2/23/25 Jazz n Butterflies

Lessons in humility while learning spanish: A real life exchange
Me to my doorperson, Guadalupe, in perfect Spanish “Ugh. It’s cloudy. Do you think it’s gonna cry?”
Guadalupe “Yes, I think it’s going to rain.”

Settle in kids, this week’s blog is gonna be a long one.

A few weeks ago I mentioned happening across an old timey jazz band in Plaza Rio de Janiero. I liked them enough that I dropped a few pesos, grabbed a card, and became Instagram friends with one Yule Torres (actually Uriel) who has like 3 or 4 bands attached to his Instagram and no sign of an events calendar. But I thought, you know I’ll reach out, I really enjoy this music, I think my parents would too. Lo and behold, a rapid response later and I am invited to a jam session tonight, well, Tuesday night. And this suited me. After a week of being exhausted by work, a day of walking to release, Monday was my heavy cry and talk to friends day, on Tuesday I was ready to be out.

And it was magical.

Every Tuesday, in a small cavernous cafe deep in Navarte, people spill out of the archway entry onto the sidewalk with beers and wines and clarinets and accordions. It’s a picturesque corner. There’s a park. The streets bisect at angle lending additional charm to the scene. A sign above Cafe Gaya Scienza (thanks Nietzsche) reads “Donde puede ser y estar”. I immediately fell in love.

Uriel, from instagram & above playing clarinet, chatted with Fran and I and then realized that we’d been messaging and so he introduced us to a bunch of the folks there and let us know that this was their 88th Tuesday jam session. It was so warm and full of creativity and life. I felt a little like maybe I found my tribe. They played jazz standards, like Don’t Mean A Thing, If It Ain’t Got that Swing, riffed into gypsy jazz and jazz with a distinctly Mexican flavor. Here’s a taste:

There are answers I want that I don’t think I’m likely to get. I’ve been happily assigning myself the victim role and tallying his transgressions, but I know that’s not strictly speaking fair. I know I was imperfect. As I try to construct a way for my brain to understand this sharp divide, I wonder over and over and over who was more to blame? Caveat: this is a stupid question. Blame is not the point. Blame is not useful. But, I felt my self doubt blossom in this relationship and my confidence wane, there’s a way in which I very deeply no longer trusted myself. And I don’t know if some of that was healthy, I don’t know if that was you being so unwilling to share that I just felt like I was constantly guessing, I don’t know if that you finding fault, being mean, was a part of it, was intentional, was protection for yourself. So there’s an element where blame feels empowering, regardless of whether it rests with you or with me. It offers clarity. There’s a way in which blame is how I recognize the changes I want to make, the boundaries I hold moving forward, and in that space, it feels useful. Maybe I will move past blame, just to understanding, in fact hopefully, but I’m not there yet. Right now truth feels murky and I hate how much I feel like I can’t trust myself with the past. I cling to a few concrete examples where I know your perspective was literally wrong. 1. That time in therapy when you told the therapist that I’d filled our whole weekend, but we were going to a movie you chose, to Bryan & Jennie’s for dinner and to a Healy family gathering. When I pointed this out. You paused. Turned to me and jokingly said “Gaslighting, gaslighting”. You didn’t apologize, you didn’t even actually say I was right. 2. After the divorce bombshell, you accused of trying to take all your money when my proposal was literally less than half our shared assets. And those just happened. It’s not subjective. It’s quite concrete. Whenever I racked my brain trying to truly remember how something happened, you told me I was keeping score, which we all know is somehow bad. Though I felt like my goal was simply to ground myself. I don’t think I explained well how our opposing memories screwed with my ability to trust myself. I’m not sure I explained it well to myself. So these moments where you undeniably demonstrated that I could trust myself became very important. I know people are shocked when people get divorced and that “you don’t really know what’s going on behind closed doors”, but I should have known. You owed me that.

In adventurous in eating news: Fran and I finally braved the wait at Expendio de Maiz sin Nombre, a non restaurant project that does not accept reservations, where Jesus serves you elevated memories of his childhood in Guerrero. This tiny project with 5 tables & a michelin nod, features no menu, you are asked if you have any allergies, you are asked if you want a beverage, you answer alcoholic or non alcoholic. Like most restaurants here with an emphasis on farm to table and traditional plates, it is a corn heavy feast. You are simply served and when you’ve had enough, you stop and are gently peer pressured into dessert. There’s a rhythm and Jesus announces what you are about to eat and the story with it to the whole of the restaurant. I couldn’t make it past plate #4, which I’m a little sad about because 5 was a rendition of molletes. The food changes very frequently. A woman who had also been earlier in the week told us it was a very different menu.

Butterfly day is here.

So… monarch sanctuaries. Apparently monarch butterflies return to the same spot, more or less, every year, embarking on a 2 month voyage from Canada and the USA to central Mexico over 4000 miles away. As you might have suspected, butterflies don’t generally actually live that all that long. For monarchs, the course of a year sees the rise and fall of 4 generations. Three generations only live a matter of weeks, but this one group can live up to 9 months and they head south to the Oyamel (Sacred Fir) forests.

There are two areas, one in Michoacan and one in the state of Mexico, where the monarchs migrate, the latter being infinitely more accessible from the city. This expedition was with the same crew I’ve gone hiking with and included a visit and lunch in a Matlatzinca community. The Matlatzinca are the indigenous people who populated the Toluca Valley. These are a distinct people who had their own cities, beliefs and language prior to being conquered by the Aztec empire in the late 1400s. They now have this one town that remains theirs and in which they teach the Matlatzincan language, one of the most endangered native languages in Mexico. It’s a small farming community tucked in between massive pine and fir tree covered hills. We stopped in the morning to pick up our local guide, Moni, and to eat some delicious tamales. The masa was really fluffy, almost mufifn like, and the colorado mole filling was divine. You do not get a picture because I ate mine too fast.

And then we walked and walked and walked up hill. Most of the way was best described as on logging roads, the forest interrupted on occasion by small farms, one tilled field and a tin roof slapped on an out building. We branched off to a narrow trail. At this point, we’ve been going very uphill at around 9500 ft and nary a butterfly. But then as Moni ran ahead a flurry of butterflies flew up in the air around, dancing in the sun. A bit further in we found them. Cluttered heavily, weighing down branches, their wings closed exposing the light orange and brown side of the wings. They favor the oyamel trees on the sunny side of the hill. The sanctuary is rustic, simply a clearing with logs and neon pink tape marking the off limit areas, handwritten signs warn you to watch your step for butterflies underfoot.

We spend an hour silent, looking up, waiting for the sun and subsequent frenzy of butterfly flight. Between bursts of sun the butterflies land, packed in on tree trunks and branches. Everything orange is a butterfly.

After a tromp back down we enjoyed lunch in town and began the long trek back to the city. Which was trafficy and ardous, but lovely and featured extremely welcoming dogs at the gas station.