Zed's dead baby, Zed's dead.

When I do my online Spanish classes I talk about things that have happened to me in Pinoso. One of my teachers is obviously quite taken with this bucolic existence. He seems particularly tickled by some of the names - the Angustias, Hilarios, Artemios, Pompilias and Laureanos, - but he also likes the little stories about the more mundane names, the Virginias, Remes, Juancos, Elsas and Enriques. I think it's the idea that, even as a complete outsider, I still use names to describe people. The plumber isn't the plumber he's Lucrecio and the optician is Elsa and the bloke who sells me gas is Quique.

I was reminded of this by a literary reference to an esquela. An esquela tells you that someone has died. I occasionally hear an esquela on the local radio to say that Don or Doña such and such has died aged whatever and that the service will be at 11am this morning in such and such a church and that his or her family are upset. More commonly though I see a piece of A4 paper pasted to the side of the church or in other prominent spots around the town. They are not big, they are not flashy and I suppose that the undertakers put them up rather than kith and kin wandering around with sheaves of A4 copies. They are not looking for a lost dog after all.

Not that I usually loiter near death notices but I was close to one, waiting in the street, for a quarter of an hour or so the other day and the esquela on the side of the church got a constant trickle of visitors. Nearly everyone except the very young slowed down long enough to at least check the name. Older people tend to linger longer. Sometimes a couple of friends, or at least acquaintances, will come together at the notice. The conversation is easy enough to invent.

The book that prompted this post mentioned that there were esquelas on the wall in the author's home town. She suggested that they are not a feature of the big cities. The inference was obvious. That smaller places still have communities whilst bigger places don't. Maybe she's right. Maybe that's why Quim is so amused by my stories of Alfredo cutting my hair or even why I have stories to tell him about Alfredo and his long gone dad.