strange dream, with great shock and then I opened my eyes was very hard to sleep again. Irrelevant to tell the dream, but tell you that in the long vigil that followed, you were-you-indiscreetly Silvia and present in my mind, therefore, conceived the idea right there you head a few words in a letter. Now when I sit down to write some lines, I wanted to tell you to start with since it was at that moment when I remembered something that I promised you the last time we talked. I hope that you will have enough literary sensibility to distinguish and appreciate the beauty of language written, beyond the coolness of the leaves.
By far, so good. This week I had a lot of work, meetings and more meetings, as I continue with my readings and try to acclimatize.
As many relatives, friends and acquaintances have sent me letters, this week I've taken on the task of responding. Just yesterday I finished sending the last reply. Why do not you had written, as I had promised.
I realize that the time of year when more writing is winter. As if to sharpen the intelligence and coolness favored intellectual work. Also, I've been very lonely in those days. In the wilderness of isolation, looking back, I have reread my story. Yes, I am born with some palm trees near the Caribbean Sea, from oblivion. One afternoon, amid the suns and unbearable heat, I make my way by my mother's vagina nubile to defiantly open its eyes and close them again soon.
was born dying. A month later I was evicted. But the life and ill will were stronger. Survived. I grew up. Here and there. Without many things but with many dreams and terrible longing to be free.
lived locked and medical care are redoubled. It was then I learned to sniff books, without even knowing read. On the great atlas of my father, riding my miniature Volkswagen (the best Christmas present I ever had) toured the East and Europe, passing the Bosphorus on a jump, down to the Peloponnese and then cheating, bordering the Adriatic crossing Po, Lucerne was a twist on castles and dragging me towards the Pyrenees. Memorized the rivers of Spain and the towns they passed the Guadalquivir, the Tagus, Douro, Ebro, Sanlúcar, Andujar, Sevilla, Córdoba.
When I got a boat, for my birthday, I undertook the expedition, and Danube in, I lost in the mysterious Dacia. In the distance was Transylvania, hidden and creepy. Cheating
, as always, out of the mess: in the Black Forest and had my Wolskwagen brought down from heaven and sat on the boat up to the doors of the Rhine, he did disappear again. Rolling, rolling, finishing my fantasies in the Netherlands and went to dinner.
hated soups. Creamed vegetables, onions, fresh meat, chicken, bananas, none pleased me.
When it rained out the window and count the drops. I think it was the rain that taught me what it is melancholy.
the evening, very early, said my prayers and fell asleep to the sound of the Fathers. "My guardian angel, my sweet company" ... and my restless eyes dimmed.
spent all this at high speed. Very early, as always, I left early from the mother's lap, the warmth of home to go find you, you and Silvia, in the mountains, announcing one morning with an unbearable shame, the heavy afternoon rain. We
respectively sixteen, seventeen and eighteen years out of puberty in a hurry, we had the same problems and shared the same fears. Thus, half way to this life of mine, more or less turbulent, we started our studies at that university in the care of the clergy.
As my old atlas, forgotten, consumed in moisture and mold, I flew with Verne, with Garcia Marquez, Flaubert, with Unamuno. Dostoevsky taught me the heart and meanness of the free world Sartre, Nietzsche saw his folly and Kierkegaard its brevity. Plato taught me to love poetry and Aristotle to hate God. Aquinas discovered the old Latin and French of Molière Malebranche. Augustine made me recover the ardent faith of children and their inconsistencies Marx. I spent my best years: reading. Read without prudence, without prejudices.
I think for my personal situation, by having a mind so restless, and then be able to establish contacts since childhood with people and foreign ways, I always kept a little distance from the tastes and habits of the lumpen words. "Sometimes I feel more in this exile-as distinct and distant, something of a foreordained. Perhaps a new Joan of Arc called to a great mission. I also hear voices. As the poet says: "voices that say, here come your troubles. Broken voices: your days are past now. They are ghosts, crowds of drunken ghosts. "
For people of my race I am full of outrageous sins. You see, when my ancestors, hungry for gold, settled near the sea, is believed convicted to die there forever. Pigs that gave light to lewd conqueror, who learned to live lost in the marshes, was born poor and shabby offspring of my father. Later generations lost in spectral time my mother was born without caste or lineage of its predecessors. Until I came along, the son of this spurious history. Of mine, I feel at times like this the most seasoned in the glory and the honor of men.
In a world that tends to uniformity, something in me insists on making a difference. It hurts my men, my brothers. It hurts the world and its misery. It hurts, it hurts immensely
Africa ... Would you 've noticed that this February we met seven years to have met? Have you noticed that since then life has changed a lot? One day, without realizing it, we discover that we're old and still not get anywhere. A life that condemns us: a distressing and harrowing sense of being and feeling always, always on the road. We walked and walked and the horizon remains the same, untouched in front of our eyes as the first day. There is perhaps another way out, but loving the journey and enjoy the thrill of the road. Perhaps in the end, when we fall exhausted and lifeless from our trip, some larger hands will pick us up and we will rest forever.
I feel somewhat ashamed to speak this way. It is my personal style, which I use with those I can understand my heart.
I hope your things are going well and you feel better in your new job. A secular school is best for you.
My friend and spiritual closeness accompany you. My thought is often you.
I await your response. Tell Silvia to write me, I do not hold grudges, I could not. I miss her so much. Be sure to take care. We need now more than ever.
With best wishes,
El Peregrino.
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