SOME OF MY RELATIVES PROBABLY WON'T APPRECIATE THIS REMEMBRANCE, but I must say the bonobo chimpanzee troop at the San Diego Zoo reminds me of the lazy Sundays when I was a boy and my parents and siblings joined a much larger extended family at my grandparents’ home at the end of an unpaved rode in Arkansas. Adults clustered together or sat apart alone. Smallest children scampered squealing among a large yard full of the thorniest and most fragrant roses I have ever known. Their play spilled over into the green meadows surrounding the place. Adolescent cousins looked with lonely suspicion at everybody and especially at each other. The girls always clustered at the far end of the long porch. They did a lot of touching, especially hair and clothes; but like all of the other boys, I knew I wasn’t supposed to get close enough to hear what they were saying.

For the boys, Cousin Carl was a fount of all knowledge about all things, especially sex. We younger cousins stayed close to him like sycophants at a medieval court. It was much later after we were grown that I thought to question the accuracy of his descriptions and explanations of the mysteries of life.

Carl, who had been to Hot Springs alone, had stories to tell. When the rest of us had been there, we were shepherded by our parents. If Carl had actually done all the things he said he did, his trips would have been much longer; but it didn’t matter. He knew things. He had been to the world. He was worldly. He told us of his plans to go to New Orleans. He knew what he wanted to do there, and he told us all of it in great detail. All in unison, like a silent choir, our breaths came shorter.

Carl is old now and lives in Odessa, Texas. I haven’t seen him in many years. I’d still like to hear the details of that trip to New Orleans, if he ever got there.