Mike Humfreville
Super Nomad
Posts: 1148
Registered: 8-26-2003
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A Personal Library
We?re in Bahia de Los Angeles for a while now. Yesterday a friend came by to suggest that I might be interested in crossing the south end of the bay
for a short visit with a fellow living there. The purpose of our visit was not simply social, but to see and scan the contents of a tiny library of
literature..
The three of us walked along the beach to the library. It began to rain, a relatively light drizzle on a cool day. Large dark cumulous were filling
the sky. Pregnant drops of water fell from the heavens and struck me on my balding pate, trickling down into my beard and all in all feeling good.
Rain is relatively rare in the Bay and it was good to be walking the beach with compadres as nature wept. I reflected to my friends the event, in
1974, where a flash flood occurred near our old hut, just up the old road, where we were spending the summer, my wife and I before we had children.
While it is a private building, the library, an exterior closet really, contains many books, new and old, used, some read by many from the looks of
their faded pages and jackets. Someone had made a superior effort to organize the books and there were tags placed in the individual shelves
indicating the subjects of the associated books, of which there were thousands. The three of us scanned the titles and subject matters. There was no
rush, we were all retired and pleased to find interesting events to round out our day.
It was interesting to me to see the various titles and contents. It made me wonder about the personas, lives and experiences of those who had read
and then contribute their books to the library. I knew that the words once read had from time to time captivated the reader as part of a perhaps
small but receptive audience. To me, it?s always interesting, albeit a necessity to understand the writer in the fullest sense I can. We are, a few
of us, communicators or at least we desire to be, to bare unanswered thoughts and our souls at times to in some gray way, to enhance our universal
understanding of all things known or in some lesser sense, perceived by humankind.
The surrounding houses, scattered along the sandy beach in the shadowed peaks of Punta Roja, were as varied as I assumed their owners were. And the
writers as well. Many of the books in our subject library were intended purely for simple entertainment. There were a few reference books, histories
and tomes of literary comparisons only a dedicated student would care or dare to read. The inanimate books were just not so. They reflected,
actually brought to life, so many issues and concerns and entertainments of both the authors but of the readers as well.
But there is an abundance of time in this setting of the Bay. There is a distinct minimalization of external directly mental stimuli and one?s mind
commutates until it finds a focus of its own, typically tactile. It is a wonderful, fulfilling sensation, to have the ability to focus on smaller
than full-blown issues and concepts that was made available to me. And thus I chew on the more abstract issues presented to me from my two friends
audibly and the many authors who have documented their thoughts for future generations.
There is a break in the rain. Bright sun is flashing on the small swells of the south end. Clouds, moments before ominous and threatening, are now
billowing into wide patches of blue sky. Suns rays are turning the black water into turquoise, the lands? alluvial fans tan in the midday and after
the darkness of a fully clouded and darkened sky.
I departed my friends where I?d found them, each at their home. I passed back through the estuary, free of tidal flows for the moment and dampened
only by the rain. I followed the path of least resistance, bearing along the narrow prints and small indentions left for me by the cattle from the
Diaz Ranch. In my mind they were escorting me home toward Mary Ann, where magically Michael, Kevin and Carly might just appear in the next few days.
I was filled with the issues of morning at Bahia de Los Angeles, burdened by authors styles and subjects, and wondering if this slight rain would turn
our million hectares of shared desert a riper green with Ocotillo and Cirio flowering, and, still learning, about the contents racing around inside
the heads of my thinking friends with which I?d shared this mild if intellectual adventure.
Too much time is an impossibility if you have an imagination.
[Edited on 4-2-2006 by Mike Humfreville]
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Barry A.
Select Nomad
Posts: 10007
Registered: 11-30-2003
Location: Redding, Northern CA
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Mood: optimistic
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Mike-----
----to me, your last sentence says it all------in retirement now for the past 10 years, I feel that I have had no spare time at all---------I am
constantly planning my days so that I get the most out of them, without exhausting myself. It is fun, and never boring.
As always, I love your writings---------keep them coming, when you find the time. (-:
Barry
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Mike Humfreville
Super Nomad
Posts: 1148
Registered: 8-26-2003
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Thanks Barry
The more we integrate into the community, a blending of great Mexican and American folks, the more we love it. If it weren't for our boys I'd be less
likely to go home as often.
Thanks for the kind words.
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wilderone
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3779
Registered: 2-9-2004
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When you have a moment, could you please visit the library in town and let me know what it's like. When I was in the area in November, someone told
me there was a new library in BOLA. I have been collecting books to donate (in Spanish), but would like to know if they have a preference for
children's books, academic titles, if they would want any books at all in English, etc. Also, where they get their books - from the government,
schools, donations, a buyer who uses donated funds. Thanks a bunch.
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Debra
Super Nomad
Posts: 2101
Registered: 10-31-2002
Location: Port Orchard Wa./Bahia de Los Angeles BC
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As usual Mike, always enjoy your stories and thoughts.
wilderone: As of last month the library wasn't open yet, we stopped by and there were workers still setting things up.
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David K
Honored Nomad
Posts: 64493
Registered: 8-30-2002
Location: San Diego County
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Mood: Have Baja Fever
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Debra... where are you now?
Going to El Rosario this weekend and might run down to Bahia on Saturday with Chris and Sarah... they want to say hi and see Humfreville's place...
We will be returning to Baja Cactus Saturday night, but maybe we all can have a meal together at Las Hamacas or ??
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turtleandtoad
Senior Nomad
Posts: 730
Registered: 1-20-2005
Location: Wherever I park. See sig for current location.
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Mood: Good if fishing
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Mike,
Just finished your book "In the shadow of the volcano". Gread read, keep up the good words.
Mike & Robin; Full-Time RV\'ers
37\' Georgetown w/3 slides & 275 Watts of Solar Power
06 Taco TRD
www.turtleandtoad.com
I am here
To paraphrase Frank Lloyd Wright; I\'m all in favor of keeping dangerous weapons out of the hands of fools. Let\'s start with keyboards. --
Mike Dean |
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