I read this week that Colombian author and Nobel Laureate Gabriel Garcia Marquez did not like when critics described his work as “magical realism.” He thought the line between realism and surrealism is much blurrier. The implication is that “reality” for me, a Cartesian drenched North Atlantic citizen, is much different than that of a Latin American. My “real” is distanced from enchantment that exists in the real world of Latin America. La Mesa embodied this blurring.
We drove forty miles from Bogotá and descended 6,000 feet to arrive at La Mesa. We stayed at an eco-resort called Hotel Toscana. Our balcony faced southeast. Each morning, Silas would wake-up way too early, around 5:30am, and ask if he could sit in the balcony hammock. Alone, he would contemplate and watch the sunrise, a quality he came by honestly from his Papa Sir. The rest of us would slumber until the warmth would stir us.
By mid-morning the temperature would reach the mid-80’s and a storm would tumble across the eastern range of the Andes. The storms were quick to roll in and quick to roll out. La Mesa would cool for a while, and then heat back up. The rhythm of sunshine and rainstorms seems ordered, but not decipherable by me. Instead of iPhone reminders and Google Calendar alerts, the land dictated our days.
At night, June Bugs would swarm the area. They were like dry leaves in a windstorm, swirling around, bumping into each other. Light pollution from Bogotá seemed mostly obscured by the mountains. One night, I walked by myself around the property and heard footsteps behind me. It was the heavy leaves of a banana tree slapping in the soft breeze.
Another afternoon Silas encouraged Erin and I to come to the porch to see a spider. He said it was in the plant right off our porch. We approached lackadaisically. Of course spiders are neat, but when you are trying to adjust to having three kids, a four-year old’s excitement over a spider is hard to prioritize. I came out expecting some sort of semi-cool jungle spider, but I could not find what Silas’ little eyes had spotted. That was because I was trained to look for a spider, like a normal sized spider. Quickly a tarantula emerged from the plant. On another day we saw a horse suffer and survive a seizure. Erin picked mangoes off the tree for the kids to cut and eat.
The resort was tucked in a strange neighborhood. It was one part shanty-town, one part private estates. We never got the story of why these two worlds sat on top of each other. I was worried about walking off the resort looking like a couple of dumb gringos with their kids, but I forgot that Erin is not a gringo. We walked along the dirt road, Silas tossing rocks into pools of stagnant water, while Erin exchanged pleasantries with porch sitting locals. We were imposed upon by a pack of barking dogs. I panicked. Erin quickly made a hiss sound, as if she had encountered roaming packs of dogs many times before…because she has. I have often called her my Indiana Jones.
We were in La Mesa for one week, for only one purpose: to meet a judge. Besides the extra time to bond with Marco and observe Colombia, we had the bonus of visiting with some staff from our adoption agency. We met Scott Brown, Executive Vice President at Gladney, and Ella, the Latin America Program Assistant. They happened to be in Colombia at the same time as us. Scott was well known to us from communication over the years, but it was wonderful to get to know him better. Ella is a Colombian who now lives in Texas. Scott gave us a lot of great history on Gladney and Ella taught us a ton about Colombia. Again, we cannot recommend Gladney more!
But Friday our business came. We went to the courthouse and watched Jairo tisk, wink, and
smirk our way into a faster procedure. When it was time to meet the judge, we walked into the second floor office of a building with Spanish colonial architecture. The windows were open, we could see the bustling marketplace and the yellow/blue/red flags of the town square. The judge played with Lucy and complimented Silas’ hair. She spoke with us for twenty minutes, asking about our jobs, our experience in Colombia, and we asked her about her story. She held Marco and we were never quizzed about our parenting style.
My conditioning to expect a small spider, a cynical court official, or to assume the sound of footsteps would not be banana leaves, revealed how acute is my sense of “reality.” I am romanticizing of course (especially about court officials). There is an enchantment here none-the-less. The enchantment of Latin America is something Erin discovered much before I did. Her season in Argentina, work in Guatemala, many visits to the Dominican, and now Colombia, have informed her affection for this part of the world. I am only beginning to learn. With these affections being stoked, is it any wonder God would bring us a Colombian son? We had no idea what he was doing when we began the adoption process, but now our family is forever tethered to this place. And this gorgeous, mysterious place really is Macondo.
austin pfeiffer 
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