A Titan in the Treehouse


Rottweilers used to make me nervous, but Titan has changed things. Titan brought his friend Roberto for a couple nights in the treehouse. They are Airbed and Breakfast hosts in Medford, Massachusetts, where Roberto decorated the Victorian house in a manner David Bromstad might approve. The house is surrounded by gardens Roberto spends a couple hours a day tending. Pass under the rose-vined arbor and wind down the stone path guarded by statuary and urns spouting ivy. Or go inside and sit in the green room with violet draperies or perch on the red leather Elvis couch in the media room. Take a shower with orchids nodding overhead. Have breakfast at the kitchen nook and watch the morning news on the television bolted to the wall. Afterward, stroll down to Tufts University or take a bus to Harvard, MIT, BU or BC. I can’t wait to go there.

So what in the world was Roberto doing booking two nights in a treehouse?

“I needed a vacation,” he said. I can only imagine how busy he must be with guests this time of year. “And I wanted the opposite of what I have in Medford.”

Well, you can’t get more opposite than Fern Forest.

Titan was a little shy at first. Fern Forest must smell quite different from Medford. Just before they arrived, I heard a coyote howling close by. When Roberto drove up, his SUV startled some deer grazing by the compost bin. A neighbor sent a message that there was a bear on her deck, sitting on a sweater it had pulled from the clothesline. I guess even bears get a little chilly in Vermont autumn.

In the evening Titan agreed to stay with H and me while Roberto went to the Bobcat for dinner. He was gone so long that H and Titan and I went to bed and left a light on for him. In the morning Roberto said he’d made some new friends at the Bobcat. When H and I stopped at the Bobcat for a quick homebrew the next afternoon, Dana the bartender told us that Roberto had met everyone at the bar. Dana said he’d never seen a patron who could talk to absolutely anyone. Where did Roberto get his good nature?

Could be the Panamanian in him. The canal made Panama a commercial capital and brought people from all over the world—Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas. Each new resident brought some aspect of culture from his homeland—food, dress, music. It’s not unusual to hear Spanish guitar played with African drum accompaniment. Panama is a bilingual country with English spoken as predominantly as Spanish. It’s a melting pot for races and a crossroads for people from all over the world.

And Roberto loves people. He falls in the middle of five children raised in Panama and serves as the family anchor, keeping his brothers and sisters connected from all over the U.S. He’s especially close with his sister Reyna, whom he says is exquisitely beautiful. I'm not surprised because Roberto is doggone handsome. In fact, he encouraged Reyna to enter the Miss Panama contest in 1995. She wasn’t interested, but Roberto offered to train her in how to dress, how to walk, how to speak in an interview. “She had never worn heels higher than flip-flops,” Roberto said.

Reyna won the Miss Panama crown that year and went on to compete in the Miss Universe contest in 1996, finishing in the top twelve and winning the native costume competition. Roberto supplied this photo of her, and I found her scores for the Miss U contest: Evening Gown 8.64; Swimsuit 8.32; Interview 9.02; Average 8.66. I’d say Roberto coached her well.

How'd he learn the tricks of the trade? Maybe because he's an actor and has performed onstage in Panama and New York. Or maybe it's his dancing career. He was one of Ricky Martin's troupe of background dancers. Or maybe it's just that he's Panamanian.

Panama appreciates beauty. In addition to Miss Panama, they have the Realmente Bella Señorita Panamá contest, the Miss Panama International contest, Miss Earth Panama contest, and Miss Supranational Panama contest. And then there’s the natural beauty of the place. Roberto says you can watch the sunrise over the Atlantic Ocean in the morning and drive to the west coast and watch the sunset over the Pacific in the evening, the only place in the world where that is possible due to the shape of the country, like an S on its side.

Not quite like October in Vermont.

After a sleep in the treehouse, Roberto took Titan to St. Johnsbury to visit Dog Mountain, artist Stephen Hunek’s 400-acre dog park with swimming pond and dog chapel. He had taken along a picture of Titan’s predecessor and friend, Gloria—a Rottweiler mix—to post in the chapel along with other gone-but-not-forgotten canine friends. The chapel’s white steeple points to the heavens topped by a winged Lab weather vane. According to Hunek’s website, he got the idea for the chapel after surviving a near-death coma from a fall down a flight of stairs because he wanted to honor “the connection between art, nature, and spirituality.”


The following day was our wedding anniversary, and Roberto presented H and me with this Hunek mug from the dog park. I claimed it for morning coffee and drink from it turned so that H can see the picture. There's a lot to learn from our four-legged buddies.

Even H says that dogs have strong spirits. Titan is an especially sweet doggie. “Gloria trained him,” Roberto says.


Titan looked a little wistful when he hopped back into Roberto's car, but Roberto promises to come back this winter to ski with H. I’m planning to partner with Titan for a snowshoe in the woods behind our house. I could use a lesson in canine spirit.

Comments

Kimbo said…
Yes, Roberto has STYLE and a kind heart. In the 80's he could host a better aerobics class than even the queen herself, Ms. Fonda. For a recent birthday party, no gifts were accepted, only donations to a local animal agency. His charisma, pizzaz, and all that jazz make him a great friend. I can assure anyone reading this blog that his abode will be a spectacular place to stay. Love him like a bro.
October 19, 2010 at 4:04 PM
Louella Bryant said…
Thanks for this tribute to Roberto, Kimbo. Next time he visits, I'll get him to give me an aerobics lesson. He is a true animal lover, and Titan is one lucky dog!
November 1, 2010 at 5:32 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Sex and the Treehouse

Image
When Hana asked to book Fern Forest Treehouse for herself and three friends, H said there wasn’t room, the treehouse is only ninety square feet, he didn’t know how they’d sleep. “Oh, we’ll bring sleeping bags,” she wrote. “Don’t worry—we’ll fit in.” H is a pushover, especially for such youthful enthusiasm. And he thought it sounded like a good time. When the four gals pulled in from Boston around eleven Friday night, H was waiting up for them, the path to the treehouse lit by solar lamps, the treehouse itself all aglitter with colored lights. From upstairs, I heard excited giggles as he showed them around, more giggles as they climbed into the spa under a sky studded with a million stars. As happens in water at 102 degrees, the giggles calmed to whispers, and eventually all was quiet. The sun rose clear Saturday morning, warming the treehouse so that the girls were up a little after 7:00 a.m. We were still in bed when I heard water running in the downstairs bathroom, and H and ...
Read more

Octopus Fishing in Portugal

Image
Ann was studying in Spain for a semester, living with a Spanish family. When the university had a break, Portugal called. It’s an old country, remains of the first settlements dating back to the Neolithic period, five thousand years before Christ. The Visigoths invaded in the sixth century. In 1986, the hills were covered in wildflowers, and horses grazed in fields crimsoned with red geraniums. On the southern coast of Portugal, the area of Algarve is dotted with small fishing villages. Santa Luzia, Tavira, Lisboa, Faro, Cape Sagres, Salema. From the gold dust beaches, one can look across the sea to the shores of Morocco. Bathers swim topless—young women, old women, bathing tops cast aside, breasts bared to the sun. Ann felt strange covering herself. She was just nineteen and modest, but she wanted to fit in, to be accepted, even among these strangers on the beach. She’d worn a one-piece tank suit but slipped the straps off her shoulders, rolled down the suit’s upper half, lay...
Read more

A Treehouse guest discovers his roots in an old millstone

Image
In spring 1794, a group of men set their shoulders to clearing land in what is now Lincoln, Vermont. The footpath they blazed into the forest eventually became a road named for the Quakers who came to settle with ox carts holding all their belongings. They were young, strong, and healthy. Once they pried rocks from the fields, they found the soil rich enough to support their crops. A year later, nearly one hundred residents, mostly from New York and Connecticut, scattered over 24,000 acres of wilderness, most living in tiny one-room cabins made from logs they hewed by hand from trees they had cut on their property. They cooked meals in stick-and-mud fireplaces, spun wool from their sheep, wove fabrics to make their own clothing, and cobbled shoes for their families. They hunted game in the forests and guarded their livestock from wolves that prowled the land. When the crops failed and game was sparse, they went hungry. Quaker services were held in homes until they built a m...
Read more