Thoughts on Driving Through Spain between Palm Sunday and Easter

Cádiz reminds me of Miami. Then again, so much of the world now feels like a déjà vu of someplace else. Art echoes other art. People resemble echoes of people I’ve already met. Decades ago, when I visited Switzerland, everything felt radically foreign—right down to the shoes. I remember being fascinated by them because they were different. Today, shoes all look the same. We’re watching the extinction of uniqueness in real-time. Speaking of sameness, Europeans used to be slim. Now they’re as plump as we are. Globalization: would you like fries with that?

Driving in Spain isn’t so bad. In Gibraltar, we got rear-ended after a sudden stop—no damage, just a jolt. I’ve made my share of wrong turns and the roundabouts? Let’s just say I'm not built for circles. I'm American; I like my roads straight and our decisions binary.

On Palm Sunday, a little tipsy, Lucy and I watched a religious procession snake through the narrow streets. Men in three-foot-tall red pointed hoods—with their faces completely covered, looking disturbingly like the Klan. Others moved solemnly beneath a golden float carrying a deeply miserable Jesus. Only their feet were visible, shuffling beneath the burden. We were told it was penance. Wheels would be easier, but apparently, guilt demands drama. The priests, as ever, prefer spectacle over logic. Dragging a savior through town doesn’t earn you grace—it just gives you a backache. If forgiveness is real, it likely begins with truth, not pageantry.

Fuengirola reminds me of Gulf Shores, Alabama. The beach now felt like a holding pen for sunburnt drunks and the exhausted retired. The shops hawk overpriced cruise-ship castoffs. The restaurants cater to no one in particular—a bland, greasy blur of gut-filler.

Cartagena, at least, reminds me of nowhere. Its Easter parade began at 9 p.m. and dragged on till 4 a.m. And just when silence seemed possible—boom—one last cannon at 4:30. Tens of thousands in the streets. And yes, more of those surreal KKK-like hats. Religion clearly works as social glue, but up close, it’s theatrical—ornate, overblown, and, at times, utterly ridiculous.

We stepped into a church and watched communion. I felt something unexpected: envy. The gold, the order, the communion of it all—this social scaffolding I don’t have. If only I could climb over my skeptical barricade and join the faithful. So many questions would vanish. What relief it must be to believe life comes with built-in meaning. What ease in confession. What bliss to just hand it all over to God.

But at 4 a.m., in Cartagena, the drums still pounded like a war march for the risen—fourteen hours of rhythmic noise. Thousands were still drinking, shouting, cheering. And just when the last nerve quieted—bam! Another cannon. We didn't sleep for two days. This isn’t devotion. It’s noise terrorism. I even prayed, not for faith, but for silence. “Dear Jesus, please make these devout lunatics shut the f#@k up. And take the cannons with them.” What does any of this have to do with resurrection? Maybe I’m just tired, but I’m done with rituals, from cutting foreskins to painting eggs, from chanting at walls to drinking symbolic blood, from hoods to halos—enough already.

 

Spain reminds me time is speeding up. Seconds are now half-seconds. Months feel like weeks. As my joints ache and my thoughts cloud, I see more clearly: none of my old victories or defeats will be remembered. Capitalism has no use for the soul—it can’t be packaged, so it holds no value. And yet, we define ourselves by those fleeting things. Now that they’re behind me, I realize how little I knew about myself. I spent a lifetime trading in temporary currency.

But then, while at the Rock of Gibraltar, a monkey sat on my shoulder, and I realized the meaning of life.