Denver is as I remember it. It’s a concrete sprawl, and the outer fringes are no fun. The town I grew up in is now a soccer-mom sort of suburb, with safe schools and large shopping centers. We drive through it on the way to my brother’s in Denver proper. He lives in an apartment in the sort of complex we made fun of as kids. “They all look the same!” we’d exclaim.
We drove six and some hours to get here, and we had to drive over the continental divide on the way. We hung out with my brother for a little while, and I got polis.nbtsc.org back on the air after a power supply in the router nearby did something strange for the second time. We went to meet my ~aunt Rosemary at her apartment, not far, but nearly 20 minutes in the car.
Rosemary isn’t actually my aunt. My family survives my mother’s parents divorce, remarriage, large plurality of half-relations and step-relations by simplifying things to any of cousin, aunt, uncle or grandparent. Rosemary was my mother’s maid while she was a child in Argentina, and followed my mother’s mother to the United States after they moved back. She’s from Bolivia, originally, though she spent most of her life in Argentina and the US. She’s now in her seventies (And going on fifty!), and has a wicked fun sense of humour. We went out (through an hour of Friday evening traffic and hellish parking near an Oktoberfest) to the Buenos Aires Pizzaria, and stuffed ourselves on empanadas after a good half hour wait to be seated. Another drive home, not so long, and I’m rather glad to have wireless and my laptop to chill out with before bed.
It’s fun. I really want to travel. I want to go to Argentina again. We talked about the small-scale terraforming of Mendoza, Mendoza, Argentina, immigration from Bolivia, the hassle of Argentine bureaucracy and trying to get a passport for an immigrant (Rosemary’s mother, 90 going on 70 but not able to live on her own anymore). We lamented the restaurant not actually having a real yerba maté on the menu, and laughed and joked about our mixed-up family and how long it’s been since we’ve seen each other.
Tired and happy, I guess, but mostly wishing I were in Ridgway now. I come out to my dad’s side of the family tomorrow. Unless they’re so dense as to not notice. But that won’t happen.