Prologue

Following a suggestion to make In Tenebris shorter, I have adapted it for readers who understand that myriad concrete circumstances cannot be subsumed under a single dimension.    Explanations are pointless when confronting human dramas and temperaments.    Clarity is open-minded:    It is attached to what is vital and to the reader’s own intuition.   In these explorations complexity becomes all encompassing and signification multiplies.

Ricardo F Morin, Bala Cynwyd, Pa.; June 30, 2022

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Time Magazine named the “Silence Breakers” of the #MeToo movement its 2017 Person of the Year; the President cursed the Press as “fake news,” and temperatures in New York City felt higher than ever.

Amidst all of this, I became juror number 12 in the murder trial of a fourteen-year-old boy.   Now, the search for truth loomed foremost in my mind. Bias and suspicion, how were they to be treated?

The defendant–young, dressed in a crisply starched white shirt and tie–sat barely 30 feet away from us, the jury.   His pleading the fifth and his twisted grimace of a grin were disturbing.

We put aside our apprehensions.   If doubt were to play a part in the case, it would have to come from the evidence.

As a jury we were surprised at the lack of cohesion in the allegations: what witnesses stated didn’t correspond to what the prosecutor argued.   No weapon nor DNA pointed to the identity of the perpetrator.   “What justified the accusation of this young man as a murderer?”

On the 18th day, each of us would have to reach an approximation as to the truth.

The deliberation room was barely large enough for the long table and its 12 uncomfortable chairs.   The air conditioning was old and inefficient.   The temperature was as stifling as it had been in the courtroom.

We jurors were diverse and had little in common.   The foreman was an office manager, comfortable in his role as moderator.   His communication skills were excellent.   Some of us had been reticent and never had voiced an opinion one way or the other.   Others were more voluble.   A teacher remained calm throughout; she listened to others before expressing her own views.   Another juror, number seven, was impatient about the length of the trial; she had a toddler to care for at home.   Aside from myself, there were two other retirees, one of whom was a corporate lawyer.

From the first days of the deliberation, we were uncertain whether the accused had taken any part at all.   On our fourth day, I said:   “the principle eye witness was not credible”; juror number five, the young woman who had been most adamant about the guilt of the accused, began to waver.   Though most jurors still thought him innocent, four remained unconvinced.   The more jurors accepted their own limitations, the more difficult it became to form an opinion.   The phrase “blind justice” turned piercingly poignant.

The majority argued with the four holdouts.   Tensions rose with the thermometer.   The heat of the midday, the humidity, and the noise from the street made us increasingly fractious.   With the windows closed, we turned on the anemic air conditioner and became more fearful than ever of not measuring up.

Our variances put us on edge.   Juror number five persisted categorically:   “the principal eyewitness was not lying.”   The crucial moment, though, for all of us, was when juror number seven voiced in fury:   “the only features visible on the security cameras could have been any one else’s in the gang.”   Slowly, we moved toward common ground. The decision was unanimous, innocent.

After we had returned to the court room, the judge polled us individually.   Indelibly imprinted on our faces was the murdered child’s mother’s face.   Her sorrow contrasted sharply with the clawing glances of the defendant’s family.   I felt deflated, even inadequate.   “Were we right, or wrong?,” I asked myself.

The jury disbanded.   We collected our belongings and moved to an elevator at the opposite end of the court house.   Below, the family of the acquitted awaited.   At our approach, they shouted deafening thanks.

We the jury, the lawyers, and the witnesses were only actors in this absurdity.

The end

Edited by Billy Bussell Thompson

June 24, 2022

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Although. . . victory may coincide with the destruction of humanity,. . . without totalitarianism we would never have known the true radical nature of evil.

Hanna Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1951 – First Edition), pp.46-70.

If liberalism were to succeed as the core of a new world order, it would be based on a belief in the rule of law and a constitutional order:    one that limits executive power in favor of the ability of individuals to make decisions for themselves about the course of their lives; which is only guaranteed through a system of democratic rights and laws.

Francis Fukuyama [Liberalism and Its Discontents (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2022)]: Excerpt from television interview (Channel 4, UK) “Putin’s vision of Russia is not ‘desirable to almost anybody”, April 1, 2022 ^[1].

I

In her book “Difficult Decisions, about Vladimir Putin” (2014), Hillary Clinton tells us that, as Secretary of State, she attended a ceremony at the St. Petersburg Monument erected to the victims of the Nazi invasion of Leningrad, after which she dined with Putin.   Putin shared with Clinton that his father had served on the front lines of the war against Germany in Leningrad and that he had had the uncanny experience of having rescued his wife alive from a pile of corpses, just before they were being buried.   Putin added that his mother, having survived an almost certain death, gave birth to him after the war (Vladimir had two brothers who had died of natural causes before and during the war).   Understandably, she felt a kind of compassion that these events had left on his psyche.   In her book Clinton poses to the reader the question as to whether these events could explain Putin’s mythology about what it meant for him to be Russian.   For her, correct or not, however, it must be taken that this story gave an account of Putin’s perception of his own history and that of Russia.

II

From the US Secretaries of State, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, John Kerry, Hillary Clinton, and Rex Tillerson, we have learned that Putin expected and demanded respect and recognition of Russian capabilities.   The key would not be to respect his values or actions, but rather to respect the importance of his role as a leader.   According to these Secretaries, the key to negotiations must correspond to the present, recognizing that Putin is ambitious in his purposes, and that, although he can adapt to circumstances as they arise, he remains unpredictable.   We would have to expect his opposition to Western ideas, in particular on the basis of his own notions of equality.   These are salient features of the Russian president, particularly with regard to his relations with the United States.   Nevertheless, in the past, Putin has maintained long-standing collaborations with the US, regarding the sanctions against Iran, the nuclear agreement with Iran, and the air corridor over Russia to resupply American troops in Afghanistan.

III

On November 8, 1991, the leaders of Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus signed at a state dacha the Belovezh Agreement (the Creation of the Commonwealth of Independent States) to dissolve the Soviet Union:   a move that Putin later proclaimed as “ the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century” ^[2].

IV

Following the closing down of the East German KGB in 1991, Putin returned to Russia, where he then first rose to the post of first deputy mayor of St. Petersburg in 1994.   In 1996, he joined the presidential staff of Boris Yeltsin as a deputy to Pavel Borodin, the Kremlin’s chief administrator.   In July 1998, President Boris Yeltsin appointed him director of the Federal Security Service (FSB, the domestic successor to the KGB) and, shortly thereafter, he became secretary of the Russian Security Council.

In the beginning, Yeltsin nominated Putin as prime minister in 1999.   Rising crime, institutional corruption, and economic difficulties marred Yeltsin’s regime.   Suddenly, on December 31, 1999, Yeltsin announced his resignation and named Putin interim president.   Vowing to rebuild an already weakened Russia, Putin was victorious in the March 2000 elections, winning 53 percent of the votes.   His campaign promised to eliminate corruption and create a strong market economy.   Afterwards, Boris Yeltsin came to lament his support of Putin.   In March 2004, Putin won a second term as president with more than 70 percent of the vote after oil prices fueled a consumer boom and raised living standards, a trend that continued for another four years.   In 2007, Putin advocated the principles of democratic equality in his speech at the 43rd Munich Security Conference, when he accused the US of imposing a unipolar world and attacked its EU participants for complicity ^[2].   Then with a controversial constitutional provision, Putin was forced to step down in 2008.   Putin chose Dmitry Medvedev as his successor and Medvedev, in turn, nominated Putin as the country’s prime minister within hours of taking office on May 7, 2008.

V

In 2008, prime minister Putin directed the annexation of two parts of the Republic of Georgia by military force and, in 2009, suppressed the separatist movement in Chechnya.   Putin cultivated a nationalist fervor, being re-elected president for a third time in 2012, and nominating Medvedev as primer minister. Violent measures quelled the resulting popular uprising in the capital and the rest of the country.   According to information sources of journalists in exile ^[3], the mortality rate of the opposition rose significantly.   Putin’s measures were to repress the opposition through incarceration, as well as poisoning them and extorting them, inside and outside the country.   In line with his aspiration to reinforce a Soviet like Federation of Russia, Putin began to affirm that the prestige of the past had been lost and that he intended to restore it.   This is reflected in his 2013 New York Times op-ed ^[4]—“A Plea for Caution from Russia” — where he once again focused his distrust on the US.   On Feb. 27, 2014, Russian troops started annexing Ukraine’s Crimea region after Ukrainian protesters had ousted pro Russian president Viktor Yanukovich.   The following month, Russia incorporated Crimea after a Russian referendum. Subsequently, both the United States and the European Union imposed sanctions.

On September 30, 2015, Russia launched air strikes in Syria in its biggest Middle East intervention in decades, turning the tide of the conflict in favor of President Bashar al-Assad.   In November 2016, Donald Trump was elected president of the United States after having promised to improve ties with Moscow.   American authorities have determined that Russia tried to interfere in the election in favor of him.   On March 19, 2018, Putin won his re-election in a landslide with a mandate that would keep him in office until 2024.   In 2021, he approved constitutional amendments that would allow him for re-election through 2036.

VI

In 2021, before Russia’s invading Ukraine, the Biden administration was already completing the withdrawal of military forces from Afghanistan, a policy incidentally initiated by the former president Donald Trump.   It coincided with Putin’s article, “On the historical unity of Russians and Ukrainians” ^[5] as preamble to the war against Ukraine, which began on February 24, 2022.

VII

Now in its tenth week, the war in Ukraine appears to be evolving into a protracted conflict.   Although Ukraine has accomplished a somewhat successful first phase of the war, Russian belligerence has centered on eastern and southern territories of the country.   Without an increased support of NATO, Ukraine is faced with a more difficult situation than it has been in the past.

Having not succeeded in overthrowing Ukrainian government, Putin has begun a second phase to the eastern Dombass region.   His new goal seems to be the separation of the Dombass from the rest of Ukraine and, thus, to control access to the Black Sea.

VIII

For Putin, one of his propaganda vehicles is his defense of the Russian language, which would be equivalent to the assumption of England annexing the United States of America as a reason to protect the English language.   On Russian television, Putin explains to a 12-year-old girl that the “tragedy” in the Donbass is that Ukraine was committing “genocide” against Russian-speakers ^[6].

In the context of this narrative, Russian state television broadcasts that “the special military operation is one to establish peace.”

IX

Ukraine’s offers for peace continue to be rejected by Vladimir Putin ^[7].   Ukrainian President Zelenskyy has maintained that a compromise should be negotiated from where it all began:   in Crimea in 2014.   For Putin, however, the annexation of Crimea, just as the invasion of Ukraine, is historical revisionism.   Many observers say that the war is not so much an existential crisis for Russia, as it is a struggle for the survival of the regime itself.

X

Is it possible that Putin’s failure in this war will bring to a halt future attacks by a totalitarian regime against its neighbors?   We can ask ourselves if there could be a united front against these attacks.   If not, then the question remains.

Edited by Billy Bussell Thompson

Footnotes:

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwuMMmUCw98

[2] 2007 https://youtu.be/hQ58Yv6kP44

[3] Zaborona Media https://zaborona.com/en/ and Ukrainska Pravda News https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/

[4] https://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/12/opinion/putin-plea-for-caution-from-russia-on-syria.html

[5] http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/66181— published in July 2021 by Putin’s presidential office, in which he explained Western support for Ukraine as a nefarious conspiracy against the unity of the Russian Federation. In it, Putin plays a questionable role as a historian to justify his determination to confront the powers that intervene in the sovereignty of his country.

[6] https://youtu.be/UzS1c_lSpNM

[7] https://www.ft.com/content/7b341e46-d375-4817-be67-802b7fa77ef1

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Acknowledgments

I recognize the contributions provided over the course of eight years by my brothers and sisters, Alberto José, Andreína Teresa, Bonnie María Teresa, and José Galdino, to whom I am most grateful for their safeguarding these memories.   I am also indebted to my cousin Eduardo Morín Brea, son of Calixto Eduardo Morín Infante for the biographical Morín family’s summaries.   I also thank my Uncle Calixto Eduardo for his guidance at the beginning of my education in the United States.   Likewise, I am grateful to my father José Galdino Morín Infante for the incentives he made possible there.    I also express my gratitude and affection to our mother for her warmth and optimism.   Also I acknowledge cousins and uncles from both the Morín and Tortolero familes for their genealogical research; I am especially indebted to my aunt Ala Gaidasz Salamaja de Tortolero, widow of our mother’s brother Federico Tortolero Rivero, and to her late sister Lina Angelina Gaidasz Salamaja de Pystrak.   And finally, I pay my highest respects for the support of my most loyal friend and editor, professor emeritus, Billy Bussell Thompson, Ph.D.

Ricardo Federico Morín Tortolero , Fort Lauderdale, January 20, 2022

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Dedicated to my brothers and sisters

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Chapter 1

The Inexorable Passage of Time

“How can one travel through time on the hands of ancestors?   En quelque sorte, one plays the role of their guardian.”

Ricardo F. Morín

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Genetic diversity is innate to the human condition.    The figuration that some animals are more diverse than others is both limited and subjective.   A more appropriate way would be, as an Andalusian friend described it:   “. . .looking for relatives from all over the world.”   Certainly, I seek to frame the stories of my parents through their ancestors, so as to develop a biography, which goes beyond a mere listing of dates and places.   I want to define links to customs and thinking.   Where this narrative leads I know not.

A few years ago, I took a DNA test through Ancestry and 23andme.   The results showed 40% of the markers to be of Spanish and Portuguese origin.   The remaining 60% were non-Iberian: from Europe, Africa, and the New World.

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Chapter 2

What Is Consciousness?

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Knowing ourselves implies a need to understand the influences that affect our consciousness:  Who we are and where we come from. Although we are limited in the short term—in its understanding because we do not have absolute control of our faculties.   It is important, more than ever in human history, to know our origins as far as we can.    The notion of self-knowledge is an intrinsic and unavoidable need.   How else can we reflect on our human spirit, both on our imperfections and our aspirations, if we do not distinguish between variability and changing nature?

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Chapter 3

Etymologies and Toponymies

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Modern scientific etymological study is based on the methods and findings of historical and comparative linguistics, the basic principles of which were established by linguists during the 19th century.

Encyclopedia Britannica, 2021.

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Understanding the etymology of proper names and their geographical locations derives from comparative linguistics, as a way to sort people into groups–by occupation, place of origin, clan, parentage, adoption, and physical characteristics.

The surname Morín derives from the Old French Moré, sobriquet of the ‘Moor’ or moret.   In diminutive forms it means ‘black’ or ‘dark brown’, or a Bereber from Northwest Africa.   The term was used by Christian Europeans to designate the Islamic inhabitants of the Maghreb, the Iberian Peninsula, Sicily, and Malta during the Middle Ages:   The term moro was applied indiscriminately to Arabs, Berbers, and Arabized Iberians.   The surname Morín was associated with the moors of Spain.   In the 8th century Arabs entered the Iberian Peninsula and remained a political force in some fashion until 1492, with the fall of Granada.   The surname Morín was found mainly in the province of Santa Cruz de Tenerife in the Canary Islands, and to a lesser extent in Madrid and Salamanca.

The surname Tortolero comes from Lombardy.   The term derives from the name given to pigeons of the genus Columbina, “dove” or “tortolita”, which comes from the Latin turtur, probably an onomatopoeia.   Since its origins in ancient times, the name Tortolero was associated with divinatory mythology, because of its ability to send messages, among other qualities, and was designated for those who raised turtledoves by trade.   A tortolero was also a mystic.   In Spain the main locus of the surname is Andalusia; it originated from Écija.   The Tortoleros spread throughout the New World, especially Mexico, Venezuela, and Puerto Rico.

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Chapter 4

Origins

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Like many Creole families, both surnames, Morín and Tortolero, find documentation from the Inquisition onward. In 2015 the Spanish government offered to restore citizenship to families who had lost it through mandatory expulsion. [1]

The Morín family, merchants from the Canaries, took up residence in Caracas in 1745.   During the colonial period, their descendants worked as ranchers, and then after Independence (1821), they served in the Federalist army fighting various caudillos.

In contrast, the Tortoleros, according to María Teresa Tortolero Rivero, go back to 19th-century Toledo.   The Morín surname can be traced through documentation in the National Library of Venezuela and from ecclesiastical records in both the state of Guárico and the Capital District of Venezuela.   Before their arrival in Venezuela, the occupation of the Tortolero family is unknown, but afterwards, they worked as cane growers and coffee farmers in Altos de Reyes.

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Chapter 5

The Morín Family

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In 1813 the fourth paternal great-grandfather, bachiller José Calixto Morín Fuentes was the parish priest in Lezama de Orituco (founded in 1688), today known as Altagracia de Orituco [2].   His slave María de Los Santos was the fourth great-grandmother of our family.   She gave José Calixto two children, whom, according to baptismal records, were emancipated by him.   One of her children was our third great-grandfather, Críspulo Morín. From the union between Narcisa Landaeta and him was born Venancio Antonio (1843-1929), known as El Tuerto.   Great-grandfather Venancio Morín Landaeta became a Federalist general in the Azul regime.

Venancio Antonio Morín Landaeta married his first cousin Andrea Fuentes Ramírez in 1870.   This union bore seven children:   Luis Ramón, Críspulo, Jesús Antonio, Venancio, Sofía, Catalina, and José Calixto.   Save our grandfather José Calixto Morín Fuentes, all of his brothers were lawyers.    José Calixto studied music. served as the director of a band in Altagracia de Orituco, and was a composer of waltzes and other popular genres.

Later, from the union of José Calixto Morín Fuentes (1892-1967) and Domitila Infante Hernández (1892-1985), nine children were born: Calixto Eduardo (pharmacologist and philologist), José Galdino (lawyer and Doctor of Political Science), Jesús María–nicknamed Chucho–(educator and government official), Sofía del Carmen (assistant to the director of the National Library of Venezuela), Venancio Enrique (merchant), María Josefina–nicknamed Pipina–(housewife), Luis Eduardo (lawyer), María de Lourdes–nicknamed Malula–(school secretary), and Isaura Inés (housewife).

The Morín Infante family lived in Altagracia de Orituco until 1944. In that year, José Calixto Morín Fuentes was appointed to the staff of the Caracas Military Band.   Two years earlier, the oldest son Calixto Eduardo (1917-2000) and José Galdino (04/18/1921-08/04/1997) were students at the Central University of Venezuela.   Calixto Eduardo became responsible for his brother at the request of José Calixto, who worried about how difficult it was to discipline him.   José Galdino and Calixto Eduardo stayed with their uncle Luis Ramón Morín Fuentes, the older brother of their father José Calixto.   During this time José Galdino seduced the housekeeper, who gave birth to a child of his.   Our cousin Luis Morín Loreto, son of Luis Ramón, adopted the boy and named him César Morín Padrón.   José Galdino studied law graduating summa cum laude in the Central University of Venezuela, July 26, 1947.   His doctoral thesis, entitled “Human Capital,” studied the basic principles of human rights first elucidated by Frédéric Bastiat (1801-1850).   Thereafter, José Galdino excelled as a trial lawyer in both civil and criminal cases.   He never became involved in Venezuelan politics.

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Chapter 6

The Tortolero Family

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The maternal great-grandparents were Elogio Tortolero Cabrera and Paula Ojeda.   The second surname of the maternal great-grandmother is still unknown, as is the existence of her brothers and sisters.   It is known that the great-grand-father Elogio had four brothers and sisters:   José Antonio (who died in Ezequiel Zamora’s guerrillas), Tobías, Rosa Manuela, and María José. It is believed that they were farmers.

The Tortolero Cabreras owned a plantation in the state of Carabobo, called “el fundo de Marta López,” in Altos de Reyes.   From the union of Elogio Tortolero Cabrera and Paula Ojeda was born Rafael Eusebio Tortolero Ojeda (1893-1938).   Rafael Eusebio married Marcolina Rivero (1898-1937). They inherited the ranch.   They had five children:   Lucía (housewife), Leopoldo (grocer), Rafael Eusebio (contractor), María Teresa (lawyer), and Federico (pharmaceutical representative).   Grandfather Rafael Eusebio, however, led a double life supporting six illegitimate children, who were never involved with his legitimate ones.

Grandmother Marcolina Rivero died at the age of 39 from eclampsia, and a year later our grandfather Rafael Eusebio Tortolero Ojeda died at the age of 49 from pneumonia.

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Chapter 7

María Teresa Tortolero Rivero

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María Teresa (08/11/1927-06/18/2010) at the age of 11 years was orphaned.   From 1938 to 1944 she attended the Colegio de Lourdes in Valencia.   The priest Francisco Martínez made possible her admission, and she boarded there for six years.   She then studied for 2 years at the Liceo Pedro Gual and, then, she began working as a hygienist in Valencia.   Subsequently she qualified as a secretary in Los Teques, state of Miranda.   Here she met and married a Russian emigrant Aleksander Sarayeff in 1949.   A few days after their marriage, he disappeared.

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Chapter 8

María Teresa and José Galdino

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In 1950, María Teresa Tortolero Rivero moved to Tacarigua where she met José Galdino Morín Infante, the head of employees at the Tacarigua Sugar Mill.   On his advice, María Teresa filed for divorce.   Sarayeff reappears with threats against her, and José Galdino, as her lawyer, has an injunction preventing his contacting her.   Then, in 1951, owing to a lack of medical resources and neonatal incubators, José Galdino and María Teresa lose their first born child, two months prematurely (Carlos Alberto).   The boy lived only a few days.   A year later (February 17, 1952), María Teresa, at the age of 24, marries José Galdino, 31.

José Galdino bought a house on a 30-acre piece of land in the outskirts of Guacara.   The land, framed between the road to Guacara and the highway to Caracas, had a house with an enclosed swimming pool.    There three children were born:    Alberto José (lawyer) in 1953, Ricardo Federico (author and visual artist) in 1954, and Andreína Teresa (lawyer) in 1955. The parents’ families often visited them.    Then the Morín Tortoleros moved to the town of Naguanagua.    In Naguanagua the fourth child was born:   María Teresa, called Bonnie by the family (playwright, director, and teacher) in 1958.   In 1959, the Morín Tortolero family moved, for the last time, to the urbanización Carabobo in Valencia.   In Valencia the fifth child was born:   José Galdino (import/export merchant) in 1960.

After fifteen years of marriage, María Teresa, at the urgency of the reverend Dr. Simón Salvatierra [3], became a candidate for the State Assembly of Carabobo and subsequently was elected thereto.   Her husband José Galdino forced her to resign the post because of the history of the party leader Marcos Pérez Jiménez’ persecution of the Morin family.   Then she opened a boutique and, once again, her husband disapproves of her status as a shopkeeper.

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Chapter 9

The Allure of Superstition

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María Teresa held herself to be clairvoyant.   People referred by close friends often came to her for spiritual advice.   Inspired by Theosophism and the Rosicrucian order, she delved into metaphysical studies.   Seeking council for her own enlightenment she frequented séances.   José Galdino questioned her sanity.   He, on the other hand, practiced his own rituals of magic.    His clients and friends gave him advice on how to keep enemies at bay, the roots of his own fate, and the principles of casting spells.

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Chapter 10

Separation and Divorce

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Marriages remain intact out of mutual understanding.   Such a union is possible as long as there are shared stories.   But without trust relationships fall apart.

José Galdino and María Teresa were unable to deal with their differences.   After 16 years of marriage, José Galdino remained an inveterate womanizer, and María Teresa, feeling unreciprocated, grew tired of him and his affairs.    In a sense, they knew not their own emotions and deficiencies.

For José Galdino, divorce was out of the question:   a threat to his status and finances.   By Venezuelan law, divorce meant divided property, something which he was unwilling to do.   When notified in 1975 of his wife’s petition for divorce, his fury became uncontrollable.

Knowing how he maneuvered in divorce cases, María Teresa blocked any possible transfer of marital property.   As a result he attempted to throw his wife’s lawyer (Padrino Príncipe) down the stairs of the courthouse.

The divorce decree was issued in 1979, just a year before José Galdino remarried (Piedad Urán Cardona:   a dentistry student, who was 25 years his junior).   The division of assets between José Galdino and María Teresa did not conclude until 1985.   Despite the court’s ruling in her favor, María Teresa fired her lawyer and took on representation by her son Alberto José!    In so doing, she had to renounce large parts of her own rights.   She now felt exhausted and lacking any sense of justice.   From there on she concentrated only on her own future.

Between 1975-85, María Teresa dedicated herself to becoming a lawyer (perhaps to revenge her feelings of having been treated unfairly by the legal system).   In preparation for law school, she fell in love with her tutor of mathematics, José Espirilión Valecillos Carrillo (Piri).   He was a high school teacher in Valencia and fifteen years her junior.   As she prepared for admission at the law school of the University of Carabobo, he too decided to apply as well.   Before finishing their legal studies, they married and took their degree in 1992:   She was 64 and he was 49.

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Chapter 11

Irony of Ironies

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Inexplicably, María Teresa and Piri worked in the same office as that of her ex-husband José Galdino and her son.    María Teresa believed her previous sacrifices had given her the privilege of becoming part of that firm.   Her practice focused on protecting the legal rights of minors.    Her second marriage, however, was as disappointing to her as the first and was dissolved after only two years.    Then in 1996, she announced that her divorce from Jose Galdino had been a mistake.   She was now mentally and emotionally defeated and began to manifest a kind of cognitive disassociation (was this simply depression or the beginnings of Alzheimer’s?).

At the same time José Galdino’s marriage to Piedad Urán was in turmoil.   Since 1993, she had been asking for the abrogation of their prenuptial agreement–thus forcing her to relinquish any property rights accumulated during the marriage.    José Galdino denied the request.   Within three years, however, fortune handed Piedad freedom.

Between 1994 and 1995, José Galdino developed symptoms of Pick’s Neurological Syndrome, leaving him unable to walk, talk, and reason.   Although, I sought treatment for him, his wife’s interference was a major obstacle.   On November 1996, following the suggestion of my father, I returned to the United States to treat my own health problems.   A few months later, José Galdino was operated on a cerebral hemorrhage.   José Galdino died from pneumonia August 4, 1997.

By 1998, María Teresa could no longer continue practicing law.   To fill her time her daughter Bonnie urged her to return to writing poetry.   María Teresa alleged José Galdino had burned what she had written before.   Between 2004-05 she reconstructed some 15 poems, which were later distributed to members of the family under the title Magia Azul.

Chapter 12

The Last Years of María Teresa

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In 1999 at the age of 72, María Terersa, fulfilling a life long dream, and I traveled to Europe.   We visited Madrid, Paris, Venice, and Rome.   On the trip, María Teresa remembered when five years before she had stumbled on her way to court:   For her it was my consolation of her that amounted to the sharing of memories.   At the airport days later, she watched our reflection in a mirror in the airline’s private club and said:   “I hope to keep this moment forever in my memory.”

In 2004, I invited her to celebrate her seventy-seventh birthday in New York City.   On this last trip, she met David, my husband of nine years, and his mother, Eva, who was four years her senior.   María Teresa admired Eva’s vitality.   The following year, María Teresa was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s.

In 2009, she languished in the advanced stages of the disease, and we knew that her treatment had to be continued in a clinic.   It was no longer possible for her daughter Andreina to assume sole responsibility for her care.   Likewise her son José Galdino spared no effort in the care of his mother.   His dedication and conduct were exemplary.

At the age of 84 María Teresa died, June 18, 2010.

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Epilogue

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A Journey Through Time

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In writing this story, I acknowledge my own limitations in trying to understand lives I thought I knew intimately.   My family and I do not know who they were, any more than we can really know ourselves.   This highlights an evanescence that seeks to define our relationships, which barely touch the edges of our existence.   There’s so much we can’t say.   Our own regrets, feelings of shame, or recklessness can only be censors to our understanding.

Edited by Billy Bussell Thompson

Footnotes:

[1] Ref: http://www.exteriores.gob.es/Consulados/SANFRANCISCO/es/Consulado/Paginas/Articulos/Leynacionalidadespa%C3%B1olasefard%C3%ADes.aspx   This link reports that “The Congress of Spain approved in 2015 a bill that grants Spanish nationality to Sephardic descendants expelled from Spain in the fifteenth century.   The rule eliminates the need for residence in Spain and does not require the renunciation of the previous nationality.”

[2] Ref: http://lavozdeoritucohistorialocal.blogspot.com/2015/08/casa-amarilla-de-lezama.html?m=1   This link mentions that in 1813 the “Bachiller” José Calixto Morín reported to the Archbishop of Venezuela on the administrative state and advancement of Lezama.   By decree, the lands belonged to the native Guarino Indians of the region, who had cultivated them until they were displaced at the end of the 19th century.

[3] Ref: https://issuu.com/academiahistoriacarabobo/docs/la_hora_de_las_tinienblas_homenaje_ This link belongs to the publication of the Digital Library: The Hour of Darkness commemorating in 2010 the birth of the parish priest Simón Salvatierra. The reverend Dr. Simón Salvatierra (1910-69) was a native of Bejuma: a priest of the Archdiocese of the city of Valencia, who broke with the norms of the church by being a senator affiliated to a controversial political party: El Indio, also known as Cruzada Cívica Nacionalista (the Nationalist Civic Crusade), founded by followers of the former president, military dictator, Marcos Pérez Jiménez. In the mid-sixties María Teresa kept his advice and close friendship. The Reverend Salvatierra was instrumental in María Teresa’s being elected to the Carabobo State Assembly as a representative of said party. María Teresa felt especially honored to be the first woman assembly member of her state.

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Poetry of María Teresa

Blue Magic (Magia Azul)

(Dedicated to my Children)

i

WHEN IT BLOOMS IN SPRING

(June 15 1974)

*

When it blooms in spring
beautiful flowers from my garden
I offer you my whole life
because suddenly …
it is finally going away.

I take care of your soil, I water your plants,
and sweet fruits I would like to give to you
from my fields of gold and silver
when it blooms in spring.

Beautiful flowers from my garden
crossed the valleys, deep seas
with their cherub wings.
I leave your soil and beloved hearths.

For the sap no longer gives nourishment
nor does it till the fields of their songs.
trailing their aroma until they fade away.

In yon green valleys
in which I dreamt
and that is the goal of my stroll
towards the plants I loved so much.

ii

WINGS BLOWN AWAY

(June 15 1974)

(Bonnie Morín Tortolero’s poem, added to our mother’s collection)

*

We were born free
like red poppies with falling wings
with an innate unease
shedding petals up and down gullies and hills.
and in the blinking of an eye
they flew away …

In what bitter nest
will they shed their yearnings
if a veil covered their sight
over the glint of their hearts
facing the world
as if it were a promised land?

*

(Poem by Maria Teresa in response to her daughter’s)

*

... Follow its swift flight
as time passes by
for wide and long is its course
and if at its first chance it falls,
badly wounded sparrow
raise your eyes beyond the clouds,
fear your lot no more
lest cowardly the flight might be
for love is divine.

iii

COME TO ME

(June 30, 2004)

*

My beloved, come to me
if you loved me
for I’m waiting for you.
Do not make me beg
for I love you
and I suffer not knowing of you.

Starving of light
of your gaze
so that I may live.
For you crossed
my path
to be loved
for eternity.

Life seems absurd
in some instances!
If a match cannot exist
with room for hope.
Letting things go
to nothing more than the draw of luck.

Leave everything in its place
for oblivion is imposed
and so be it.

iv

TO LIVE FOR THEM IS MY VIRTUE

(April 9, 2004)

*

From the narrowness of form
the principle of virtue arises,
the virtue of my loves,
the virtue of loving.

Feeling how much I love them
I exist for them.
It’s all I have.
It’s all I am.
Without them I would be nothing,
to live for them is my virtue.

I love them, I love them …
Thanks to my maker,
Love is life.

v

I REFUSE ACCEPTANCE

(April 14, 2004)

*

I don’t want to force barriers.
I don’t want to have chimeras in my dreams.
Nor to encourage the illusions of a false hope.

As fragile as a straw in the wind.
thus, I wish to erase
all ungrateful memory of its existence

So much that I wish
with the very force of love,
which I carry indelibly within,
in opposition to chance,
to that one toying with us
as if we were ignorant.

vi

DO NOT FORSAKE ME

(May 11, 2004)

*

Instill in me your creative force
to praise you with rapture,
all that my soul longs for.
Eager for your compassion
I implore your presence.
Fill my soul with your divine love
and do not forsake me.

vii

I DREAMT

(May 11, 2004)

*

I dreamt that I was a diva
of the Bel canto
that with devotion
I sang to my father
while daydreaming,
my companion since infancy
with a sweet melody
within myself,
which I still sing not knowing why.

viii

WHEN A DREAM BECOMES REALITY

(January 26, 2004)

*

What may have been audacious for me
for others may have been presumptive.
To judge deed rather than intentions,
Man has no dominion.
He may dream
as a way to spend time
by limiting himself to dream.
No one may be hurt.
He may be just with his dreams alone.
But while dreaming as a way of life
his dreams may also be fulfilled.

ix

MOST BEAUTIFUL OF ALL

(September 11 2004)

*

She was beautiful, the most beautiful among the beautiful
with an upturned and fine nose
with thin and expressive lips
with huge heavenly eyes
with a smiling gaze.
And with a sweet voice inviting to sing alone.
I sang with her
In the shadow of a picture window
And as I sang
Mocking birds joined in
and they began to sing

The song they heard.
Morning birds
that came to her window
singing at dawn
awakening the day

Mama smiled
and between songs she told me:
“You are one another sparrow
my good girl, my smart girl
an insight I shall provide
so that between flight and flight
your dreams may be realized,
so that between dream and dream
you may also learn to fly.”

x

ABSENCE

(June 13, 2005)

*

How much does absence contain
distresses and troubles of the heart
for whom awaits the absent one
never to return, leaving doubts
for whom awaits in suspension,
for not hearing from her beloved one,
whatever happened to him?
One cannot be filled in quiescence,
empty without his love,
and to know best how to await
until his return
with the loving sameness of before.

xi

AN ANGEL FROM ABOVE

(June 30, 2004)

*

An Angel descended from above
teeming with light
and his eyes like the splendor of two stars
reflected upon my soul,
conquering me.

Yet to be left unrequited
not knowing how to live without.
Where has my beloved angel gone?
Where did he go?
Who may reflect upon him
as much as I did?
Waiting for you.
One has to learn.
For you will return to me
to be made happy
as I always did.

xii

AFTER LOVING HIM FIRST

(March 1978)

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Why did I meet him for love?
Why did I love him
having to live with his absence?
What a cruel chance!
to have poured my love
not knowing if corresponded
to end having to endure his distance
beyond my comprehension.
Whatever happened to that love?
to his falling in love?
The one I saw shinning in his eyes?

xiii

IF ONLY I COULD SEE

(March 1978)

*

I transit like a wanderer among shadows
and though stone blind I wish to see,
looking and seeking among things
where daylight does not enter;
looking between all things
until I find a kindred spirit.

I ask My Lord in his infinite mercy
to take compassion of my vexing pains
if I suffer for deluding myself God like
I also suffer from feeling desolate:
The pain that steals my soul
and all the grace of its  glory.

xiv

GREATNESS YOU BESTOWED UPON MY SPIRIT

(July 1979)

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Greatness you bestowed upon my spirit
for the whole world rests upon my bosom
though in sadness I stray
in vain attempts to redeem my heart.

As pariah in a desert
in my migrant existence
I feel the prick of painful thorns.
and the corrosive doubt of uncertainty.

My home’s encumbered by the punching of loneliness
only absence occupies it.
Why have you forsaken me?
Why so much cruelty?
If born to love
when for love’s sake
I wish to be faithful.

xv

BLUE MAGIC

(July 9, 2004)

*

You shall see how
the golden eagle in swift flight
will reach to infinity.

You shall see all we love
turns Blue by magic.
It will come to you.

And you shall see how the magic of love
transforms your heart,
and empowers the joys of life,
our dream so long awaited,
to love and being loved!