Love Again Before the End of Time. . . WAS IT SO GOOD THAT YOU STILL WANT MORE? . . . OR SO BAD THAT YOU WANT SOMETHING GOOD FOR A CHANGE? Given the chance to go back in time to just after his fulfilled love with Vernique - would Vilanova take the risk of loving again in partnership? Being happy to have had one great love for most of a lifetime, should he be content to limit himself to friends and family with only the occasional dalliance? Might that not be wise, given the anguish that it is often coupled to searching for continued fulfillment? But he cannot give lie to his need for intimacy in his life, for the joy that can only come from sharing experience, waking each morning with his love beside him. So, his answer is an unequivocal "YES," to seeking LOVE AGAIN BEFORE THE END OF TIME. Losing his lifetime partner after 47 years at age 72, Vilanova de Gaia had already reached that plateau of fulfillment in relationships, adventure and those many possibilities he didn't even know existed. Yet he wasn't ready to give up the day-to-day intimacy in his remaining years, which had ultimately given so much joy and meaning to his life. He had no idea that through all he learned he would not make the mistake that came close to shattering all those remaining years. He almost gave up his quest, thinking it was too late, when fate gave him an unsought reprieve. Vilanova's passionate encounters stimulated him to write memorable verse to women he discovered along the way to "love again." This included verse of adventures, such as fly fishing in Colorado, spending the night in a Tuareg camp in the Sahara, and taking local children on safari in Kenya. All of these elements are poignantly melded together in this narrative of an exceptionally fulfilling life in love, work and adventure. To Vilanova, the most meaningful recollections were of the people he met along the way. TOLD IN TEN CHAPTERS - Here's a brief summary of each chapter: CHAPTERS ONE - WANTING MORE How I struggle to maintain a passionate life, trying to give new loves a positive view of the memorabilia in my home of my late wife, Vernique. CHAPTER TWO - CLIMATE OF POTENTIALITY Making it even better, celebrating favorite characters on New Years Eve, lightening 21 days of radiation treatment with daily distractions, and maintaining a physical reality through sculpture. CHAPTER THREE - LIVING AT A WORLD LEVEL Seeing the world from the inside out as wine importers, riding an Arabian stallion into the Sahara desert to an unforeseen Tuareg camp. CHAPTER FOUR - REACHING A PLATEAU OF LIFE Living every day to fulfillment after Vernique is given six months to live, that become our seven best years, while starting Kenyan Kids on Safari, a charity. CHAPTER FIVE - ADDING ANOTHER DIMENSION Vernique's poetry celebrates life, while tinged with facing the ultimate reality of death. CHAPTER SIX - HEALING LOVE Helene lifts me up from my grief onto a plateau of friendship until I'm bursting with passionate serenity, but finding nothings left but the dream of love. CHAPTER SEVEN - INTERMEZZO & LIFELONG LOVE Lizabeta and the agony of dating (especially old family friends), then a wonderful interlude at my sister's Smoky Mountain home, all the while weaving back into a relationship with my lifelong love, Zafra, who dies suddenly. CHAPTER EIGHT - WANTING IT TO BE LOVE That turned out to be the case, even though I was sure that this striking beauty with such presence and ease of manner was the ONE. CHAPTER NINE - LOVING AGAIN: A SELF-DESTRUCT Giovanna slides into my life when I had given up hope of loving again, but realize a great passion for each other before she burns out like a star in nova from an addiction induced by medication for old pro-skiing injuries. CHAPTER TEN - TO LOVE AGAIN STILL LOOKS POSSIBLE Even after throwing away the key to that door, Terra and some members of her family are giving me life and love again.
About the Author: Like Don Quixote, Vilanova de Gaia spent much time tilting at the windmills of love, after losing Vernique, his great love of 47-years, to cancer in 2007. He wanted more. Being sent away to a New England boarding school at nine years old, where his entire day was rigidly structured, made him resent any sign of overbearing authority, although Vilanova did receive a prep-school education that got him accepted to Yale. By that time, he had enough of the intense Eastern atmosphere and settled for the University of Texas, where he studied Journalism and Latin American Economic Development. Adventuring in Nicaragua upon graduating, he worked in a gold mine operated by "Rip" Robertson. He later found out Rip was a "rogue" CIA agent, on "leave" for mistakenly blowing up a British, rather than Russian ship. He also taught American Marines "live combat" in the remote rain forests of Nicaragua's Zelaya Province. Realizing he wasn't cut out to work for someone else in corporate America, Vilanova spent many years operating his own advertising agency in New Orleans, with an emphasis on real estate. Publishing a residential home building magazine, he was called on to lead the cause for removal of a crooked Director of the New Orleans regional office of the U.S. Dept. of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Getting Vernique and his two children away from the draining heat of the South, he specialized in commercial real estate marketing in the Pacific Northwest. At the same time, his passion for foreign travel with Vernique led to becoming a wine importer. After her death, he moved to a riverside home in the foothills of the Cascades, while seeing if he could ". . . love again before the end of time." Now, Vilanova and Terra spend more time at home, surrounded by a herd of 300 elk roaming the area, providing sufficient wildlife to satisfy Vilanova's penchant for the African reserves, although Terra is glad not to have encountered a mountain lion or bear.