some childhood battlefields

Today the yard was, again, the sea; Soldie Wilson scanned from the top of the cliff. Or the bedroom window, as it could occasionally need to be. The boy stood there, contemplating the imposing sight of the innumerable war ships towards the horizon, towards battle in all certainty, the battle of uncertain result against the fierce and ruthless Kitschelandian. He knew as he saw all this that there would be no super-heroes that would come to the rescue of the allied troops, not this time: they'd be engaged in other business in outer space, maybe, or in any case outside of this scene, maybe even not existing today.

The rumble of cannon fire in the horizon, Soldie turns around and rides towards his cabin. Bombs thrown by the Kitsches' war planes above whistle as they fall towards the ground nearby but he doesn't pay much attention; it is getting late, almost dark and the battle must be suspended and he must disappear into nothingness as they're calling for dinner and the planes, the ships and soldiers, the action figures and the dolls have to be put away. Tomorrow will be another day, another sunny morning good for the yard becoming the sea and maybe for a super-heroe to save the allied troops from disaster.

Miraflores and the setting sun (12 Jan 2004)

I have seen fairies. Without recognising what it was that I was seeing, as we often do. One afternoon on Avenida Sucre, on ,my way to the conservatoire in Santa Capilla, the sun low on the horizon, in front of me the white walls of Miraflores where the President of the Republic, whoever it may have been then, woud have presided over the roller coaster of trying to govern our tropical madhouse of a country. The guards, military police, the turrets with machine guns at the ready. The ever-gridlocked, snarled up traffic, the horns hooting, the flashes of temper, steam rising from the cars' bonnets. Traffic cops trying to direct the traffic, as ungovernable as the rest of the country, along the six lanes of gridlock on Avenida Sucre. And then, on the last bend as you could see the sun setting on the right (is this correct, or is memory deceiving me once again?) there she was. Normal eighteen, nineteen year old girl, somewhat hippie-fashion, brown hair floating in the breeze. And she smiled at me and I tried to smile back, shy person that I was, that I still am although I have learnt to deal with it to an extent over the years. Never saw her wings, never saw the minute tracery of burning stars after her feet in her wake. Just turned around and, in that expanse of nothing by the wall of the Presidential Palace, she was gone. Disappeared. Perhaps she suddenly realised she was in the wrong part of the world for elves or fairies, the South American Caribbean is a land of a different kind of magic.

So I continued my climbing up the hill to Avenida Urdaneta towards Santa Capilla, starstruck, pierced with a bittersweet arrow of longing for something i had never seen or known, somebody who probably did not exist, a vision from another world or from a dream, deaf to the noise of traffic, the whistle of the traffic cops, the radios in the cars blasting out salsa while stuck in the jam, blind to the Palace military guard looking at me quizzically, the lights changing now green, now amber, now red, the people beginning to pour out of the office blocks invading the streets, the shoe shines at the corner of Carmelitas offering their service to the passers by (but not to me, with my long hair, torn jeans and boots falling to bits), the street vendors peddling trinkets or voicing 'El Mundoooo' but it was not the 'world' that they were offering but just an evening newspaper instead...