Charles Igor Loving

1941-2026

 

It seems like the losses we are asked to endure often come in bundles.  Last time it was Bill Narum and Ed Alexander.  Now it is Pliny Fisk and Charlie Loving.  And Charlie and Ed were famous friends for their lives.  They were both cavers and they were no more afraid of a dark, unmapped cave than they were afraid of the dark futures that face our human condition.  For they both carried their own light.

When Charlie and I would hike in the mountains of Mexico in the Catorce Uplift, we would always have the necessary light and tools to go in and take a look. 

I first met Charlie over 5 decades ago when he walked into my advertising agency office.  That company, Directions Company, was handling some great accounts, most notably, Armadillo World Headquarters.  Charlie had a T shirt idea to pitch to another Ad agency that was politically connected to the Texas Drive Friendly campaign.  It was the official logo with a tire skid mark over it. It didn't go over that well.

Charlie was well known to me because of  the Luckenbach T Shirt and all the posters he had done for Soap Creek and his Flying Chicken contests. I also loved his Nuncio Narc cartoons in the Rag.              .

But in a few years he settled down in Round Rock and I ended up in an old mansion in Taylor running Taylorvision and we both had children.  Our boys were about the same age and so were the girls. In those early days we celebrated their birthdays and behaved pretty normal.  Using his schooling in Meteorology, Charlie became a TV weatherman, and I had graduated up to running large car dealer campaigns in Laredo and Abilene.

But there was nothing "normal about Charlie". 

In Vietnam, he survived a fall from his medi-vac helicopter and lived in that rice paddy drinking river water for 3 days until he was rescued. He and Ed crossed the Saharan desert alone. He illustrated my book called The Day of the Heart. He even helped me find land for Utility Solar plants.

In the early 70s, I published his Nuncio Narc Comic about a dunce who was always getting in jams as he tried to arrest dope smoking criminals.  It was published in conjunction with the Adventures of God, a cool white bearded handsome man that smoked only the best hash as he used his powers for good. The comic called Everwuchawe is still traded.

I still have the originals in my flat files.

Many years later, after our children were grown, Charlie was living in Real de Catorce with several other Caver Texans.  It was a haven of free thinking Americans, and a nice sprinkling of Italians, Swiss, and Germans.  The Don of the town was also a Movie Star as well as Charlies' close amigo.  I had heard about this enclave, but had never made the 600 mile trip across the border.

Then,  as I faced divorce, Charlie took the bus to Austin, picked me up and took me to Catorce on that same Mexican bus line.  When we got to Matehuala, we went to the open air market of this bustling Mexican truck stop city.  Getting our provisions, we got in his Ford Bronco and headed up the mountain on the cobble stone road that shook the jitters right out of you. At the end was a long tunnel.  On the other side was a different world.  At sixty miles an hour and 600 miles for the trip, I learned to say that we erased about a decade an hour in the journey.  

In Catorce,  horses were clopping up the stone street, and roosters were crowing at the sun, and Huicholes with their culture of loose fitting white clothes were selling their intricate string drawings and jewelry on the streets. Telmex had only a handful of phones.  The internet was just showing up in a few coffee shops.

It was time travel. 

I spent the first night in Charlie and Rae's house, but couldn't get past the gato dander.  By the next night I was ensconced in habitacion Once with the best restaurant in town just down the steps. Here in the Abundancia, I fell in love with Real de Catorce.  Each time I would transit through the tunnel, I would cry with joy to be there.  Soon, I rented the best home on the Zocolo with a view from my terrace of the 200 year old  towering cathedral 2 blocks away and the town square below.

I still have that home 25 years later.

When Charlie turned 60, I threw a huge party for him at my big house in Austin. 

I owed him.

Perhaps the high lite of the evening was when musician Henry Clay (of the lost planet airmen) got stuck in the upstairs bathroom for an unknown time until I freed him. 

A few years later, Charlie and Rae tied their knots together in Austin with food cooked by R14 chef Francesco.

Over the last 25 years, Charlie and Raye would often stay in the Quemado room in the Big House when they came to shop or see a doctor or just visit Austin.  By now they had a new house in Real County designed by one of Austin's finest architects. Catorce wasn't going to work for them any longer. He called his new home Deer Corn.

During this long piece of time, Charlie lost his son John Charles.  But his daughter (Alicia) has prospered at Austin Energy and as a proficient horse jumper.

Charlie was drawing or painting practically every waking moment.  His views of humankind were most often in the shadows.  But going through some of his email over the last year and a half, he seemed to value our walk on this earth and how we humans should behave..

Here's a taste of what he sent me:

Entitlement is darkness, humility is light. St. Francis

Humility takes the  focus of self off current circumstances, 

to serve others with no need for reward or recognition.

St. Augustine believed that humility was the fundamental to religion.. there was little actual virtue in a soul that lacked humility,, only the appearance of virtue.

Proverbs 18:12  before a downfall “the heart is haughty.” “Humility comes before honor.”

Churchill, humility is the foundation of virtue.

Confucius , humility is the solid foundation of all virtue.

Braggarts are the essense of weakness and they live very small lives. The arrogant will never serve anyone outside themselves. They find pleasure in those who serve their ego.

The success of a nation depends on the character of its people.

 

And, like me, he worried about the world.

A talking head says we are in for a big crash. 

And another said there will be a war.

One  of my nurses is a Trumpista   

She shows me all her guns. 

She is I am sure not in the minority.  

But I am sure that Charlie was.

He had a famous Uncle named Barbette. 

Barbette was a gay cross dressing circus tight rope walker in Paris, 

who worked on Hollywood movies like "Some Like it Hot "

Some say Charlie was a Spy.

He, like Barbette, was mostly an entertainer. 

A cartoonist of our  turbulent Time. 

A man who drew what he saw.

And then showed it to us. 

We will all miss his candor

and his humor. 

And the Earth

will grieve his departed spirit. 

Yet it remains.

Bye Charlie 

 

CHARLIES PAINTINGS 

DEER CORN 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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A New Year

 

 

As the New Year headed our way, my little family made its way to Europe, specifically, the Iberian Peninsula.   Over the years, we have spent the New Year all over the place.  We have done the big cities, NYC, Mexico City, San Francisco, LA/Las Vegas, Austin, Buenos Aires, Paris, London, and now Madrid. And we have done the smallest hole in the walls from "Bernies" in Port Aransas, Texas to Real de Catorce, Mexico.  

In Catorce, we used to celebrate the New Year with 50 or 60 international friends from all over the Globe.

After dinner in El Real, we would go to the top of the Hotel and experience the greatest, most dangerous fireworks extravanganza at close range.  The six inch  firework mortars would suck the air from around you as everyone on that roof realized that this unregulated display was not only top notch, it was also a 7 or 8 on the Peligroso scale.  The finale was a Gyro-Gearloose contraption made of bamboo by an aging  Matehualan craftsman down in the valley.  It would light up and spin and slowly but surely ignite all of its arms and appendages,  spraying rivers of sparks in every direction, and then all of a sudden, the very top crown would ignite, start spinning at high speed, and then lift off into the heavens to the screams of delight from the equally lit crowd.

We would find it smoldering on someones concrete roof in due time. 

But before we made it to Madrid, we spent 4 days in Lisbon. The last time I was in Lisbon, it seemed a little sleepy but well maintained.  Perhaps the most picturesque city in Western Europe, it has grown to become a destination for tourists of all stripes.  The restaurants are many, the Hotels are modernized, and with the shops and views from the hills of Barrio Alto and the history of the Castle of St George and Alfama on the opposing hill to the north, the historic old town is nicely knitted into the larger metro area. 

Just south of Alfama is the back road up to the Castle.  On the way up is a great Brunch place called Dear Breakfast.  Up the hill a little further is the Cathedral of Lisbon and across the street is the Museum of Resistance and Freedom.

It was there that we were reminded of the recent history of Portugal during its fascist period beginning before World War II.  

Portugal's history of repression, particularly under the

Estado Novo (New State) dictatorship (1933-1974) led by António de Oliveira Salazar, was characterized by strict censorship, pervasive secret police (PIDE/DGS) surveillance, torture, imprisonment of dissidents (like at Aljube prison), suppression of free speech, and control over media and political life to maintain colonial power and traditional values. 

This authoritarian rule, a continuation of earlier military dictatorships, ended with the bloodless Carnation Revolution in 1974, which ushered in democracy. 

The Museum WAS Aljube prison.  And many of the inhuman cells were still intact.  The place gave me the eeby-jeebies. The fact that it was just a few yards from the Cathedral of Lisbon was not just a brutal juxtaposition, 

It is a metaphor of the unholy alliance of church and state. 

The Portuguese people have a long history of courage and exploration.  They were the first to navigate the seas beyond the safety of visual reference.  Thus we have Brazil.

Portuguese maritime explorations resulted in numerous territories and maritime routes recorded by the Portuguese on journeys during the 15th and 16th centuries. Portuguese sailors were at the vanguard of European exploration, chronicling and mapping the coasts of Africa and Asia, then known as the East Indies, Canada and Brazil (the West Indies), in what became known as the Age of Discovery. 

And their technology was advanced:

Portuguese nautical science evolved from the successive expeditions and experience of the Portuguese pilots. It led to a fairly rapid evolution, creating an elite of astronomers, navigators, mathematicians and cartographers. Among them stood Pedro Nunes with studies on how to determine latitude by the stars, and João de Castro, who made important observations of magnetic declination over the entire route around Africa.  

Today Portugal and Lisbon specifically is a model of urban design and commitment to that 500 year history of exploration.

But like the US, Western Europe is facing the large movements of peoples as climate change and a new age of political repression collide.  The Trump administration has claimed that around 140,000 people had been deported as of April 2025, and recent figures are closer to 600,000.

And, the number of people in immigration detention in the US has hit an all-time high according to data published by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement  (ICE).  The data, which comes out every two weeks, shows that as of December 2025, ICE held more than 68,400 people.

And as in the US, the flow of peoples across nation states is also moving those who are seeing their streets and towns change in complexion rightward.

And that explains Drumph.

I'm reading Bruno Latour's book, Down to Earth on climate and politics. In it, he says, "By pulling out of the Paris Accord, Drumph explicitly triggered, if not a world war, at least a war over what constitutes the theatre of operations. 

We Americans don't belong to the same Earth as you.  

Yours may be threatened; ours won't be" 

We made our way to Madrid for our New Year's Eve celebration in a place called Ginger.  

We all wore our funny hats and masks, and blew our little horns. 

For a New Year. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Children of the Wind

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We spent the New Year in Mexico this year.  It was the first time we had been to our home in Real de Catorce in 3 1/2 years.  On New Years Eve, we ate dinner up the hill from our house with a grand view of the well lit Pueblo some 9,000 feet in the Sierra Catorce mountains.  For the first time since I talked the local priest into letting me light the church a decade ago, the 200 year old cathedral that silver built was lit up for the holidays.

The town was ablaze.

After dinner, when we returned to our home on the zocolo below, we could see the stage where the evening's festivities were just getting into the spirit of the coming New Year.  The bands were loud, but actually pretty good which is not always the case. A few friends joined us and we welcomed the New Year in relative peace and warmth.

On New Year's day, we got up early and started the jalepeno frijoles that have become a tradition replacing the black eyed peas of the Southern portion of Mexico's bully brother to the north.  Although we had intended in staying almost 2 weeks in this magical high mountain pueblo, we decided to head south to San Miguel and the slightly lower elevations of the Mexican highlands.

I used to look at San Miguel with some disdain.  Mostly because there were so many redneck Texans there who not only had no intention of learning Spanish, they held the locals responsible for understanding their mangled Spanish.  That has changed in the last decade.  Many of those types have returned to Texas and have instead been replaced with Mexicans from D F.  Those Americans that are replacing the Texans are from high tech centers in the Bay Area.  It's a much better environment, and we now go to San Miguel to see our lawyer, artists, and business friends that we know there. The food is good and although expensive, the accommodations are first rate.

We rented a nice home just west of the Cathedral on  Los Arboles street just off of Canal. It was private and quiet and nice.  We have another place that we like a lot  just yards away from the very center of town. It's called Cinco Flores and with its location on the upper side of Aldama, its a gem.

We spent the last 2 days in Mexico in San Luis Potosi which is probably the biggest city in Mexico that you've never heard about.  It's now about 1.5 million inhabitants, and the southwest side of town is beginning to have a very developed look of mid rise structures than grow out of the low sloped mountain that runs to the south.  San Luis is an old city and was part of the early highland culture that fought the Spanish Conquistadores to a stand off over 70 years in the 1500's.

So, here is the history of a war you never heard of.  This from Wikipedia

The Chichimecas were nomadic and semi-nomadic people who occupied the large desert basin stretching from present day Saltillo and Durango in the north to Querétaro and Guadalajara in the south. Within this area of about 160,000 square kilometres (62,000 sq mi), the Chichimecas lived primarily by hunting and gathering, especially mesquite beans, the edible parts of the agave plants, and the fruit (tunas) and leaves of cactus. In favored areas some of the Chichimeca grew corn and other crops. 

Chichimeca population is hard to estimate, although based on the average density of nomadic cultures they probably numbered 30,000 to 60,000.^[5] The Chichimecas lived in rancherias of crude shelters or natural shelters such as caves, frequently moving from one area to another to take advantage of seasonal foods and hunting. The Chichimeca referred to themselves as "Children of the Wind", living religiously from the natural land. 

The characteristics most noted about them by the Spanish was that both women and men wore little clothing, grew their hair long, and painted and tattooed their bodies. They were often accused of cannibalism, although this accusation has been disputed, due to the Spanish attempt to smear natives as savages in order to justify forced conversion to Catholicism by Spain during the Mexican Inquisition.^[6]

The Chichimecas Confederation consisted of four main nations: Guachichiles, Pames, Guamares, and Zacatecos. These nations had decentralized governments, and were more of independent states.^[7] Due to decentralized political unity, their territories overlapped and other Chichimecs joined one or another in raids.

The Guachichiles' territory centered on the area around what would become the city of San Luis Potosí. They seem to have been the most numerous of the four ethnic groups and the de facto leaders of the Chichimecas. Their name meant "Red Colored Hair" from a pigment that they also applied to their skin and clothing. Living in close proximity to the silver road between Querétaro and Zacatecas, they were the most feared of the native raiders.

The nomadic culture of the Chichimecas made it difficult for the Spanish to defeat them. The bow was their principal weapon and one experienced observer said the Zacatecos were "the best archers in the world." Their bows were short, usually less than four feet long, their arrows were long and thin and made of reed and tipped with obsidian, volcanic rock sharper than a modern-day razor. Despite the fragility of the obsidian arrows they had excellent penetrating qualities, even against Spanish armor which was de rigueur for soldiers fighting the Chichimeca. 

As the war continued unabated, it became clear that the Spanish policy of a war of fire and blood had failed. The royal treasury was being emptied by the demands of the war. Churchmen and others who had initially supported the war of fire and blood now questioned the policy. 

In 1574, the Dominicans, contrary to the Augustinians and Franciscans, declared that the Chichimeca War was unjust and caused by Spanish aggression.^[15] Thus, to end the conflict, the Spanish began to change public policy to purchase peace from the Chichimeca and assimilate with them.  

The Children of the Wind were not defeated and their spirit in the Mexican Highlands lives on today.

And now I know what a true Zacatero is. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Humberto Fernandez

Humberto Fernandez Tristan ended his walk on this plane of existence on Monday, June 5th at around 7:30.  Those who knew and loved him will miss him and his remarkable character greatly.

Last week, Charlie Loving and I flew to San Luis Potosi, rented a car, and drove to Matehuala.  There we found Humberto outside his house in a screened in tent with plywood floors underneath a large pecan tree.  He was reclining in a beefed up anti-gravity chair with a foamy finger mattress underneath him.  He was really thin and his legs were down to the bone.  Even so, with his flower lai and dark glasses on, he was cool.

The scene was beautiful.  Humberto was surrounded by his dogs, the birds, and most importantly his loving family.  There were water fountains giving off soft soothing sounds into the traffic free air.  There were flowers that made the air almost sweet.  Inside the tent, Humberto spoke in a very low voice.  Almost every word was thankfulness and how privileged he was to have had such a good life.

There was no fear in his voice.  He told us he would see us on the other side. For about 90 seconds, his spirit arose and he spoke as if he might arise out of the chair.

We kissed and held his hands and stayed for about an hour.

As Charlie and I drove up the mountain, we tried to absorb what we had just experienced.  We were clear that Humberto was somewhere between the beginning of the end and the end of the end.

Four days later, close to midnight, I heard someone come into the courtyard door and come up the stairs.  It was his older daughters, Dawn and Melodia.

They came in and told me...."Daddy passed away at around sunset."

The next day, we went down the mountain and to his house.  We picked up Cornelia and took her to the crematorium where Humberto's body had been taken earlier in the morning.  There we met with Humberto's three brothers and two sisters, his two older daughters, and some of their cousins.

Within a few hours, Humberto's ashes arrived in one of his beautiful Huichole bags.  It was still warm.  We formed a circle as we each held his remains, some of us holding and kissing the remains of the man who had such an extraordinary walk through this world.

He is surely flying through another one now.

On New Years Eve last year, I interviewed Humberto at his house in Catorce.   You can see why Don Humberto will be so missed by so many.






I hope that others who love and have been loved by Humberto will post their experiences with Humberto in the comments.

Plans are being made right now for a celebration of his life in Real de Catorce. They will include a procession to Quemado and later to the old church grounds. It looks like the date is June 20th.

If you want to go from Texas, let me know.

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The Tao of Catorce

I went to my home in Real de Catorce at the end of May.

While I was there, I produced another Earth Heart.

This one is a real departure from my other efforts, but given the circumstances, it seems appropriate.

The main purpose of the trip was to see Humberto Fernandez, the don of the town, resident shaman, movie actor, and all around charismatic super star.  I brought Charlie Loving, one of Humberto's oldest friends with me. We visited with him in his off mountain home in Matehuala. He was weak but still with us.

After the first three days, it seemed like we had been there a week.

After a week, time stopped.

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Sacred Hunt

 

I put this together last night. It's a trip to the desert of Wirikuta. It's about birth, and life, and living the fullness of things. And its about giving thanks, For the richness that abounds, and the creation that we share.  

May we all have Thanksgiving, Each moment of every day. And may life be our dream, as death becomes our ally, and the profane grows Sacred. 

  

 

 

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