Despite the cover claim, only three of the book's 233 pages, one appendix, are in English.
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by Dr. David Fialkoff, Editor / Publisher
images from San Miguel de Allende by Francisco de la Maza

October 30, the day after I returned to San Miguel from my month in New Orleans, I attended a memorial service for an elderly member of our synagogue's congregation, who had passed away a year earlier. The death anniversary, a yartzeit, is observed among the Jews as a special time for the departed soul to rise within the heavenly realms. In addition, the first yartzeit marks the end of the official mourning period.

In my absence the synagogue had moved. Quite close to the old location, the new place is much larger inside and out. It's a compound, with multiple buildings, considerable grounds, and a swimming pool, all much more accommodating for the rabbi's growing family and congregation.

The new sanctuary is also more accommodating. It is what we here in Mexico might ungenerously call a palapa. More politely, it is a large garden pavilion tucked into a corner of the property, open on two sides to a grassy yard.

I arrived late to the memorial service. With dusk falling, the proceedings were already underway. Entering at the rear, I remained standing in the open area behind 20 or so seated attendees. There were another 20 empty seats, but I sit too much. Up front, the widow was tearfully concluding her talk.

Then the rabbi began his offering which turned out to be a professionally-produced video, centered around a half-dozen wordless Chassidic melodies, nigunim. It has always greatly impressed me that the hyper-rational Jews, believe that the truest experiences are above words. (In the secular world, hyper-rational science finds itself at the same disadvantage, unable to explain emotion, art, history or even the economy.)

The format of the video had the on-screen narrator interpreting the spiritual, yet very human theme evoked by each melody, before that tune was performed via a type of scat singing ("ya, ya, ya" or "ma, ma, ma") and violin or clarinet.

Familiar as I was with each of those moving melodies from my years of attendance at the Chabad House up in West Hartford, Connecticut, and as there is a great participation mystique to such things, I sang along there at the back. Doing so I faced outward into the yard, into the night, to somewhat mute my contribution to the evening.

Halfway through the video, introducing the fourth melody, the on-screen narrator explained it as a plaint to God: "We know that everything You do for us is good. It is only that sometimes we cannot see that it is good. Please, help us in a way that is obviously good. Enough with the difficulty."

There were a lot of chords being struck with me that evening, but this one was particularly poignant. I believe that in some vast, eternal, often inhuman way, everything is indeed good, perfect. I have faith that we suffer here purposefully to cleanse our soul (to pay back karma), so that we can enjoy a brighter, less sullied existence, even if that brighter future is somewhat distant, up the road a way.

I am never far from tears, tears of sadness or tears of joy. I can make myself cry on demand, in less than one minute. There at the back of the open palapa sanctuary, swaying and drifting in the Mexican night, singing that wordless, heart-wrenching melody, I wept, softly, privately, although the rabbi's wife, who was also standing in the rear, may have heard the anguish in my song. Many tears fell as I sang: "Why does life have to be difficult?" Not that my life is so difficult. But, you understand, I was considering the human condition, and was carried away by the solemn occasion and the jet lag.

In fact, very recently, my life has become much easier. Entering the modern age, I've started using ChatGPT-4o to help publish Lokkal. The articles are all still written by humans, but I've begun using the machine to accomplish much of the routine work involved in the otherwise oh so glamorous publishing process.

A very successful man said that the key to success was to have only one desire. Lokkal (the Yellow Pages reborn for the digital age; in the public interest; building community; strengthening the local economy) is my mono-mania. I double-downed, investing whatever spare time my recent technological upgrade afforded me into a publishing project that's been on the back burner for a while.

For months now, Lokkal's digital map has been almost ready to launch. It already functions as it's supposed to. The next phase involves populating the map with sites. My idea is to start with Centro, and, in Centro, to start with churches and other public places. Then, we'll find businesses that want to appear alongside those public sites.

Although there is very little information available on the internet about these public sites, there is an older book in the Biblioteca, San Miguel de Allende by Francisco de la Maza, that gives us a good start. Not available for loan, my idea was to photograph the book's relevant pages there in the Biblioteca, convert those photos to text at home, and work with that text, and whatever other relevant information I can find, to add content to Lokkal's map.

Towards that end, last Monday, I rode my bicycle into town only to find the Biblioteca closed for Mexican Revolution Day. The holiday wasn't technically until Wednesday, but people love puentes, long weekends. My entry barred to that hall of knowledge, I continued on with my plan for the day, which was to pay a visit to my friend and author, Don Patterson.

Stung by the frustration of the Biblioteca's closure (it's not so long a ride into town, but on the way back the hills, especially the last ones here in San Luis Rey, are a challenge), en route to Don's lovely home high up on Las Garitas, I contemplated what life would be like if things we're not so difficult, or not difficult at all.

In his Brothers Karamazov, Dostoyevsky opined that the inhabitants of such a "perfect" world, unable to bear the ease, would start to break things. Rod Serling, presented an episode of The Twilight Zone, regarding a gangster who died and went to a "heavenly" casino where everything: food, women, card games and roulette wheels, all went his way. In a short while, unable to stand the monotonous winning, the gangster begged the majordomo to send him to hell. The majordomo superciliously enquired, "Where do you think you are?"

My visit with Don began with me describing my frustration at not getting access to the book, and wondering with him what an easy world would be like. ninety minutes later, our visit ended with Don asking me to identify the book I wanted. When I mentioned that it was a book by Maza, he said, "Francisco. I have it downstairs."

Riding home, the folio-size book suspended in a bag from my handlebars, I stopped into the PhotoGraphic Gallery, a sponsor of Lokkal, where I chatted with and collected money from Jo Brenzo. When Jo commented on how good I was looking, I told her, "Everything is coming up roses."

But, I still wonder, what would we do without the thorns... the real ones and the imagined?

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Dr. David Fialkoff presents Lokkal, our local social network, the community online and off, Atención robustly reborn for the digital age. If you can, please do contribute content, or your hard-earned cash, to support Lokkal, SMA's Voice. Use the orange, Paypal donate button below. Thank you.

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