#205 / 2011 June Oaxaca: Meeting the Neighbors

MY WRITING BUDDY
#205

I can't look at this view without thinking of my writing buddy Kurt Splitorff. I've never met anyone like him before, but always wanted to. I like to mine people, dig out their information. A wise man once said,"It is easy to learn from your own mistakes; it takes a wise man to learn from the mistakes of others."

Kurt was international. I met him on the first night I got to my room. He was a fixture out on the opposite end of my balcony, smoking a good cigar and writing or reading. He was a short story writer, really talented, very John Cheeverish. The first night we met we discovered our mutual enjoyment of Proust.

He lived all over the world, modestly, like Beatlick Joe would, in places like Indonesia, exotic addresses. He swam, he wrote, he smoked cigars and drank cheap wine. He was great. Not handsome in a conventional way, and not for me, but indeed his friendship and camaraderie were an essential part of my experience in Oaxaca.

He had a Sam's Club card and invited me along to shop. He taught me how to ride the buses and get to the good grocery stores. What a pal. And I descended into all my bad habits, against all my well-intentioned plans, drinking and smoking  cigarettes. I can't even believe it as I say it but after twenty odd years I actually went to the store and bought a pack of cigarettes. May God forgive me. Grief can make you do weird things.

But I came to my senses and eventually I threw the cigarette pack away. Kurt said I should have given it to somebody. But I wrestled with it all, smelling all that aromatic cigar smoke wafting across the balcony. We sat our there with glasses of wine and smokes and whipped each other into literary frenzy as we read our journals back and forth with each other. He was a tough critic. I liked him a lot.