Generations in Flight: What the Monarchs Taught Me

“What has been your favorite non-monarch highlight so far?” asked one of the two Jeffs on our trip. This was the younger Jeff, the psychiatrist Jeff, the met-in-Vietnam-and-have-been-friends-ever-since Jeff (not to be confused with my older brother-in-law Jeff).

It was a fair question, asked while sitting by the warmth of the fire at our outside dining area after returning from the Piedra Herrada Monarch Butterfly Preserve, which would surely have been a highlight for all of us had Jeff not qualified his question.

We were tired from the “45 minute” (four hours) hike up a steep mountain to the cluster of trees where the butterflies gather for warmth and sustenance during the winter. Our journey, however difficult, paled in comparison to that of the monarchs which covers thousands of miles in a mysterious multi-generation relay.

David, our 15-year-old guide, taught us the details when we stopped for much-needed moments of rest during the ascent.

Surrounded by tall pines and bright blossoms of the Mexican milkweed the butterflies eat, we caught our breath and asked questions, trying our best to wrap our minds around the story of the monarchs while simultaneously translating from David’s Spanish.

Vicky Ann showed our guide a photo of a silver-winged butterfly that my son’s girlfriend found near the pool back at our Home Exchange country mansion. David explained, if I understood correctly, that these butterflies appear only in November, the month of the Day of the Dead. It is said that they are the souls of loved ones returning to take part in this annual ritual.

At the top of the mountain, Vicky Ann sprouted wings of her own and successfully maintained her silence as required so as not to disturb the monarchs which were gathered in multi-layered clumps hanging like foliage from the tall pines. As the sun warms them up, the butterflies take flight and fill the air with swirling streaks of orange and black in every direction. It was so quiet that my sister Kathy said she heard the fluttering of the thousands upon thousands of monarch wings.

The generation of monarchs that we met are known as the super generation, larger and longer living than others. These are the ones that left Canada and the US to winter in Mexico, crossing borders unimpeded by walls and tariffs. Many of the males die here while the females will take one more trip in the spring to northern Mexico where the next generation will be born.

Two more generations will continue the cycle, moving north during their short lifespans of two to eight weeks. Later this year, the next super generation will be born, living two to eight months, and continue the cycle once again, just as it has happened for as long as there have been monarchs.

“Which generation are we?” asked Cindy one night by the fire. I realized our group of 11 already spanned many generations, ranging in age from four to seventy-four, with nearly every decade represented in between. Indeed, during another moment by that magical fire, my friend Eric observed my son Ricardo teaching something to his four-year-old. “Your son is teaching my son.” Knowledge being passed from one generation to another as two proud fathers looked on.

Our gourmet communal evening meals seemed to magically appear from whatever ingredients we had on hand, in large part due to Leah, Eric’s mom, who I was happy to reunite with after visiting her and her husband in Korea two years ago.

We had many philosophical discussions over the following days about metaphors the monarch migration can represent in our own lives. One that stands out to me is the idea that no matter which generation one belongs to, every one matters. Without the two-week lifespan of some monarchs, the eight-month super generation couldn’t exist. The whole system would collapse.

I’m now in beautiful San Miguel de Allende where I attended a writing conference. Last night, I heard the poet and novelist Kaveh Akbar speak, one of the most brilliant and prolific people I have ever heard. At one point, he read a poem written 43 centuries ago by Enheduanna, an Ancient Sumerian priestess. Afterwards, he described how the air in the room had literally changed. How after reading the poem he felt a tingling on the back of his neck. He wanted us to understand that a woman who wrote a poem 43 centuries ago just changed our world. Isn’t that incredible!

We are all important to this world, no matter your age or lifespan. The immigrant, the poet, the refugee, the trans person, the farmer, the teacher, the hungry, everyone matters.

And how we react in the face of injustice matters. Even when all seems hopeless, it is comforting to find hope expressed in a poem written in 2300 BCE as well as in the determined monarchs that, against all odds, carry their migration secret forward from one generation to the next.

So what was my non-monarch highlight? For me, the answer was simple. Sitting with so many loved ones from different parts of my life, many of whom had never met in person, around a table outside our Mexican mansion for nightly meals by the fire and warm conversation, to relish each other’s company, our beautiful surroundings, and the lessons we can learn from the monarchs. Because as Eric said, “This trip was never about the monarchs, it was about us.”