Tracing My Love of Books

I always tell people that I became a writer not because I went to school, but because my mother took me to the library.
Sandra Cisneros

I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library.
Jorge Luis Borges


My first home—which nostalgia has since consecrated—was an second-story apartment on Olive Street, near the intersection of Grand and Vernon Avenues, in South Central Los Angeles. The city block on which I once lived no longer stands; the land was ceded to allow for the expansion of Vernon Avenue School, the first educational institution I ever attended. And although the building I spent the first seven years of my life was razed long ago, I find great comfort knowing that it succumbed to a cause that’s sacred to me.

Across the street from my first home, on the northwestern corner, was the neighborhood’s public library. Before I could even walk, or so my mother tells me, my father, who was an avid reader, would take me along whenever he needed yet another book. And he went there frequently, as I clearly recall.

And, regardless of the many years that have slipped away between then and now, from the recesses of my earliest of childhood memories I can still conjure up the feeling of being in a sacred space, on hallowed ground, where grown-ups spoke in hushed voices amid the comforting smell of aging paper. I remember feeling utterly safe while inside the building’s red brick walls; and a blessed sense of peace filled me as I strolled down the massive aisles—at least they seemed so to me back then—picking out books to leaf through while sitting on the carpeted floor.

My time there was so luminous, so full of discoveries that I came to believe that the bookshelves surrounding me, poised as tall as mountains, held the sum of all human knowledge.

These short voyages of my early childhood, holding my father’s hand during the short walk from my home to the library, are, without a doubt, the first steps on my journey toward becoming a writer.

Since my Olive Street beginnings I’ve spent countless hours in mammoth libraries, some of them larger than cathedrals, gathering knowledge from—as well as finding inspiration in—the writings of others.

Yet, in spite of my affection and admiration for those vast sanctuaries of wisdom—including the Library of Congress—I will always trace my love for the written word to that small South Central Los Angeles library that, according to the search I conducted online, no longer stands today.

The Pleasure of Guiding New Writers

Writers will happen in the best of families.
Rita Mae Brown


I’m teaching a course that I’ve grown to love. This year, Balboa Academy, under the auspices of the Continuing Education Program of the University of San Diego, is offering “Introduction to College Writing.”

In the class there are twenty students—eighteen seniors and two juniors. I’ve taught this college course many times before, particularly while at Florida State University-Panama, but in reality I lacked the full experience to do so effectively because I was unaccustomed to writing short pieces, having devoted most of my efforts to producing book-length works.

Fortunately, however, since I last taught this course I embarked on the adventure of this weblog. The practice of writing for this medium has made me realize how little I knew about the skills writers need to produce brief, readable personal essays. What’s more, over the past two and a half years that I’ve been experimenting with short pieces, I’ve developed a deep affection for this genre. And thanks to my newfound love, it has become easier for me to pass on my enthusiasm to the students.

I’ve enjoyed watching these bright young people grow, and rather quickly, as writers; and I’ve taking great pleasure in seeing them start to think like experienced wordsmiths. What I’ve particularly liked are our critique sessions, performed in a workshop format; the class discussions stand as evidence of how much the students’ views on the act of writing—as well as on what constitutes a good essay—have matured.

And in order to teach students the importance of audience, I’ve made it a requirement that every person in the class create a weblog. Over the past four and a half months each student has stockpiled a nice collection of essays, and most of these writings will come to full light beginning in late January and throughout the month of February.

I invite anyone interested in the initial results of the students’ hard work to visit their weblogs and, if so moved, to comment on their efforts. Click here and scroll down to the Student Blogs button to read their postings.

The most exciting part of this journey, however, is that the students have become so enthusiastic about the writing process, and so proud of their work, that they’ve decided to publish a book that will contain the class' best pieces. They’ve elected an editorial board and have settled on a name that, in addition to reflecting their school spirit, also indicates the importance they place on the basic tools of the craft: Words of a Dragon. The anthology will be in print in early May.

A teacher of writing couldn’t wish for more.

A Glimpse into Purgatory: On Waiting in Airports

The devil himself had probably redesigned Hell in the light of information he had gained from observing airport layouts.
Anthony Price

Purgatory: Date: 13th century. 1: an intermediate state after death for expiatory purification; specifically : a place or state of punishment wherein according to Roman Catholic doctrine the souls of those who die in God's grace may make satisfaction for past sins and so become fit for heaven; and, 2: a place or state of temporary suffering or misery.
Merriam-Webster’s Online Dictionary


I write this piece while sitting in Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson Airport. A pleasant male voice frequently reminds travelers, over the public announcement system, that it’s the world’s busiest airport, as if that were a good thing.

Glancing around, I see a swarming curtain of people. Like fish confined to a small space, they are trying not to bump into one another as they struggle against the human tide to get to the gates that will eventually take them to their final destinations.

The majority of us have two things in common: one, we are on our way elsewhere and, two, few of us, if any, really want to be here. Let’s face it, it’s not like every person around me woke up this morning and said, “I’d like to spend a good part of my day in Hartsfield-Jackson Airport.”

Yet, in a way, I’m here by choice. I far prefer being routed through Atlanta whenever I visit the States because the ordeal of going through customs is far more humane than when entering through Miami—the portal most Latin Americans use when traveling to the US.

Still, in spite of Atlanta’s relatively friendly reception, whenever I’m here—or any other airport, for that matter—waiting for my connecting flight, I believe I'm living a preview of purgatory: the sometimes long waits serving, at least in my imagination, as acts of penance.

I doubt that I would enjoy working in an airport, especially when a flight is delayed. It is during moments like these, those tortuous waits that seem eternal, that the passengers are left to stew in a distressing cauldron as a forewarning of what hell is like. What’s more, promises of release from this torment ring so uncertain—because of our disquieting and emotional urgency to get wherever we’re going—that the temporary dwellers of these halls of travel can, with unusual ease, become desperate and ill-tempered.

A few years ago, while waiting in the Atlanta airport, eager to return to Panamá, my flight was delayed for more than four hours. Under normal circumstances, Panamanians are gentle, mild-mannered, and patient people; but on this occasion, because of the delay, the beleaguered passengers became a discontented rabble. (Partly to blame for this was the airline personnel’s failure to provide an adequate explanation for the holdup.)

The disturbance began as a low murmur, like the growling of wolves. The buzz steadily increased until it boiled over into loud, individual shouts of protest. I could see in the eyes of the airline employees—who clung to the counter as if that scant barrier would protect them—that they feared for their safety. I expected a riot to ensue when a few of my frustrated co-passengers rose from their seats and headed toward the counter. Fortunately, just as the situation was reaching a boiling point, someone in a position of authority showed up and promised that we would be leaving within the hour.

Those few words were enough to soothe everyone’s frayed nerves during that brief, infernal flare-up. And, although we weren’t happy, the assurance that our suffering would soon end took us out of hell and placed us back into purgatory.

And that’s what airports sometimes become—places where we wait in quiet desperation, experiencing life on the edge, as we fervently hope that our flights leave on time.

Preview of a Postscript

Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life's coming attractions.
Albert Einstein


I'm still undecided whether Meet Me Under the Ceiba, once published, will have a postscript. My wife, Erinn, favors a brief explanation of the murder that inspired the story. But placing myself in the shoes of the a reader, in the case of this novel, I believe I'd prefer wondering how much is true, or not.

In any event, here’s a peek at an addendum that, conceivably, may never appear anywhere else.

A Postscript

On Christmas night of 1999, Aura Rosa Pavón—a humble coffee-picker and jack-of-all-trades—was murdered under circumstances close to those described in this novel: a labyrinthine entanglement of jealousy, lust, and greed. Her body was found at the bottom of a latrine two months later, where the killers had dumped it. It was Aura Rosa’s sister, María Auxiliadora Pavón, who, acting on a vision, led the authorities to this heartless resting place.

At the time I was living in Nicaragua, and with great interest I followed the case in the newspapers. Needless to say, I was deeply saddened by the thought that Aura Rosa had to pay the ultimate price for loving Carla Vanesa Muñoz, a young woman who since childhood had been the victim of sexual exploitation. In addition, I felt that the murder perfectly illustrated the homophobia that is rampant not only in Nicaragua, but in all of Latin America. To cite one relevant example: Aura Rosa Pavón, in life, spent two months in prison, charged with committing sodomy—including one week, as a penitentiary joke, in a men’s facility. In the novel I shortened the time of Adela Rugama’s confinement by more than half. I believe that to have done otherwise—in other words, to write the truth—would have dangerously tested the readers’ faith in the narrative.

Also, in conditions similar to those related in the novel, three suspects were brought to trial. La Comisión Pro Derechos Humanos de Lesbianas y Homosexuales placed considerable pressure on Nicaragua’s judicial system to find these individuals guilty. Perhaps as a result, the accused were sentenced to thirty-five years in prison, each. Nevertheless, through various quirks in Nicaragua’s laws, those convicted of murdering Aura Rosa Pavón only served three years of their sentence, and under the law they cannot be retried for the crime. Carla Vanesa Muñoz committed suicide two weeks after their release.

I am deeply indebted to María Auxiliadora Pavón, Aura Rosa’s older sister, who during one exquisitely lucid day-long conversation gave me the foundation of this novel. She is a remarkably courageous and generous person who has chosen to forgive her sister’s killers rather than to seek vengeance. Without her cooperation, Meet Me Under the Ceiba would not exist.

Unlike the fictional “chronicler” of this tale, my “investigation” was limited to a few trips to La Curva, an exploration of the surrounding communities, a chance visit with the judge who presided over the case, and the scrutiny of court records and newspaper articles.

In writing this novel, although I took countless creative liberties, I did my utmost to preserve the spirit of Aura Rosa Pavon’s life story.

Those are the facts.

The rest, I guess, is fiction.