Mole Mirror.

I was reading a LA restaurant review which prompted this entry which is a memorial long overdue as a long time Tuesday regular passed away late last year.

Francisco (I never found out his last name) was a short, somewhat chubby but typically cheerful hispanic guy who could have been anywhere from 40-60. He'd apparently worked on a number of restaurants in various capacities and was very knowledgeable about food as well as other topics in general, enough so that I found it hard to believe that he was out of work. I suppose some of it might have been due to the fact that it was sometimes difficult to understand what he was saying as he had a cross between an accent and a sibilant 's'.  But if I had a business and needed a gofer, I would have hired Francisco.

On the nights he showed up, he'd frequently stay for the bible study and devotional time and afterwards we often talked about food quite a bit, and one night the topic turned to Mexican regional cuisines, It turned out that the region of Mexico he was from was known for mole. I'd told him that I'd never really had an authentic mole, and he'd promised to make mole for me and bring on a Tuesday night. So for a while when he showed up I'd ask him if he brought the mole he'd promised.

Last year he disappeared off the radar for quite a while and then showed up again for dinner. Apparently he'd contracted the West Nile virus, and he was in the 1% for which it causes serious neurological problems, resulting in him being hospitalized for a number of months.  That was the last time I saw him. A few weeks later, someone in line told me that Francisco had passed away, I assume it was from complications from the illness.

He's not the first person from the collection of people who've come for dinner that have passed on. But this feels different in a way I'm having problems verbalizing. Jay was Jay - the reason he was on the street was because he couldn't control his drinking. Ditto for his girlfriend Uno (who, according to rumors, did NOT die. I don't know what to think), who really let herself go after Jay died. I miss them, but I miss Francisco in a different way. I guess it's because I discovered a genuinely likable person that most people probably never got to know, and now he's gone. And I don't want a few people thinking the same thing about me when I'm gone, I guess.