Evolution in Guadalajara

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“¡Rapido, Nezzy! Faster!” Ziggy never asked, directed, talked, or orated. He shouted, the man with vocal cords of Polysteel. “If we get there before power poles and wells are sunk, we can ward off development of the hillside, if not the flats. IWT guys can set up a million-dollar bird-watching post out here, maybe even restore some of the native trees—what the hell’s their address? Oh yeah, Inter-national Wilder-ness Too-urs at-dot—” Bang, bang, bang, like a chant his callused fingers pounded out a code on the long-suffering laptop’s grease-corroded keyboard.

Our propane Volkswagen clattered past the outskirts of Guadalajara on roads recently transcended from burro trails by the anointing of lava gravel, palm-sized stones that might as well have been edge-up machete blades, considering the tire slashing they did. The car managed to avoid the most severe lacerating, which was fortunate because Ines, behind the wheel, was looking not at the road but at the steep volcanic flanks rising ahead, and Ziggy was pounding furiously on his laptop, in between wrenching and generally fruitless twists of its comsat transceiver. I was stuck, as usual, in the back seat with The Royal We. I started stroking her fur backward, raising sparks and risking the bloodletting promised by her flattening ears. Transceiver reception cleared.

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