Christmas Filling

A week of shrimp. Shrimp by the ocean, shrimp in San Fernando, or Shadow Hills, to be exact. Christmas Eve: chicken fajitas, peppers, tortillas de harina and Dos Equis in a small restaurant/bar in San Felipe. Barbara, a woman who clearly knew the place, offered me a sip of her libation, straight from her glass: Kahlua and lime, she said, don't you want one? I preferred beer after a long day on the road, the straightaway desert highway still etched on my retinas. The refried beans, as Barbara predicted, were heavenly, and the two beers went to my head. The next afternoon I watched S. eat fish tacos and spoon salsas roja y verde onto his rice while I threw back cold beers as I read in the sun. Christmas dinner: shrimp, bites of lobster, chiles stuffed with shrimp, chunks of succulent carne asada, skewered. The white wine in our room tasted like flowers on this, our fake honeymoon...