an homage

My mother invited her brother on our venture as a RM-Spanish speaker-other driver (Mom, who dislikes driving on a good day on safe stateside roads, flat out REFUSES to get behind the wheel in Mexico)-easygoing sort of travel companion. The downside? Muter now had an impeccable example of a patient, polite, ideal fellow traveler/guest to hold up to our weary, slovenly, familial-sort-of-lazy-bickering idea of travel.

But other than that, it was great having him along. He listened to everyone's rants and raves and long-winded opinions and offered easy miniature Spanish lessons, anecdotes from the mish ("Speaking of Mexico and something crazy happening..."), translation, and overall gameliness.

The guy was up for whatever whenever. He gave us thoughtful Christmas gifts and treated us to churros. He was quite entertaining and an interesting counter to our inside jokes and modus operati. He'd read to us about Cain and barter very poorly.

Being an entirely different color than the rest of us, he never touched the sunscreen. We marvelled when he ate bagfuls of cheddar-jalapeno popcorn and "Limon"-flavored chips single-handedly. We admired his scope and depth of football knowledge and enjoyed his delight at BYU's bowl game success. (Meanwhile, the Mexican announcers gamely tried to narrate this bewildering American sport and showed a single replay nine times straight.) We wondered that a statement so meaningless to us (e.g., "Urban Meyer is quitting") could elicit such an excited response from the ordinarily calm guy ("Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa?!?!")

On the whole, we enjoyed having him very much and feel bad for taking advantage of his amiability.