March is a time when trees full of lavender and blue explode along many avenues of Guadalajara and stain certain rural roadsides like the magical blood of ancient Nahua gods.

As the 1960s came to an end, a woman who had built a fast-paced New York advertising career (Helen Rubenstein’s advertising manager, vice-president of a mid-sized advertising agency, copy group head for Baten Barton Durstine and Osborn), who had reared a family, and seen her husband pass away, retired and drove to Guadalajara.

On an August afternoon in 1963 Astfulo (“Tulfo”) Diaz gave me a horse racing tip. In pueblos lining Lake Chapala, horse racing of both the most formal competitions, as well as the most casual pickup races were grandly popular. Spontaneously, without preparation, they could take place, midweek or on weekends.

Chucha — Maria de Jesus — Anzaldo was a small wiry woman of about 60 when I first met her in the 1960s.

Like a sudden outbreak of dengue fever Christmas somehow got started in October this year.

The stuttering eruption, November 20, of Mexico’s 1910 Revolution was believed at the time to have been missed by most of the nation’s 10 million-plus inhabitants.