Río de la Plata - Buenos Aires

I am going to get to silver in a roundabout way. When the Spaniards first arrived to what one day would be Argentina (argentum is silver in Latin), they called the vast and wide river Mar Dulce. Sweet in Spanish, dulce is used to describe water that is not seawater. Because of the colour of the river, it became el Río de la Plata and from there, when the Spaniards were ejected in the 19^th century, my country of birth became Argentina.

Since I was a little boy I assisted my mother is polishing our silver with a product called Silvo. They still make it but when I checked under my kitchen sink I found something called Twinkle.

We had a lot of silver including one of the few valuable gifts that my father gave my mother which was a set of silverware.

Now in this 21^st century it has been many years since I took out my father’s silverware. I polish all the silver I have feeling sad that my daughters and granddaughters will have no use for it.

To this day I can remember the smell of Silvo and how my fingers became black. I remember as well the smell of Brasso which we used to polish all other metals including Chilean ashtrays (what will become of them?).

Polishing metal as a little boy and polishing silver by Rosemary’s gentle command, was a social event. Now when I polish all that silver, I feel melancholically alone and all the thoughts of that boyhood past come to haunt me.

I especially remember my little silver-haired cat called Plata. She died a few days before we moved from Kerrisdale to Kitsilano. When I told my youngest granddaughter Lauren that I was a going to bury Plata she said, “Papi you are going to bury her in the new house.” She was right and I did.

Plata

 As I wrote the above I kept getting a memory that began "Of silver..." I looked everywhere for a poem that began with that an got nowhere. Then I went to Google and put "of silver, Alex Waterhouse-Hayward and found a link to a blog I wrote August 12, 2023 which is very similar to this blog. So, yes I am repeating myself. But ther is a bonus as the "Of silver..." is the beginning of a wonderful enumeration by Cuban magic realism writer Alejo Carpentier

Of silver the slender knives 

Los Panchos - Massey Theatre - New Westminster - 20 November 2025

Ayer, 20 de noviembre, 2025, mi hija Hilary (nacida en Tacubaya, CDMX) y yo fuimos al Teatro Massey en New Westminster, British Columbia para un concierto del trío Los Panchos con una historia y tradición de 41 años.

Yesterday November 20th, 2025, my daughter Hilary (born in Tacubayan, Mexico City) and I went to a concert at the Massey Theatre in New Westminster, British Columbia to a concert of the Mexican trio Los Panchos that has a 81 year history and tradition.

Para los anglosajones que no entienden el concepto del bolero, importado de Cuba a finales del siglo 19, para mí hay un comparación, no cercana a la música del grupo "folk" Peter, Paul and Mary. Los tríos mexicanos cantan en harmonía con tres instrumentos, una guitarra, una guitarra más chica llamada un requinto y una tercera guitarra mucho más chica. Anoche tenían un baterista.

 For those Anglos that do not understand what a Mexican bolero is, they should know it was imported from Cuba at the end of the 19th century. The closest that I can think of to Mexican trio music is that of the folksingers Peter, Paul and Mary who harmonized like trio musicians do. The Mexican trio consists of a guitar, a slightly smaller one called a requinto and an even smaller one. Last night, Los Panchos had a drummer.

Los boleros son composiciones musicales casi siempre compuestas por hombres con alto romanticismo  (a veces algo cursi) y con letra en la cual un hombre quiere a una mujer que, o va a morir, o ella lo va a abandonar.

Boleros, more often than not involve male composers where the lyrics (by male lyricists) are overly romantic and involve a man in love with a woman who is about to die or leave him.  

Central al concepto del trío, es el requinto equipado con un capotraste que resulta en un sonido más agudo. El que toca el requinto usa una pirotécnia extraordinaria.

The requinto guitar is all important for the Mexican trio sound. Attached is a device called a capotraste which makes the sound higher and more striking. The requinto player uses all kinds of very fast playing techniques.

Last night I wanted to hear two compositions. One is El Reloj (The Clock) by composer/lyricist Roberto Cantoral, and Mujer by composer Agustín Lara and lyrics by Ramón Lago Mallo. I had to wait for one of the many encores.

Anoche tenía la ilusión de escuchar El Reloj por Roberto Cantoral, y Mujer por Agustín Lara con letra de Ramón Lago Mallo. Tuve que esperar para uno de los muchos bis. ¡Y los tocaron!

Such is the popularity of Mexican trios throughout Latin America that the very Latin American audience would sing along when invited. I noticed that the people who sang along were mostly women! Could it be that Latin American women are very romantic?

Tal es la popularidad de los tríos mexicanos, y en especial de Los Panchos, que cuando nos invitaban a acompañar al trío, muchs sabían la letra y noté, además, que en su mayoría eran las mujeres! ¿Serán más romáticas las mujeres latinoamericanas?

Because I lived in Mexico many years until 1975, the concert was a tad melancholic. I remembered my mother, grandmother and my Canadian wife Rosemary, who died five years ago. But I was happy to see the smile on my daughter’s face who while born in Mexico she left with us in 1975 when she was three.

Como viví en México muchos años hasta 1975, el concierto me resultó algo melancólico ya que me acordé de esos momentos con mi mamá, abuela y mi mujer canadiense, Rosemary que fallecío hace 5 años aquí en Vancouver. Por otro lado me encantó como mi hija Hilary, que se vino con nosotros a Vancouver en 1975 como una niña muy joven, estaba en la gloria con la música.

 I will now put below links to two blogs that have the lyrics to El Reloj and Mujer.

Abajo los enlaces a El Reloj y Mujer 

 El Reloj y El Reloj con Los Panchos

Mujer - Agustín Lara 

Niño & Niña

Rosa 'Susan Williams-Ellis' - 21 November 2025

Of late with the early darkness and the constant rain, I have been in a funk of no activity. Today, Monday, November 24, I am filling the holes for the days I did not write a blog. With this one I will almost be done. I will need to write a few more.

This white rose is the last rose of the season. It does look pretty good considering the weather circumstances. Because of my constant thought of my departed Rosemary this rose represents her. Why?

Rosemary was a delicate, gracious, elegant and beautiful woman. At the same time she was a lot stronger when facing stress and turmoil than her husband. Somehow a delicate white rose that is the last of the season is the Rosemary of my memory. Unlike Rosemary this rose will come back next year and make me smile.

Every day, as I read of the goings on in so many countries in this 21st century, I am grateful for the decision Rosemary made in 1975 to leave Mexico for Vancouver. But paradoxically, because of her financial acumen, I do not have to worry about finances. When my daughters need it they get it because I can. When I depart this world they will be even better off.

Because I do not have to worry (as a result of Rosemary's financial acumen) and because my only obligations besides feeding myself, feeding my cats, walking Niño, I have this philosophic angst of trying to find a meaning for my continuing existence.

When Niño, who is in remission from his lymphatic cancer of the intestines, stares at me I know what he is thinking, “Alex don’t die before we do. Who would take care of us?”

That is a powerful motive to keep on.

How were Rosemary and I to know that all those Mexican curios, pottery, dresses, etc would one day surround us to the point that we knew that we could not get rid of them because of our joint memory of where we got them, why we wanted them and how in our many movings from one house to another they all survived?

Now alone in my Kits house surrounded by them I think of that nasty word (for me) legacy. What will happen to my thousands of negatives? Will my daughters and granddaughters have room in their houses for all the framed photographs on the walls and the ones in storage?

I have the opinion that the Vancouver Archives are where photographs and documents go to die. I am aware that the digital links to Vancouver Sun and Georgia Straight to important articles are not being stored. We live in a city with a poor memory for its past.

 My 6726, (not including this one) blogs contain lots of memories of Vancouver events. Few know that I am the most prolific photographer in Canada. Besides Bev Davies I documented the punk movement in Vancouver that began in the late 70s.

I have a lovely old book El Legado de San Martín, that Juan Domingo Perón made sure all students in school in 1950 would have a copy. I think of this great patriot’s legacy as that of a man who had all the power to become a strongman in his country but opted to exile himself in France.

I think of what my friend Abraham Rogatnick told me a few months before he died, “I am not long for this world and I am glad.” With all the turmoil affecting our 21^st century I am beginning to think like him.

 There are little things,(not important?) like the garden aprons, IDS,etc that Rosemary had as a master gardener and when she worked in the Shop in the Garden at UBC. Can I just throw them into the garbage? They would have no meaning for my daughters.

These are the thoughts that consume me and keep me awake. Sometimes I must take those London Drugs sleeping pills that manage to not give me a hangover in the morning.

Legacy is for the birds.

Se conjetura que nuestra memoria es total y que cada hombre está en posesión de todo su pasado y que, dado el estímulo necesario, puede recuperar cada imagen, cada línea leída, cada matiz de la angustia o de la esperanza. Del cerebro humano se ha escrito que es como un palimpsesto en el que se superponen infinitas escrituras. Parejamente, todo está en la vasta Biblioteca. Jorge Luís Borges

Con mi melancolía diaria en la cual pienso en la muerte de mi Rosemary en diciembre de 2020 no puedo convencerme de hacer mucho. Me quedo en la cama con mis gatos Niño y Niña y me recuerdan que hace 7 Rosemary y yo los fuimos a buscar al  SPCA (Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals). Hasta su muertoe los gatos compartieron nuestra cama y ella los acariciaba.

De vez en cuando digo, “Rosemary” o “Rosamaría” y noto que los gatos me miran. ¿Se acordarán?

En la mañana después de darle la comida a Niño y Niña subo y hago la cama. Mi Rosemary decía, “Make the bed neat for the cats.”

Según Borges(lo leo todos los días) para arcordarnos, primero necesitamos olvidar. Al mismo tiempo nos dice que nuestra memoria es total.

Estoy rodeado de fotografías enmarcadas, de objetos que Rosemary tocó, the libros que leyó. Cuando voy a la sala o el comedor me rodean vajillas y arcones mexicanos.  No puedo más que acordarme. Pienso de ella al apagar la luz antes de dormir. La veo en mis sueños y me despierto con su ausencia presente en su lado de la cama.

No puedo olvidar. ¿Tendré alivio sólo cuando de mi queden las posesiones que compartirán las de Rosemary en ese lugar que en inglés es oblivion pero no tiene una traducción al castellano?

My Rosemary had lovely handwriting and through the years she had several diaries. One of them was about her first trip to Mexico in 1967. It has lots of detail on all the places she went. But it ends in June so there is not mention of me meeting her around 15 December.

One of the tragedies of life is that when you become curious to ask a question, the person who can answer it is dead. I never did find out how it was that when I saw her from the back with her lovely straight blonde hair, wearing a dark blue miniskirt that showed off her lovely legs what it was that I told her. Did I touch her shoulder? I have no memory of the event.

The diary in this blog is one that I am now going to use to organize my life. In my terrible handwriting and printing I will put my shopping lists, my blog ideas and important phone numbers.

I am going to Mexico City (CDMX) in December for a project which I will elaborate in another blog. All my contacts will be in this agenda that was Rosemary’s. It feels right and appropriate.

How was I to know in January 2006 that my blog would become a sort of “Dear Diary”?  So much of it is a record of my 52 years with Rosemary. I figured that it represented 63% of my life.

Perhaps my inspiration to write my blog came from finding a book in 1967 in Buenos Aires. It was Dag Hammarskjöld’s Markings. This diary was found inside his desk after he died. There is not one day that I don’t take the book our from my library or at the very least remember something from it.

Markings 01 

Markings 02 

Markings a Long Spring