Some Christmas memories are atypical and have nothing to do with—garlands, cozy fireplaces, ornate cookies, eggnog, the giving of stuff, and mistletoe.
This is a story about a seasonal memory that has everything to do with the magic of youthful adventure and little to do with Christmas.
Henry and his parents traveled to Acapulco from Mexico City on Christmas eve,1966, staying at The Las Hamacas Hotel, across the street from Acapulco Bay in the central city.
The Lucowski family show at the small-time hotel in a pink Cadillac limousine at 10 AM, checking in and going to the canopied dining area by the pool for a late breakfast.
The hotel serves a homespun and memorable breakfast— freshly baked hard rolls, Churros or Mexican donuts, sliced avocados, tomatoes and cucumbers, bananas, fresh strawberry papaya, eggs, bacon, and brewed coffee. All of it served in a fun, relaxed manner on tables covered with white linen.
The Mexican waiters wearing white chaquetas and black pantalones are known for their dark sense of humor— directed at each other and the gringo guest.
Like, telling a woman with a wig on,
señora your hair is bonita!
Or, saying to a kid who isn't eating,
Niño, finish your breakfast or Papá Noel is going to bring you coal for Christmas.
And, telling an elderly woman who's dining with her husband,
señora, take it easy on the Red Snapper you're eating, he looks like your husband.
After breakfast, Henry goes across the street to a taco bar on the bay, his parents will go for souvenirs, crap really— bogus machetes that couldn’t cut butter, silver from Taxco that turns green, cheap sombreros wrapped with Shrink Wrap, stuff!
Anyway, Henry's sitting at a taco bar on Acapulco Bay drinking a beer at a small table. He puts a hand full of pesos in a jukebox filled with 45 RPM records, the hippy music of the day— Sopwith Camel, Strawberry Alarm Clock, Hendrix, The Doors, and Jefferson Airplane.
At 16 he’s an easily tempted, astute lover of everything native— psychedelic music, incense, exotic and erotic literature, who’s constantly reading— Hemingway, Henry Miller, Anis Nin, William Faulkner, William Butler Yeats, Kerouac, and even the Kama Sutra, but still a virgin.
He notices a young couple approaching, crossing the street, coming from his hotel, they are walking arm in arm. As they pass he leans towards them, asking them to sit down, they oblige.
Their siblings, Juan and Moon, 16 and 15 respectively, also staying at The Las Hamacas Hotel.
Moon’s fetching, willowy with long chestnut hair, wearing glasses, looking nymph-like, a child who's becoming a woman. Her older brother Juan is cool, lean, tanned, with long sideburns, his hair parted in the middle, a member of the Carte Blanca surf club of Southern California.
After a beer, Juan sees a shadowy figure walking the beach who locals call El Mago, The Magician.
Juan stands, running to catch up with El Mago, then walking down the shore with him.
Henry and Moon talk over beers at the cafe, for them, love is in the air.
When Juan returns, he sits down at the small table, the lover’s trance fades as he says,
look under the table.
Juan flashes a plastic bag full of golden buds, Acapulco Gold. Henry was familiar with ganja, having read about it in Kerouac’s On the Road, and Henry Miller’s book Big Sur.
At sundown, the trio walks across the street to The Las Hamacas Hotel, going to Juan and Moon’s room. Their mother is staying next door and she respects their privacy. Something, Henry’s parents didn’t see as an innate right of youth.
They sit on the single beds at the center, facing each other as Juan rolls a joint. Eventually, he lights it, instructing the nascent lovers on the art of taking a pull.
Draw steady, hold the smoke in long enough for it to flow through your veins, heart, and brain. Whatever you do, don’t fish lip the joint. Moon laughs at her brother saying,
fish lip? Where'd you dig that up?
After smoking awhile, they laugh at nothing, and anything— exaggerated, fun, laughter.
Finishing the doobie, the trio walks through the patio door to the pool, sitting poolside with their legs dangling in it, tossing fallen flower peddles into the blue water, watching ripplets expand outwards as their chakras open magnifying their senses.
Henry stands on the poolside, bolting to his hotel room, returning with a paperback copy of Yeat's The Land of the Heart’s Desire, going to the diving board and standing at the end, reciting poetry,
Come Fairies, take me out of this dull world, for I would ride with you upon the wind and dance upon the mountains like a flame!
Juan and Moon stand and applaud.
On Christmas Day they wake at sunrise, giving their parents the run-around, taking a taxi to a beach on the Pie de la Cuesta coast. There's a rundown film location behind the beach where scenes of Johnny Weissmuller's last Tarzan film were shot by RKO in 1948.
The beach is packed with Mexicans who went to Mass on Christmas Eve to honor the Baby Jesus.
Going to the beach on Christmas Day helps the Mexicans to shake off the stifling circumstance of praying for hours in church pews the night before.
You can hear Ranchero music blaring from beachside cantinas, shacks made of bamboo and thatched straw roofs serving, fresh grilled chicken and fish, tortillas, refried beans, rice, beer, tequila, and soft drinks.
Juan, Henry, and Moon walk away from the crowd to an isolated area of the beach with a single cantina. They place a large Las Hamacas bedspread on the sand, strip down to their swimsuits, and drink Pacifico beer.
Juan body surfs while the precocious teens, Henry and Moon, talk about esoterica—
What is life?
Is there a God?
Did Martians create the human race?
The young lovers bond intellectually, physically though, their both virgins.
At sunset, the trio catches a taxi back to The Los Hamacas Hotel and go to their room. The virgin lovers lay in one single bed and Juan passes out on the other.
At this point, Henry's parents were missing him and suspected something was going on.
Henry and Moon make out on the bed, breathing hard, deep kissing, fumbling, confused, finally getting naked under the sheets— getting closer to first-time coitus.
Hit and miss, he locates Moon’s pink taco and gently puts the meat to it, getting off in record-breaking time, 30 seconds. She's surprised, shaken some, and she can't recollect feeling anything.
As for Henry, he couldn't have pulled it off if he hadn't read the Kama Sutra.
In that it was their first time, the lovers clean up more than they need to, Moon spends 40 minutes in the shower.
They walk out the patio door to the pool. Henry’s mother, Linda, is waiting and she corners him. He realizes he missed Christmas dinner with his parents and she reads him the riot act,
Henry, what were you doing in THAT hotel room with THAT girl? Where have you been for the last two days? Your father and I have been worried sick. You could have left a note at least.
She smacks him around, cross-slapping him European style on both cheeks in front of Moon.
He's more embarrassed than hurt.
His mother goes on with the sermonizing, she’s juiced on Martinis.
Henry, you missed Mass. It's Christmas Day, a time for families to be together and to pay respect to the Lord. I can smell beer on your breath, and God knows what you've been doing with THAT girl? Go to confession tonight.
Linda opens her purse and pulls out a Rosary, handing it to him, knowing her son is beyond hope and backsliding. He says to her,
Ma, you drink too much, so forget about sainthood!
Speechless, his mother does an about-face and goes to meet his father somewhere.
In spite of missing Mass, Christmas Dinner, and getting chewed out by his mother, the happenings over the last few days are an awakening for Henry.
Maybe, the magic of new love discovered was paramount to— garlands, cozy fireplaces, ornate cookies, eggnog, the giving of stuff, and mistletoe.
Juan, Henry, and Moon— We Three Kings, or Two Kings and Queen, win the crapshoot of life, this time around anyway.
