Viva Harley Davidson!

This morning my husband and I witnessed an amazing event. The 16th annual Eurpoean HOG (Harley Owners Group) Rally that was held in Fuengirola, Spain, one town over from ours. The rumor mill told us there were 7000 Harley Davidsons registered. I don’t know if there were that many, but the parade that made its way around the town took well over a half hour to fully pass us by. What a spectacular spectacle! The shine: chrome, polished paint, handlebars, engines, wheels. The black – leather, t-shirts, vests, boots, seats, saddle bags, helmets, bandanas– and orange Harley logo. The noise – rumbling, purring, roaring. The riders: old, young, fat, thin, long haired, bald, grey, blond, bearded, shaven, men, women, rugged, polished, Spanish, English, Irish, Scottish (with kilt and all!) French, Italian, German, Danish, Belgian, Finish, Portuguese, Dutch…and those were just the ones I saw. There was a unique camaraderie and uniting thread, that made thousand of people of all ages, nationalities and walks of life come together to show off, admire, spend money on and enjoy the machine of machines.









This Harley phenomenon is a unique one, and not owning a bike, let alone a Harley, we definitely felt like outsiders who wanted in. I wondered if the marketing plan from the early days had pictured this as their objective or if the clever management of Harley Davidson picked up the phenomenon and built on it through remarkable marketing and branding. It is a sight to see, an example to study!

I compared the morning to a visit to the Prado Museum in Madrid: if you were to see a small collection of the masterpieces you would be impressed by each and every one, and spend a long time admiring each piece. But when you are surrounded by thousands of marvelous works, you become saturated and pass them by without paying more than a few seconds attention to each one. It was a remarkable show of masterpieces in their own right that we thoroughly enjoyed. Not to mention an offering of the best people watching we’ve experienced in years.

I wonder what my father would have thought of his once yuppy, urban-sophisticated daughter, feeling a camaraderie with a bunch of bikers, and wondering what she would look like in black leather and a halter top on the back of a Harley?

From my peaceful mountain, I hear goats bleat in the distance, a strange overlay to the traffic I can now hear. I’ve walked back up from the ravine where mountains on all sides keep out those road noises and where I can still feel isolated, calm, peacefully alone with nature. The goat bleats louder and two baby bleats respond. It is the season, I have seen many shepherds with their goats and sheep on the mountain sides that flank the busy roads I travel. There are cranes and new development all around here on the coast, gradually replacing our natural back drop, so I love seeing these few reamining herds and solitary herders with their dog as only companion, even if between billboards and flags for soon-to-be-built luxury residences. I love the few hillsides left, still Spring green and covered with wildflowers, that nourish these creatures with the mediterranean herbs and grasses that give a special flavor to their milk: milk that gets sent to local co-ops for Manchego, de cabra, mahon, tetilla, Spanish cheeses made from sheep and goats milk in some proportion or another. So bleat mother goat, find your kids, for without them you would not produce milk, and without your milk your commercial reason for being would evaporate and then what become of you?

Tribute to my Dad

With Fathers Day approaching, I no longer have a card or gift to send, weekly phone calls to catch up on, someone to chew over Redskins results with, but I have warm memories of all that and more. In tribute to my Dad, who left this world shortly after a wonderful family Christmas gathering at my brother's two and a half years ago, I copy below his Father's Day gift from me from 1999. He said it was the best gift I could have given him. Wish I could give him another one like it this year...

MY DAD

He's a cool looking guy. Just under six foot and shrinking, a bit heavy around the middle, but that's his trademark. He's always been that way and I couldn't imagine him differently. His salt and pepper beard gives him an intellectual, or perhaps bohemian, look. Both are also accurate descriptions of the man. His dark eyes light up when he smiles and his laugh is contagious. He looks relaxed and unhurried.

He's been lucky in life, able to earn a good living around airplanes, the passion in his life. He and his wife made a decision a few years ago to make flying their priority (before it was "in" to re-evaluate your priorities and get out of the rat race) and readjusted their lives to achieve that goal. They know what they relinquish to fulfill their desire to fly and don't worry about it. I admire them for that! They can't be bothered with what others think or say about them, and I admire them for that too!

His material needs are few although he indulges in some of life's best pleasures, good food, good wine and Jack Daniels. I learned to appreciate the enjoyment of sharing a well-cooked meal with interesting company around the table from him. A wonderful dinner and a fine bottle of wine forever inspire conversation, debate, analysis, or reminiscing when he's at the table. An old Spanish refrain says, "Some eat to live and some live to eat." Happily he taught me how to fit into the second category.

He also taught me about football. I impressed many a guy in high school and college with my knowledge about the rules, strategies, players, statistics, and the like, all thanks to our dedicated Sunday afternoons and Monday nights. (Nobody likes to stay up that late at night on their own on a Monday) I still remember lighting a fire late in the afternoon on crisp fall Sundays, a cup of hot chocolate and the Redskins game. If it were against Dallas, so much the better!

He's a country-western and bluegrass fan, to the core. But don't give him Garth Brooks; give him Hank Williams, Charlie Pride, or classic Willy Nelson, but he'll take Vince Gil and George Straight too. THE CHAIR - one of my favorites, and I'll never forget two stepping to it with him in my living room in Spain. Or, two stepping with him in the bars in Ft. Worth when I lived in Dallas. Of course we laughed over songs by the Oak Ridge Boys, the Bellamy Brothers and Billy Ray Cyrus. Country and western lyrics are often a good source of laughter! They were also a good source of communication when I was in high school.

The best compliment paid to him, as a father, and to me, as a daughter, was something he said a few years back. " I'm lucky. During 18 years I gave you two kids the base on which to build your lives, and now I have two responsible, law abiding, and interesting adult children, who never gave me any serious worries. I couldn't tell you how to live your lives or what to become, you had to find that out on your own." And so we did, and when we're able to come together to share all that it's a wonderful experience.

I sure miss those wonderful experiences Dad...Love You Forever

G8 vs. Grass Roots

If you read my I Believe piece below, you will see that I believe that a grass roots movement i s "threatening" the traditional power brokers of the world as we know it, and will in our lifetime bring about fundamental changes. The news today from the G8 summit in Germany supports my theory. 16,000 security personnel and a 12km (7.5 mile) fence, which I heard this morning cost 25,000,000 Euros, have been employeed to protect 8..EIGHT.. world leaders (and their entourage I assume) from over 10,000 protesters.

What does that say about our world. How many people's lives could those 25,000,000 Euros spent to build a fence significantly improve...and what did that money actually do for those EIGHT lives? Save them????? I wonder......

In latest news reports it seems the protesters have gotten closer than security planned, expected, wanted, and the leaders are surrounded, their wives have had to cancel excursions. Maybe they'll open their windows and listen. Or will they just close their eyes, look the other way and play deaf?

G8 vs. Grass Roots, I root for the underdogs..all 10,000 and counting of them.

Night in the Gardens of the Alcazar of Sevilla

In the glow of twilight the lavender flowers of the jacaranda form a pearly lace against the ink blue sky, like a Sevillana dressed in her mantilla for Semana Santa processions.

A sacrificial cypress has given its trunk in support of a soaring bougainvillea whose wispy branches cascade magnificently to the ground in sprays of magenta.

The kissing branches of the colonial palms and native eucalyptus form a portal to the stars. The moon slowly nudges into it, hesitating in a golden mist. Then, more confident, she moves into her full glory, shimmering white and bold as she fills the whole portal. Her diamond light becomes a fleeting canvas for the lace of the flowering jacaranda.
I watch her continuing climb in awe of the performance I am sure she has orchestrated just for me. A moment of intimate admiration passes between us before her non-relenting ascent allows the stars to re-appear through the portal, seemingly fainter and more distant under her brilliant light.

The palms, cypresses and eucalyptus dance homage to this rising moon in all her fullness, carrying the heady scent of jasmine and lavender on the breeze.

The golden lights of the Giralda – majestic and powerful in the distant night sky – convert hungry bats into magical bronzed creatures, seemingly protecting the sacred tower from evil invaders as if in a fairytale.

I am enchanted and under the spell of these Moorish gardens that connect me with a place in a past I somehow know but cannot remember. Another life, another palace, I cannot quite describe, but these gardens and these scents, I know they have been in my soul forever.