The rains have gone but the sun dances through the sky with a thousand veils, each a fantasy.
It is tempting to walk with my head in the sky to observe this dance and figure out the various shapes and movements. Alas, other things have demanded my time.
I had a visit with a traumatologist this morning concerning pain in my shoulder. It is so cool here for me since I have private insurance and do not rely on the public system. My monthly fee for that is not even 200 Euros. And it gives full coverage with no co-pays, though I could have paid less and accepted co-pays. There are also no bills coming later.
Today, I got lost and had to get off my bus and walk for maybe half a mile to get to the right place in the Vithas private hospital. That walk was a delight with the clouds and different views of the massive castle on the mountain. I was alone with the sky and almost alone on the sidewalk.
I was called right in. The doctor, a woman in her late forties probably, sat there cold and formal daring me to try to chit chat, cuz I like to do that and humanize a bit the visit. Oh well, I did get a half smile out of her at one point.
She reminded me of my barber, though he is a man with thinning black hair swept back and an angular face. He is also quite terse and un-talkative. Business is business and so unlike the kinds of interactions that take place in bars and cafes/
I have gotten him to converse with me and he has been a great source of information about aspects of Alicante’s life, since he is born and raised here. So I imagine the issue of the stiffness and stern look is related to formalness and time and place. I will have to come back and report after I have been here more.
Still, I get a kick out of breaking through that with delicacy so as not to offend,
In the cafe this morning, while eating my bowl of yogurt with granola, I read an article tangentially related to this that almost made me cry as it cut a little close to my own fears and anxieties.
It was about and 84 year old man in the city of Valencia some two hours away from here by train. Since his wife died he had lived alone. People saw him in cafes and bars, and walking on the street, but he had only formal interactions though people described him as pleasant.
He was just one of many older, retired men walking or sitting alone in the streets as the day passes by. They often seem unfocused, though at first—after my life in the university—that struck me as a luxury, a delight.
Most men still have focus that I can see, even if I do not know the details. José, for example, who I have written about before, has a round he makes every day with his walker.
We exchange sentences now and it is wonderful to see the light blooms in his face, eve if the sun is off at a club some where dancing dirty. José is focused on keeping and improving his ability to walk. That is a superb goal. Of course I do not know what else occupies his time.
Seeing him and his smile when I greet him always makes me happy.
Another man, a much younger one who is probably a Latin American and only recently came to Alicante, maybe five or six months ago, I see in cafes having his breakfast which always includes a coke and alcohol.
He dresses as if a musician and at first said almost nothing to anyone. He is opening up. Today I saw him brightly ask the woman who serves at an Argentine cafe how she was and he called her “mi amor”, my love, with a bright and even flirtatious tone in his voice. This made me happy as he had really seemed lost and self medicated with booze when I first saw him.
Anyway, back to the article in today’s El País. The man they described had disappeared fifteen years ago and nobody noticed. He was invisible. The firemen broke into his apartment yesterday in a mid rise building and found his skeleton in his bed. He had died, alone as he had lived.
The journalists wrote about how before he disappeared he had been getting more and more disheveled. His clothes dirty and wrinkled and he, unshaven, his hair uncombed.
It is so easy to lose yourself in your emotions and thoughts while that slowly happens to you,
There is another man, an Scotsman who is in his early eighties and a fairly recent widower. He is an engineer by training and has lived all over the world supervising projects. He recently returned to Alicante, alone.
He had lived here before and it was a happy time in his life so he returned though his children and grandchildren live in London. He does not wish to give in so easily to the entropy of old age but is seeking a revival, even if a small one.
As a result he came to my English language book group, a bit poorly groomed. We talked and he told me his story and desires in a thickish Scottish brogue.
He has become a valued member of the group and is active in reading the books, discussing them, and joining people afterwards to go to a bar for a drink.
Like him, I have made it a point to become part of groups and to develop social relationships. Unlike him, I also make it a point to not live alone.
By nature, I am just a bit of a loner and have a social anxiety. Those are things that I have to actively work with and against because I am very aware that if not, my fate could very well be that of the man who passed away alone, in his bed, in Valencia.
The battery of my laptop is about empty, and I feel like going outside to chase the clouds myself and enjoy a bit of the playful sun.
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