We Haven’t

Forty-one year later in Málaga

Brighton Beach 1985

Life is short, have fun. My father said it so often it stopped sounding like advice and started sounding like a fact about the world. He's the reason I went to London in 1985. London is where I met Walter. Forty-one years later, I'm flying to Spain to see him.

In my carry-on: a passport, a charger, and a photo from a beach in 1985 of four kids who couldn't have guessed where they'd all end up.

Walter is Austrian and Spanish, lived in Bombay, then Sri Lanka, then Mallorca by the time he was a teenager, speaks five languages, and somehow the two of us became friends for forty-one years and counting. We corresponded for years — yes, with actual pen and paper — before losing touch. We found each other again on Facebook, and since then we've reconnected in Chicago and in Paris on my birthday in 2019, which was grand.

The Moroccan mountains are visible from the balcony when the weather is just right. The lights of the coast sparkle across the water, just there, while you stand outside with a glass of wine in your hand. That's how far south Málaga sits — close enough to see Africa.

We opened a bottle of cava. Then another. The wine is Anna — from the vineyard of a friend's cousin, a sentence I'm still turning over this morning, because of course one of Walter's friends has a cousin who makes wine.

We stayed up past midnight reminiscing.  As we wiled away the time I said something to Walter about how much London had changed since our “Queen Elizabeth College Days.”

"Of course it has," he said. "It's been 40 years!"

Forty-one, I corrected him.

"41? 41?" He laughed. And then, quieter: "Of course it's changed. But we haven't.

We're still the same.”

A note from the writer:

I'm having difficulty writing this because there is too much content. What started out as a blog post has brought forth a flood of memories that can't be summarized, and I've struggled with whether to post anything at this time, for fear of not doing justice to the story.

So consider this a teaser. I'll eventually break it down and give more context of why my dad had his "life is short" mantra, more of Walter's fascinating background (with his permission), the rest of our visit, and then on to London.

More to come.