both sides of the bike

i posted 50 or so bike flyers and he took most down following right behind me. why sir? well i was a punk, or some sibilance of one, is what he pieced together. a grade above graffiti artist, yet dressed in relaxed fit blue jeans and a button down shirt. he, a local merchant, accused me of uglifying his street and ultimately bringing down the neighborhood. me, the guy who had attended more neighborhood planning and association meetings than anyone else in the city, this side of the private sector. no sir, i thought to myself, we're actually on the same side so stick with me. i've spent nearly the last 12 months designing and constructing a major historic chunk of your streets, complete with fancy new light posts, on the hope that a few more punk kids will come next year and cover the brushed aluminum finish with a flyer or two. just imagine it sir. at some point you won't be able to manage it all and the streets shall runneth over with people doing all of the things we didn't plan for them to do. you won't know what to do...I actually failed to say most of this and stood somewhat receptive to his own speech. he went on how the new bikers in the area were hurting business, with which i managed to inform him of the following week's transportation planning meeting. take that! in the end we were both a little thrown off though that we'd both taken the offensive arguing for the same thing. by the way, after hundreds more flyers did make their way around the city and almost all our energy expended to get it there, the second bike summit was a success.

meanwhile i'd been training and raising money for my MS bike ride to across the coastal plains. six months ago i embarked on that with the purchase of an actual road bike, and the following pedal clips and florescent paraphernalia that would go with it. i knew it'd be hard both physically and physiologically to, you know, be a cyclist instead of just a guy who bikes. i in fact had been taking it a bit too casually throughout the summer in exchange for other agendas, but the early days of fall were spent with my crotch hugging the frame coasting and climbing the hills of bexar county. and then on the big weekend, i found that yes i am comfortable in my skin tight uniform chugging pickle juice and applying butter to my shammy. 150 miles into it, as my team and i turned a corner to see a bay bridge below and the comforting corpus christi skyline backdropped by the gulf of mexico i realized that i'd be back next year and maybe at a faster pace.

but for now i'm back to just the guy who bikes.

so ironic, it isn't and so un-ironic, it is

So Austin is weird. I get it. I like it, yes, but it's no longer mine. I go there, visit, eat my share of urban delicacies and I'm reminded with each neo-dive establishment that I'm not as cool as you. Even as I spend a three day weekend at a huge festival and blend in among them, I'm the explorer stumbling across the beautiful person microcosm. It's more foreign with each new high rise condo that appears and with every familiar face that leaves. I feel more like a stranger each time I come home.

So SA is lame. I understand. We passively watch pro wrestlers in for a glimmer of pasión and have generally relegated any smattering of comunidad to the chunk of year between Fiesta and NBA championships. For years, I know, the urban renaissance has been underway, but this rate of rebirth has pushed our pregnancy into a fifth trimester. As I've found myself well into el gremio, it's time to create that which we've always wanted. With each high rise hotel taking over downtown, I find another action/cultural/planning event and recruit troupes for the eventual Battle of the Alamo Gifts Shops. Community gardens, neighborhood planning meetings, bicycle coops, and the whole grab bag of cliche liberal ammunition that it takes to push back against our own momentum. It's underground, by certain measures, but the people in power are dropping phrases like farmers market in increasingly regular city meetings. This week I watched my old SA neighborhood passionately presenting for historic designation and everyone in the press room felt something we hadn't felt in a while. I think this is going to happen, my friends, but we must look to our neighbors a la norte and figure out what we're willing to do to get there.  Let's not forget where we came from.

portlandia

northwest is a buzzword that strongly hits the hippest of nerves. the birthplace of coffee, hacky sacks, and platonian philosophizing, they’ve had us believe. hell i think they invented the pine tree, right? it’s with such questions heavy in my heart that i bought a plane ticket just two days prior to my excursion. i’d be like a modern louis and clark cultural expedition, except i’d transfer planes in denver.

the greatest thing about last minute airfare is it forces you to spend the rest of your trip frugally. i’m talking about foraging for berries, frugal, which was the case not long into a long beautiful hike. i’m talking about walking the streets and seeing where they took me, and who would take me in. i was lucky to have three semi-random hosts willing to free up some floor space and a wealth of comfortable park benches during the day.

rachel was generous enough to pick vicki, mark, and i up from the airport, drop me off to explore, and save me from cold and starvation the first night when i hadn’t set up a home yet. my first full day in portland was spent with rachel and vicki mostly outside of portland, driving across the beautiful countryside in search of hot springs. a locked gate and closed sign only encouraged the determined women to delve deeper into a village of naked men. upon their discovery, the gay men’s retreat politely asked us to leave and call ahead next time. gladly they didn’t ask us to leave the boy. the path home afforded the rare american work of alvar aalto and a chance at sneaking into a countryside wedding.

farhad drives an orange 1978 mercedes van complete with built in kitchen/bathroom and friendly pitbull/ridgeback. living behind an old house in the newest gentrified neighborhood of the NE, he had turned a garage into an apartment, the diesel van into biodiesel, and my preconceptions about portland on its end. it’s deeper than cool graphic tees and fixed gear bikes. it’s about, if i may, people doing it yourself. sure, that leads to a sampling of clichéd urban burritos stands, but it’s all individuals deciding they want something and in turn making it. these are not your father’s lazy hippies, but the most entrepreneurial of the gen-y. there’s a certain energy in the air i felt biking through hordes of artisan market shoppers. farhad himself, was making a living my buying and selling cars month by month, and retrofitting the rest of the diesels in portland to biofuel for an ambitious fee. thusly, he has a web of former and future clients spread around the various neighborhoods all involved in their own like minded projects. that said, i’m still not convinced the entire city can keep up. for every well meaning light bulb shop, there’s yet another hip baroque children’s boutique, and yet one less black family. one more pizza place, street car stop, and displaced family. the crime has moved away, so that the white people can safely talk about darfur. somewhere between, around true genuine intention and positive outcome, i found the rebuilding center. it provided the pot belly stove to farhad and thousands of other reclaimed pieces of portland’s past. if they are going to change, grow, move at this rate, the people at least know where they’re coming from.

After spending a Saturday night with a hundred interrelated Persians in the suburbs and wishing farhad good luck with his newly purchased boat, I was back to nomading Sunday claiming park bench space for my busted backpack and weary legs. a scrap of paper and half charged cell phone held whatever chances i had for shelter. couchsurfer sarah, like an angel, pulled me into her already overbooked home by downtown. I’d be staying with three other random travelers that night so i dumped what i could and left her to what ever quiet time she had. she left me with a new scrap of paper detailing the hiking trail that would lead to the aforementioned berries and beauty. hours later and still shy of my planned return i wandered out of the woods into yet another great neighborhood and its local movie theater. for two hours, i was there, living in portland, not visiting, not urban exploring. i just sat and laughed. meanwhile sarah worried for my return and left me vibrating voicemails telling me it was safe to come home. and there was home, warmly lit with three and a half total strangers who i’d all be sharing stories with into the night. rose, dan, shir, and marc all staying with sarah on NW 18^th, fourth floor, examining the fantastic social project we’d undertaken. by the next day, i’d have critiqued rose’s vintage clothes shopping, listened to shir’s israeli military experience, and been woken up by the news of dan’s late night bike accident. we again left each to their own adventure and i headed out for one more full day of getting my fill of portland. by bike, trolly, and tramway i covered the largest areas yet and collapsed in the architectural section of the book store that had by then become my most steady address. i called sarah, she mostly asleep from the emergency room night before, didn’t really remember who i was, but simply asked “do you want to come home?”

tired, and better off because of it, i was ready to go home.

when it rained, it poured

for months straight it rained and kept us inside as best it could. it deterred the dryest of plans, possibly took away my internet, and got my socks wet. within the cumulonimbus cage, we pressed on and gave it all we had until it gave up. it's done and thus with this little patch of 110 degree sun i'm making a break for it. let's head west, he said, and with that i bought a last minute ticket and packed a bag.

Summer

the girl in her summer dresses

it’s funny how sprawling by your closest window unit can bring up memories of san antonio summers past, each one surprisingly different in this city that never changes. then again differences are easily measured against the likenesses. the day again belongs to a development company in florida, dealing out scissor trusses by the handful. somewhere in there though i’m preparing to run meetings at city hall. the nights spent studying have simply switched from texas judicial procedures to certified wood ratings, yet are thankfully distracted by someone strumming songs on the couch. and the spurs, god bless them, win again giving way to downtown pandemonium of which this time i contribute. it’s a little less observation and a little more action.

riding around in strangers’ pickup beds through an ad hoc humid parade of late night gridlock kind of makes you feel like you’ve arrived…we’ve arrived…with decorative brooms in hand. it’s everything we’ve been working for. lying around by that humming AC let’s you wonder what’s next.

either way, let’s ignore the electric bill until october.

Architects!

22,000 architects, months of preparation, a former Vice President, and a contingency of dedicated locals showed that maybe, just maybe there's hope for architecture and San Antonio over the next few years. For now, the convention is over so let's all take a breather before we get too busy.

Happy May

The last throws of April showers afforded a four day eye in the storm in which us San Antonians poured out of our respective barrios to finish out Fiesta just as strong as it started. Front porch gentility meets back yard wrestling in our holiest of secular celebrations. Sushi and beer alongside strippers and renaissance art on a Thursday night give way to roof top hammock naps overlooking the city skyline. Hanging off neo-classical confetti covered cornices proved the perfect perch for pitching pastel eggs at parading sneaker clad debutantes. The same Friday followed by comped chicken,waffles, and bike rides to meat packing plants and haunted VFW halls proved to be the best paid vacation day ever. Saturday set a new standard for sedintariness as the three block stroll between a keg laden porch and a historic neighborhood fair became my only challenge. Foot long corn dogs on the other end were a worthy carrot on a stick. That mustard stained shirt should never be washed.


Then in the final hours of Sunday sunlight, the rain returned to soak every kickballer on our makeshift field. We played through the downpour to an 11 or 12th inning until the roasted corn stopped roasting. There, covered in butter, mud, and more confetti I saw that fiesta was over. Someone likened Sunday to the last day of summer where the sun sets and the credits roll under voice overs letting us know where the motley group of sandlotters would end up for the rest of their separate lives. Luckily summer hasn't yet started.

fiesta 2007

sometimes when in the middle of something memorable, it's good to pay extra attention to each minute as each minute passes. that vacation, that ice cream, that city wide festival, that something will all be over soon enough so why not appreciate it as much as possible while you can. sometimes you know exactly when that thing is coming to an end you can only dedicate so much to it, or just as likely you dedicate that much more to make up for it approaching end. letting the fact that it's raining during fiesta shouldn't short change the thrill of throwing confetti eggs at your senator as she floats by on a regal barge. the zydeco band will actually make you want to tap your foot if you really want to listen. go ahead, follow the spontaneous motorcade down the street and through the big wooden doors to discover a theater full of little girls in pageantry and old women in funny hats. you're probably not going to get that chance again. the city is alive and so are we so let's live a little and worry about cleaning up cascarones later.

where does one begin? (and where does one end?)

I keep busy. In this "City That Never Sleeps...unless it's after 10pm," I've at least stayed out past 11 a handful of times lately. In fact I think we've all gotten past the point where we're reverse psychologically self reinforcing our own cynical lame existence to feel ok with ourselves in the mirror. I'm ok, you're ok, and all the royale Us are actually doing great. I'd like to avoid the need for insecure comparisons to cities just north who manufacture quirkiness at an impressive rate. I'd like to avoid them, but they're just making it too easy?

This previously mentioned Royalty is dissolving from the nebulous theory that kept us going, into a full fledged chunk of a town. They're coming out of the stone work. Per happenstance you meet one person who certainly knows another whom certainly is somehow related to that guy you once went to that thing with. By the end of the weekend, you've seen one person you don't actually know 10 times and can't imagine life without them. It's grassroots monarchy at its best and most incestuous. Weird social networks aside, the city of San Antonio most defendable when at its closest. The Bike Summit pulled in upwards of 150 people, many of whom actually hadn't met before. Now they have and We are better off. Don't even get me started on the power of a kickball.

Of note though is these youth of the republic having grown up, graduated, and are increasingly getting jobs, money, and their accustomed leisure time. We're well off, creative, and We don't want to get bored. That's the root of our beginning and inevitable end to it all. That's what's bringing down the hip giant up north. Too much, too soon. Too white.

And apparently such precedents have been set before. On the eve of the greatest ironic uniting force this city shuts down for, I find this article...of course Char makes an appearance. Fiesta brings us together, but it's not all we are. It's time to refocus on what really matters - eating pounds of oysters that have been sitting in the sun for hours with my fellow Antonian acolytes. I look forward to finally getting baptized into the family.

The Motorcade Diaries, pt. 2

Over 10 days in the middle of March, I traveled through coastal Mexico into the mountains of the central states visiting various cultural sites and the many bathrooms of government run gas stations. It was beautiful, surprising, tiring, and fulfilling. Led by an anthropologist Dr. B who is the definition of wise, twenty of us drove thousands of kilometres between five cars and five cb radios. Together we represented a cross section of America, or at least of South Texas. I tried journaling when possible and can't guarantee the names of towns or the accuracy of the Spanish I tended to slip into. I pick up the trip now in the last few days...

Dia Seis
We had one last huevos rancheros and left the Taselotzin co-op by 10am. I want to point out how luscious the landscape is up in the mountains. Everything has something else growing on it. Flower pots are moss-welded into the soil encrusted stairways. Trees are cut into posts, lined into barbed wire fences, and then these posts sprout into their own trees formally lining the perimeter of fields with succulent smelling pink flowers. Coming down we dropped off one of the local students back at his school in San Miguel. Further down the mountain a couple of our ladies dropped in on some 90 year old woman they'd made friends with a couple of years before. The series of towns and buildings through the hills seem very archipelago like, yet instead of water it's 150 tall pines sprouting autumn like shades of pollen on this last week before spring. The landscape changed quickly outside of the mountains though we remained above a mile mile elevation.

Our next stop were the expansive Aztec ruins of Cordona. Here the settlements were countless paths, walls, foundations, and pyramids all made of dry stacked volcanic rock tightly snaking up the topography. While there we witnessed the governor's helicopter take off with some Texas writer whose name I recognized at the time. Other than that we had the ancient city to ourselves.



Somewhere between our location of Tlaxcala and Cordona we stopped at a random puebla to hand out school supplies at una escuela. The elementary age students and their teachers were a tad shocked at the randomness of cinco coches full of 19 Americanos y un Australian taking over their playground with gifts and broken Spanish conversation. I met a little muchacho named Marco and others who I whipped out my Mexican child play time bag of tricks. These little uniformed ones also loved using my camera and could kick my butt in soccer. We left as quickly as we'd come and their clean pressed white collars and green sueteres pressed against the chain link fence dicen "Bye! Bye!"

By sundown we'd made it to this much dryer region of Tlaxcala and I had pescade con queso blanco y camerones. Our table capped it all off with the sharing of a deadly chile chased with tears and pats of butter.

Dia Siete, Ocho, y Nueve

As with anything, these past few days showed that even twenty person ten day road trips across the interior of Mexico have downsides. Right now I'm fending off a head congestion shared by most of our troupe. And during this final stretch back north, the arid plains of northern Mexico do little to cure a stuffy nose. Before I digress further into Mexican misery, I want to say that this trip has ended as well as it started...Since Wednesday I've laid awake all night with chills and a racing heart beat, been collectively involved in a wreck that coincided with a dead battery and broken alternator, gotten stuck in Friday afternoon traffic in Mexico City in which we were pulled over by two cops, been scammed out of thousands of pesos by that second cop who most likely was fake on account of his tow-truck-squad-car, and did I mention I nursed a horrible fever last night in a roach ridden hotel room with a fiesta jamming in the parking lot outside and standing water puddled around the bathroom's central drain?

However, the wreck happened in front of an insurance office, an alternator was quickly rebuilt by the town's Chicago trained mechanic, the roach puddle hotel had a couple of English channels to drown out the parking lot party, and anything else in between i can just chalk up to experience building. Furthermore, the food just keeps getting better, namely a hamburger I want to make mention of containing string cheese, pineapple, and chipotle sauce. The mayo slathered roasted corn and three scoop ice cream did little to help my allergies, but they tasted a lot better than the thick Mexican decongestant.


As for all the other travelers, just at the point where everyone seemed to tire of everyone else, Dr. B has remained cool and humorous enough to keep us on the same page and sharing great stories over our long awaited Frito pie dinner.

Tomorrow I'm home.

The Motorcade Diaries, pt. 1

Over 10 days in the middle of March, I traveled through coastal Mexico into the mountains of the central states visiting various cultural sites and the many bathrooms of government run gas stations. It was beautiful, surprising, tiring, and fulfilling. Led by an anthropologist Dr. B who is the definition of wise, twenty of us drove thousands of kilometres between five cars and five cb radios. Together we represented a cross section of America, or at least of South Texas. I tried journaling when possible and can't guarantee the names of towns or the accuracy of the Spanish I tended to slip into. I pick up the story having already driven deep in to country...

Mexico Day Three
The hot springs after a short drive past ravines. The pool reminds you of Barton Springs, but with more therapeutic water falls and cattle. It's all warm and sulfury. Right outside I might have been swindled for a few chile rellenos, but being taken advantage of by old Mexican women in a rain forest is that bad. Even if we never left the car I'd still be content looking through dirty car windows.
Next stop we ate lunch underneath a string of trees running along a downhill street surrounded by goats and beauty. Here we saw el haciedna de Santa Anna y mas. This was luxury back in 19th century Mexico, complete with courtyards, finely carved furniture, geese ponds, and the largest tree I've ever seen in my life. It was Myst-esque to say the least. However, it's amazing how much better people could live back them compared to how poorly most of the country lives today. Then again i prefer to concrete ram shackles to most of the current luxury homes found stateside.
Into the afternoon I saw my favorite museum yet in Xalapa. Nothing by Olmec and other native artifacts housed in an airy cascade of smooth marble galleries. Mixed in too were covered courtyards with a mixture of bird echoing through the open air building. After the long walk through I found the expansive lawn and dozed by a troupe of young Mexican string players.
Quick dodging through winding puebla calles brought us to Coatepec and our personal bedrooms. For the first time,
we ate out as a group. My cecina was cheap and somewhat outstanding, but not far from what you could get in San Antonio. Outside the restuarante, the city plaza was very much alive on this Sunday night. Against normally rational judgment, I spent the next couple of hours walking back streets with my camera. The focus was "dimly lit storefronts and what life I could find behind them." The later it got, the dimmer the streets and the stares I received. I used what Spanish I had to lighten my presence and found those first gente wondering who the hell I thought I was were muy hospitable. I'd later learn that gangs and prostitutes were just emerging during my street walk, but before long I was back at the hotel gateway with the guys discussing architecture and San Antonio.

Day Four
Between swimming in hot springs and lounging on expansive lawns, my legs became home to a couple dozen chiggers. The stop at Texolo falls easily cured me, though. After all of the little ravine and fern shots I'd taken at 70 kmh we were in the middle of Tres Cascadas near Xico early in the morning with it all basically to ourselves. El centro casacada fue un grande vista. Further in el primero cascada seemed fit for Lord of the Rings or Windows desktops. Of course i took as many fotograficos de eso as I had en la todo trip, but I promise not to blow it up for a poster over my fireplace. Even more memorable, all the paths and walls connecting everything were rough hewn stone stacked and stained by years of tropical growth. No matter how old everything was, it's hard to carbon date even the more obviously recent objects. Even a newish restaurant tucked down a trail that I almost missed was as good as old. Honestly it's not historic. It's not modern. it's just what it need to be.
The rest of this Monday was our slow trek across central Mexico away from Xalapa ad the coast. I took over driving the Jeep and learned my best to navigate a meandering network of hill towns streets and the accompanying pot holes. Past the towns up into the mountains, the quaint streets turned to cliffside inclines with larger potholes. The aroma of burning brakes overwhelmed the tropical aroma. Up and down a few thousand feet over a couple of hours put us at where we're at now. Not surprisingly Dr. B has brought us to a fascinating co-op motel Taselotzin with open verandas and more stone paths. Dinner gave us sopa de orga y quesadillas. Dessert was a hesitant group mariachi sing-a-long. It took a few dias, but I'm actually usando espanol to speak to locals and extract information. Conversaciones between otra gente speaking are somewhat understood. This trip is....good.

Day Five
I speak Spanish. Somewhere sometime I took a few classes years ago and somehow my straight A's actually mean something. After a huevos rancheros desayuno, we were free to walk into the town of Cuetzalan. La plaza y las calles were filled with people, children and dogs. Actually, the dogs seem as busy and determined as the people, impatiently crossing la calle y passing you on the sidewalk when you're too slow. As for mi español yo coompro gifts from a couple of aggressive abuelitas. A tortillas warmer, an toy acorn top, and a scarf all for amounts cheaper than I would get in Estados Unidos. The issue is, I've been told to haggle con Los Mexicanos. However, conozco que ellos son pobre so why shouldn't I pago concuenta pesos instead of vienti cinco. They can now afford another week's tortillas and I can save a dollar off my cable bill.

Dr. David Brye, un professor de universidad san miguel arranged our five day lunch with a few local families in what would be the greatest lunch experience ever. Off the highway, through una puebla, and down some back calle were their dirt floor concrete homes filled with Catholic knick knacks and the smell of pollo de mole. Served in old plastic bowls. The single chicken leg was drenched in the smokey sauce with a side of hot corn tortillas in place of a fork. (Said tortillas also became much needed napkins.) For a while the group in our casa ate quietly trying to navigate the fatty poultry pieces that were probably freshly plucked from the chicken that morning. It took someone asking to see the kitchen for the cultural experience to commence. We saw the hanging meats, the hiding children, and scrap dogs bustling in the back. Our small familia's casa's cinder block beds were pushed to the corners of a small room lit by a single glass block skylight or dangling compact florescent.
The next casa over housing the others was home to not only the neighborhood maize grinder but also shaman/chiropractor of sorts that had been arranged to heal Robert of a slipped disk. Watching this with his table of burning candles was nearly spiritual. The silence of everyone watching amidst the bustle of children and chickens outside was a healing in itself.
Next, the man's son or daughter, both young and one being pregnant sold me a few stones and fossils I assume to help pay for burgeoning family. They were proud and young, no more than 18 either one, so the idea of haggling in my Spanish was only so successful and left me with another guilty feeling. I tried adding an American object to sweeten the tradeoff, but there was nothing in my bag I wanted to remembered by. The following few hours we blew our schedule to play with the local niños that had slowly built up on the sloping street. A couple of our women handed out balloons and historic British war plane post cards. Did you know that the famous fighter "The Pink Lady" translates as "La Mujera Rosa? Well now little six year old Alex does now.The boys were particularly fond of my camera which was further elevated by the addition of a telephoto lens. The instant preview was nearly priceless. All together, during our three hour stay I maybe spoke 20 minutos de inglés. Them being only children may have helped. I was knocked out for the remaining afternoon back at the dorms, after which a troupe of musicians played for dinner and everybody danced.

i'll miss you most of all, chicken

i am now at my fifth apartment in the last 14 months. those keeping track since i started this travel log in august '04, i'm up to mailing address number eight. even sending out a mass email at this point seems ridiculous for all those who even try to keep up. if anything, that email address is home, right? what do they expect in this world of short attention spans and globalization. we're a transient generation and we're just beginning to make money. look out for us.

well here's to electric alarm clocks and a bright future at my new home just down the road.

satxvatx

from the 16th floor at the corner of 6th and congress, you can see a lot of austin. honestly i'd never gotten much higher than the top level of the union in my 5 years there. that compounded with the city developing faster than google alerts can keep up with, made me feel as if i'd stumbled upon some new discovery. i knew the city was no longer the city i knew, but i wasn't fully aware that i'd be playing a role in austin's rapid decline/incline. luckily my lack of involvement in the meeting at hand allowed me to ponder such things from my designer chair in a slick white room against floor to ceiling glass eating designer coffee cake. you can't look anywhere without a crane obstructing your view. it's disgusting and exciting that i have a part in it all. minutes later we rushed the meeting over to south congress, ate hip sandwiches, and toasted the whole damn thing with fair trade coffee. i spent the day amongst the power playing architects, developers, and marketeers deciding what will be cool in austin's future. in doing so, i became the prototypical austinite seven months after escaping. forgive me father, for i'm a marketing sector.

before dark i was back at my san antonio washateria reveling in the warmth of laundered socks.

see the world

I think I'm now an international movie star, with less of an emphasis on movie and star. See thewaronthem.com episode 4 to witness San Antonio's contribution to Eric and Bobby's two year trek around the world.

See couchsurfing.com learn a bit more. See the ghost tracks on the south side to reenact our Tuesday night adventure. See the deserted bridge on the east side to see a good view of downtown. there's still a whole lot out there, but i broke off a good sized chunk.

lesser known basements of san antonio

I spent a portion of yesterday underneath the city. Down winding stone stairwells devoid of functioning light fixtures, the manager of an old Mexican restaurant was directing me to the expansive but mostly empty basement of his circa 1870s building. It looked as if no one had been there in a couple of years, and I'm sure I was in a privileged minority of those who'd ever been down there. You could see some streaks of light coming from street level and hear muffled traffic and frozen wind above, but for the most part it felt very foreign. He guided me around for a minute showing the building extents, vent locations, and other architecturally necessary facts, but I was ready for that arc of the covenant to be revealed behind a pile of rubble. The fact that there were random holes dug in the sub foundation didn't so much spook me as the puddle of red liquid that caught his flashlight. Red soda leaking from the restaurant above was his explination, so we'll leave it at that.

The historic civic center of Texas is the reason for all of this. I've somehow landed some amount of responsibility lately in forming its latest incarnation. Working on something historical in this city feels good, but knowing that your every new move is making the newspaper and thus angering your barber is challenging. The chance to make history is shared with the chance to screw history so let's tread lightly here and try not to sever ties between San Antonio and the Catholic church.

On the other side of the plaza, a nun was winding me through underground stacks of vacation bible school binders. According to her, there used to be a tunnel between the bookstore and cathedral that had been sealed off within the past few decades. Seeing that the church is the oldest cathedral in the county, I can pretty much say I was just feet away from the bones of Mary Magdalene. They've already got Davey Crockett down there anyway. The sister and I actually spent a majority of the time down there discussing the future of the plaza. I'd like to help her out, but she seemed to think otherwise. I went back upstairs defeated agreeing that I'd keep her updated. On my way back outside to the sleet covered plaza I was questioned again, this time by a little east European nun. I explained what I could to her, still feeling like the bad guy, after which which she mumbled an east European reply and handed me a card depicting a woman saint. I think she said something along the lines of "she always seems to help people out." I thanked her, stuffed the card in my jacket pocket, walked a couple of blocks, slipped on the icy sidewalk, and lost the card somewhere along the way.

how the west side stole new years

Geographically, San Antonio sits on the south west corner what sociologists and college sociology students call "The Texas Triangle." This mega-region, as I can now call it after having learned the term last week, is one of amongst 10 or so similar areas around the world growing at a rapid pace. Everyone in Texas is for the most part found between DFW, Houston, and SA. Knowing that, and seeing that this state is the cartographic measure of how land large other countries are, there's a lot of empty space. It's in that feathery space between the high rises and dirt that one finds the south and west sides of San Antonio. In a city that never makes the national news, these neighborhoods hardly make the local news.

Friday night brought in the latest late night high life bike ride here in town, along with thousands of Alamobowlers and a huge storm system all convening in front of the Alamo around 9pm. With rough approximations of rain gear, we set off in hopes of escaping the weather and crowds. As the next few hours played out, we were half right and spent a good deal of time biking through the dark streets and drive-in theaters of the south side mostly soaking wet. The eventual stop at Jack the algebra teacher's old house brought in space heaters, Mexican hot chocolate, and a piano that no one really knew how to play to formulate one of the best things one can do in Texas on a Friday night. I have no idea where in town we exactly were at that point, and the return into the storm afterwards did little for the breadcrumbs I left, but I'm sure I'll be back at his place at some point in my life.

Last night's New Year's celebration put me on top of a rotting mansion roof, sipping champagne, and nursing my newly strengthened bronchitis. Before the Tower of the Americas even had a chance, the entire west side of San Antonio had lit up their back yards with the greatest fireworks show I swear anybody had ever seen.