Uncle Pat's Window Seat

Day Five in Madrid . . .  Pretty much slept in this morning; got a slow start. Last night found J&J Books and Coffee on Calle San Bernardo (it's an English-Language bookstore, y'all; I'm going to need another book for the train to Lisbon Tuesday overnight), so today we bounded out of the room at the Crack of Noon and learned a little about the subway system of Madrid. We've been using the buses thus far. (And the feets.) Eighteen minutes later we're on the Plaza de Espańa. Serenaded on the train by a young man with his guitar who played a few licks, then went up and down the aisle collecting coins. Kathryn parked on a bench in the sun; I trucked across the park to catch the several-stories-high billboard for "Capitana America." Moved around to get out from behind a tree and wound up behind a different tree; had to move to the sidewalk. But I did get the (much edited) shot. Then I had to check out the fountain (la fuente). Oh! what a major scor...

Note on the culture of Madrid . . .  The Prado Museum costs 15 Euros for entry from 10AM to 6PM. After 6PM entry is free. The line for free entry starts around 4PM and is stretched around the block (it's a huge block) way before the 6PM doors open. I like it here.

Every day is an experience. I took the photo of the ornamental cabbage "tree" yesterday on my walk home. Breakfast: We get totally dressed, leave the hotel (hostal) and go to the bar on the corner, next door to our hotel's street-level door. We order hot water (Kathryn brings her own caffeine-free tea) and cafe-con-leche and a couple of sandwich-mixtes (fried egg, ham, cheese) and enjoy it with a score of other people.  Every day so far, a blind lady comes into the bar and stands smiling inside the door. One of the girls behind the counter goes and takes her by the arm to the stairs behind where we sit; this morning the manager marched over, offered her his arm, and escorted her through the bar. I believe she might work at the restaurant above the bar. Today we did the laundry. We combined our clothes into a single laundry bag and set forth to the "Lavadores" (washing machines) we located on yesterday's excursion. We stopped to pick up a ...

I have come face-to-face with my provincialism, and it's frustrating.  I've been thinking I'm so urbane and sophisticated because I was stationed in Spain and in Italy fifty years ago. "I have seen the world," after all. Then, on top of that I have friends who are LGBTQ and from every part of the world and who have ancestors from every part of the world, and I have taught in schools with over fifty languages in the halls . . . And I got knocked on my pompous arse just dealing with day-to-day here. Because the only stable part of my day is in my own head; I can't go back to my own house and sit. I can't cool off, decompress in my truck on the drive home.  My home is a third floor (European third floor) apartment, and I either walk or take the bus everywhere I go. I hunger for the sound of American English, a language I am facile in. My Spanish hodge-podges me by, often with a lot of finger- pointing, and I frequently have absolutely no idea what...

IMPRESSIONS OF MADRID .. .. .. Fifty years ago I was a Navy yeoman in a transport squadron station in Rota, Spain, at the Naval Air Station that's not there any more.  My wife and I have returned to Spain to see how much of the Europe that we knew is still there.  How much has it changed. These are the first impressions I was able to capture. I'll smoothe things out as I progress with these posts. one of the women at the bar where we had breakfast -----guided a blind lady who came in to a seat and took her -----order Kathryn and I went to find groceries . . ."alimentarios" are -----everywhere; a pear and a tomato here; pkg of tuna and -----pkg of peas there; couple of mandarins yet another  -----place and a blackberry "tiramisu" at a small bakery -----for dessert --- 3/8 mile around the block bazillion cars in the street, and everybody is walking Kathryn stayed in to do some bookwork, so I  -----took the bus to the MUSEO ...