Chewie asked about our water supply. This topic was very important to him, we saw it in his body language. ¿Cuantos gallons, agua? I counted to twenty on my fingers. Veinte aqua aqui. Bueno.

Chewbacca had one errand to run before we left, said he'd be back pronto. He turned back into a jaguar like a shift changer, jumped into the bush and was gone. An hour later El Tigre returned with a tattered and bleached-by-the-sun climbers pack, a frying pan, a dozen eggs, tortillas, frejoles in a big can, chilis, red peppers, onions, garlic cloves, cilantro, tomatoes (we had the cheese, lettuce and cabbage), Cholula hot sauce, and a case of Tecate Beer. Where'd he go? Joe loaded the eggs into our ice chest, we wasted no time chugging another cerveza.

Our truck tailgate was down and Chewie emptied most of the contents of his rucksack. Out he pulled a long sleeve T shirt with the Go Climb a Rock stenciled on the back (no lie). He also had a Grateful Dead T shirt with the dancing skeletons artwork. A white baseball hat with the Mexican national emblem on it that looked as beat up as my Corona hat. A Blue Water climbing harness came next, the kind my climbing wall manufacturing company sold to gyms who had our walls installed — Sport Rock International, Paso Robles. Hum. He had an ATC belay plate, well used, chalk bag, and . . . who is this guy? Then, with much anticipation on our part, next came, a small wool blanket, then . . . those shoes, I have a pair of those old boots: Boreal Firés! Chewie saw me stare at the Spanish botas. He smirked, picked one up said, Mi amigo es Chongo Chuck, and his rubber. ¿Tu sabes Chongo Chuck? Si!

This encounter was getting stranger and stranger by the moment and we hadn't even got going yet. One more item to inspect — the quart and half glass bottle. Dan carefully picked the jar up and I asked, Que es esto? Chewie we were finding out, was a most versatile Mexican. This small jug contained his very own signature tequila. ¡Hijola! For Dia de los Muertos (Dan now cradled the bottle like it was a little baby). We again looked at one another to try and remember exactly what the Day of the Dead was — is — all about. Chewie was willing to be with us for at least a day during this solemn remembrance, oh yah, to celebrate the death of their relatives and their spirits returns during this fall memorial. Looking north, being so close to La Línea, La Frontera, the Mal Paíz, El otro lado, I imagined Chewie had relatives or friends out there.

What must it be like to cross the border in the middle of summer, with too little water and too many La Migra searching for you? To loose a family member to dehydration and death! Chewie was animated and talkative as we stashed his gear in the bed of the truck.

Joe and Chewie padded the Bell Jar care-full-ee with our sleeping pads as if it was Nitroglycerin soon to explode with any jolt. We wanted that explosion to happen in our brains. We hopped into the king cab truck and us dumb sheep followed the directions of el pastor. Within an hour, as I remember it, we were at the smaller domes, just passed them we found a place to camp. Like Joshua Tree with no neighbors. Our oasis.

As we unpacked what we immediately needed, more beer and chips, lawn chairs and such, we relaxed in the late afternoon setting sun. Chewie wasted little time preparing for the evening meal. Joe helped. Dan and I got the campfire going. We had a pound of ground round (we were going to make hamburgers!), Canola oil, Chewie the pinche or cook had the rest of the ingredients laid out like he was the Cajun chef Paul Prudohomme, and was now beginning to concoct tacos de fantastico on our Coleman stove. More chips and salsa, we were listening to the Flying Burrito Brothers. ". . . Wild horses couldn't drag me away / wild horses couldn't drag me away." Chewie said that after dark on the radio AM dial, we would be able to tune into a station all the way south to México Ciudad. A thousand mile radio signal.

As I watched the Mexican Magician prepare our meal — his treat, I thought of the famous artist Picasso and his sculpture, The Goat. This is how I saw Chewie. Tough, rugged, duro, funny, yet polite, kind, even compassionate. Servant and artist. A Mexican Picasso.

¡Comida! We laid out our dinner in an organized fashion on the tailgate, tacos, chips and salsa, beans, cheese, cilantro, cabbage and lettuce, onions, and cerveza. We all had a chair to watch the sun set. We were now the Four Musketeers eating with gusto, now well satiated and well in verse. I am the quiet one, the listener, many call me Deep Thinker. Joe and Dan are more entertaining and conversational. Chewie was now part of us, or we were part of him, a gregarious cuatro amigos chowing down. Dinner over we bused our tables, cleaned up, and prepared for the next course.

By the time the stars came out we were well into our conversation about life on the border. Chewie brought out his agave liquor. "I want to make mescal as good as Tish Hinojosa plays Tijano and TexMex ballads. I'm not there yet, wrong kind of agave here."