June 26, 2017 - Coffee With Martha

Coffee with Martha

I want to start this blog out by saying happy birthday to my fabulous and gorgeous mom, Shirley Rosinbaum Pennoyer!  If you know her, you know she is the best.

Tomorrow I leave for Trinidad, Bolivia in the Beni department in the north.  It is on the Mamoré River, which feeds into the Amazon.

My friend, Martha, says she has friends there and thought we’d like to meet each other.  So I invited her to coffee at my artsy coffee place near the Plaza, the Café Patrimonio.  Since it is a new place, only since January, many of my Bolivian friends don’t know about it yet.  That means I have the great pleasure of introducing it to them.

I arrived early, so I could write a bit.  I am waiting on a friend who is editing Onesimus, so I have started working on three other novels.  I believe one will surface in the near future for me to finish.  One is the story of Moses and Pharaoh’s daughter, another is Luke interviewing Mary, and a third an expansion of an event in high school.  Martha arrived before I got too far.

Martha is one of my favorite people in Bolivia.  She knows the significance of her namesake in the Bible and is striving to be more like her sister, Mary, who sat at Jesus’ feet.  She feels she is like the biblical Martha, but if you meet her, you will agree that she is more like Mary.  She is the kind of woman who devotes herself to prayer.  She will pray for you in a heartbeat.

Now let me explain the picture of Martha texting.  No, she is not one of those people who texts while talking to you.  She has a friend in Trinidad that she wants me to meet, thinking she will show me some of the special sites in the city.  So, while we were having coffee, Martha proceeded to text her friend to set up the meeting.  You don’t get to see the next scene of her beating me over the head with her chair for taking a picture of her texting (just kidding).

After coffee, I had the privilege of showing her around the Patrimonio.  It was the home of Dr. Melchor Pinto, a famous doctor and politician.  One room is a reconstruction of his office.  The walls are covered with famous people from Santa Cruz.  I knew very few, but Martha, knew many of them.

There are five other rooms filled with art.  Most of it is modern.  One room is permanent; I think it ight have been Dr. Pinto’s personal collection.  The other four change ever few weeks.  They stagger the changes in galleries, so it seems that every week there is something new.

Martha needed to go to the school to work in her room.  I needed to pack.  I love relaxed mornings like this with friends.  Want to join me for a coffee?