Category: Real Personal History
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Below The Equator IV: A Day at the Recoleta Cemetery/ Among the Serene, the violated…and Evita
[Abandoned poster display outside the wall of the Cemetery of Recoleta, Buenos Aires. The advertising is gone, but behind the wall, the city’s dead remain. Photo is mine] My biggest fear in life is to be forgotten. I cast my dreams aside to fulfill those of others. ~~Maria Eva Duarte de Peron (Evita) Readers, you…
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Below The Equator III: Getting Down to Business in the Big Garden
[Yes, I’m thirsty. A statue greets the park visitors, offering a drink. Photo is mine] One touch of nature makes all the world kin. ~~John Muir There should be no doubt, dear readers, that your host and blogger has had a few stressful days upon our arrival in Buenos Aires. You’ve read how painful the…
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Below The Equator II: The Incident At Gate 47
[The afternoon of January 2, 2025 found me sitting on a sofa in the lobby of a Hostel. Photo is mine.] Some travel is more of a nuisance than a hardship, but travel is always a mental challenge, and even at its most difficult, travel can be an enlightenment. ~~Paul Theroux The original title of…
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Below The Equator I: I Don’t Need A Reason To Go To Buenos Aires, But I Have A Few
[A Gaucho. Source: Wikipedia.] In Llama land, there’s a one man band And he’ll toot his flute for you… –Come Fly With Me. Songwriters: Sammy Cahn/Jimmy Van Heusen. The song is referencing Peru. In Buenos Aires, tango’s a must, Even pigeons here dance in the dust. Empanadas so good, you’ll shed a tear, But watch…
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Coal For Christmas
[Another year. Another Christmas. I republish this every holiday season with a tweak here and there. This story is true and I am passing it down to new readers and my two children and my grandson. Every story from our own lives or the lives of those we once loved…every story is worth telling. There…
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Ooh, Paddy: A Boy Sits In The Grass Near His Grandfather
[My grandfather, George Hotchko. Photo is from the early 1970’s. Credit: Daniel Egan.] Oh, I dunno, Paddy. Sometimes those stories keep me up at night. They make me uncomfortable. ~~Spoken to me by my grandfather, George Hotchko. When I was a little boy. 1950’s. Part 1-Meeting my grandfather… Yes, the title. Of course I’m the…
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A Dark And Sad Anniversary
[Steve’s grave. Monroe, Louisiana. Photo is mine.] The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there. ~~ L. P. Hartley On Friday, November 22, I will step away from whatever social engagement I may be involved in…and I will look up to a cloud or maybe a single star. And I will remember.…
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The Journey’s End 3: Inside Wimborne Minster-The Man In The Wall & The Chained Library
[Wimborne Minster. The Church of St Cuthburga. Wimborne, Dorset. Photo is mine.] The day we find the perfect church, it becomes imperfect the moment we join it. ~~Anon Where heaves the turf in many a mould’ring heap, Each in his narrow cell for ever laid, The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep. ~~Thomas Gray Elegy…
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Aethelgifu, The Teenage Abbess: A Peak Inside The Walls Of The Shaftesbury Abbey
[Gold Hill, Shafesbury] Silence isn’t empty, it’s full of answers. It was a chilly day, this fourth day of October. Chilly and windy. Mariam and I had just had a very enjoyable lunch with a former student of mine, Sally, and her husband, Matthew. Sally was in my Geography class when I had the joy…
patrickjegan 