Federico Reyes Heroles
There are days when the mind does not ask: it is where it should be.
This is the case.
In the distance, Chuy appears. Easy to pronounce for a minor child, Chuy was omnipresent. Over there, over here, with his friends, huge for me. Where did this Chuy, so popular in the Northwest, come from? I don’t know. When he reached adolescence, he complained: call me Jesús. But there are still those (like me) who remember… Chuy. Restless look that did not stop. We did not know grandparents; all four would die shortly after my parents’ marriage. However, he was hugged by his paternal grandparents. Then came something disconcerting, “What,” the teachers asked us in the schule (German School), “your brother’s name is Jesús Federico, and you Federico Jesús? There was an explanation. As a child, my father was called El Espantamuertos (The Dead Scarer) because of many previous lost siblings. And my mother also mourned Mireya, who was already the II; she died of diphtheria. Then Gloria, my mother, invented the safe formula: for the two grandparents to endure, they will both bear the two names. Systemic confusion: J. F. came to make a bank withdrawal from F. J.’s account!
The ranchera stage arrived, jokes included. A large room with six beds lent itself to everything. A frog in the bed of Pepe Pliego, his long-time friend, who would hallucinate any bug. A calf in Raúl Millares’ bedside, just at dawn. Or simply being abandoned in the countryside miles away. Children’s jokes. My mother complained about the barbarity of… “the children”. She would have granddaughters that would make up for it. Pepe Lamas was skinning a rattlesnake with our help because it was still wriggling around, already dead. He was going for the skin. My mother was engrossed. During the nights and early mornings, the eagle was on the arm with a glove of flesh, and the cap was removed little by little. Little pieces of meat to achieve his friendship. At night, Simon and Garfunkel rumbled in the big room, with Bridge over troubled water. Or Jesús trying to kill a coral snake with an ornamental machete. That’s in the memory.
Jesús, always with the best grades, would study economics at ITAM and law at UNAM. He would argue with my father about economic strategies. That generation brought to mind new ideas, diminishing returns, comparative costs and advantages, and so on. They chased away ghosts. From there to MIT, very young, 23 years old? He would run into Pedro Aspe and an advanced troop in search of a different kind of training. Five years later, to the Bank of Mexico, and from there, to the Treasury to pursue a public service career. Many told him to go to the private sector. Better pay, that was the reason. He went through the worst financial storms at the Treasury, with Silva Herzog as Secretary and Suárez Dávila as Undersecretary. He made his way. He decided to do public service; his father’s trajectory did not inhibit him. Banobras, the Energy Secretariat, the Embassy in the United States, Pemex, and others. His deployment as a diplomat was remarkable because, without having the least experience, his pleasant character and conciliatory vision injected freshness into his activity. He made countless visits to consulates. He achieved good relations in Washington. That’s why he went there. He enjoyed it. Then, Back to the professorship, consulting.
Serious mistakes, one: to have entrusted me with the religious education of his first-born daughter. But who would have thought of that? I never got past the Holy Trinity; I never understood him, three persons in one? My desperate mentor failed. We dined alone from time to time at La Cava. He liked good wine and was demanding but kind to the servers. The conversation was always about res publica: the obvious problems and the… not so obvious problems. A friend of his described him brilliantly: “he always walks with a little rain cloud above”. It was true; he was looking for potential storms. He was right.
A life-long relationship with his great partner, three grown children, four grandchildren, and… a lot of friends. By the way, besides being a great professional, he could also be the life of the party.
Farewell, dear Jesús.
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