Castiñeiras

Every time I get the gift of spending a few days in my favorite place on the planet, Some of my old ghosts come along for the ride. This is not a new feeling, in fact it's quite common every time I go back home to Spain.


Castiñeiras is a place packed with memories of another time of my life. Memories I like to remember, even though I have forgotten many along the way. Sensations and feelings that I know belong to a long gone time in my life where days were dark and bright at once. With all, pieces of a life that has made me who I am today. And every now and then it's good to remember and at times even relive.


Castiñeiras bring along, especially, long lazy hours full of sun and sand filled with many memories. Never ending nights chasing falling stars and drinking "queimada" on the rocks... and I don't mean with ice. Wild parties that even today, twenty years later, many in town remember, even those who weren't invited... or especially them. Having breakfast right out of the tree in the morning... or early afternoon more often than not. Hours and hours picking up little pieces of color among the grains of sand in the beach... yes, I have some odd hobbies. Solitude, rain, saxophones...Times long gone that still today elicit smiles and complicities. Times that are very much linked to my brother, one of the four most important men in my life and who I love with all my heart. He knows it.


These days have been great thought short. Anyway, in Castiñeiras, even two months would fly by. The weather has not been all that great, but we were able to enjoy the beach a few days.


Naím and I have enjoyed the family in bits and pieces. Some days Abuelo was there, others only Uncle was, others everyone was there, and we even enjoyed the visit of my sisters-in-law who had never been here before. We even spent a couple days on our own, and had a very cute and unexpected encounter with Peke, one of the regular readers of the Spanish version of this blog, who I had not met in person before.


Even though I'm leaving this place, it always stays close to my heart. And a piece of my heart always gets trapped in the sand and stays resting among tiny granite crumbs, little colors, and white pieces of shells. I can't have it any other way.