Travel Forum / Travel Types / RV Travel / July 2009

After a miraculous rain, the mail arrived a little after noon
with a new packet of books from Amazon, including "The Fencing
Master" by Arturo Perez-Reverte.  Tales of Spain, circa 1866.  

On page 23 he describes a rancorous meeting of assorted loafers
at a sidewalk cafe:

"The couple of hours that he spent there each afternoon helped
him salve his loneliness a little.  For all their defects, their
grumbling, and their bad-tempered ranting about every other
living being, at least they gave one another the chance to give
vent to their respective frustrations.  Within that limited
circle, each member found in the others the tacit consolation
that his own failure was not an isolated fact but a thing shared
in greater or lesser measure by them all.  

That above all was what bound them together, keeping them
faithful to their daily meetings.  Despite their frequent
disputes, their political differences, their disparate moods, the
five felt a complex solidarity that, had it ever been expressed
openly, would have been hotly denied by all of them, but that
might be likened to the huddling together for warmth of solitary
creatures."

Touché, maestro.  A definite touch...

Bob