Fire and Bleach

In my experience, Mexico is a country of intense surprise. Good surprises and bad surprises flow like unpurified water. It could be my culture shock kicking back in again, but I can't help but think it is something deeper. Mexicans expect life to deliver both horror and beauty and they are not surprised when it does exactly that. Maybe it started with Cortes riding that horse into Mexico City. He looked like a god and the people were not surprised their god had come. Then the horror began.

The culture of Mexico has been woven from a fabric of intense cruelty and unimaginable beauty. The Spanish and the Catholic church perpetrated horrors on the native population here in Mexico for hundreds of years. Today the wealthy and those in power continue their tradition of callous cruelty but somehow, those without power or wealth, live life with a joy and appreciation for beauty that somehow transends reality, making life bearable. The Mexican fabric I was wearing this week was transformed in a surprising way.

Our friend Mary Ellen, Harry and I were grocery shopping together at Mega, the large Target-like store here in San Jose. I reached up high on a shelf for a bottle of bleach and to my dismay, found myself drenched in its contents. The bottle had no cap and my momentum splashed the contents all over my arm, my hands and my clothes. I watched as much of my black blouse immediately turned an ugly brown and my light colored pants turned lighter. Mary Ellen and Harry went to find a store employee to report this event. I suddenly found my self surrounded by the English-speaking Mexican workers who roam the isles helping tourists find peanut butter and attempting to sell you a local time-share. They all looked so sad for me, shaking their heads in disbelief, that I figured I would be compensated in some way. They all disappeared as quickly as they had appeared and I was suddenly standing alone in the soap and detergent aisle smelling terrible and looking ridiculous.

I got mad and wanted to get even. I am an American! I had not brought down many clothes that were appropriate for this hot humid weather. I needed the outfit I was wearing. I got fired up and chased after one of the bi-lingual employees. He took me to a manager who, after much debate and argument, told me I could have a blouse from the store, but not an expensive blouse. Finding a blouse is not easy for me here in Mexico: shoes I can find easily; blouses, no. Mexican women have small feet like mine, but not generally my bust size. A woman employee in the clothing department began diligently bringing me very ugly "sale" blouses and after a few tries, I thanked her and fumed off. Just another arrogant American shopper.

Mary Ellen, expat of 20 years here, told me I needed to just let it go, though she went to the store manager too and told him in the states or in Canada this would have been handled differently. I had told the manager what it would cost to replace the outfit but he smiled and pointed out I was not physically hurt. This sort of thing happens all the time in the store he said. Why was I so surprised? You are now wearing a different colored outfit! What's the big deal? "Ni modo!"

I took Mary Ellen's advice and thought, in my American way, there is a bright side to this! I now can rationalize going shopping for clothes! I went into town to the clothing store where I had bought my now bleached outfit and bought a new shirt and pants (OK, I bought two new shirts and two new pairs of pants: there was a sale going on). I was traumatized after all! Well, the surprises just kept coming! I learned I now could wear clothes from the shop that were two sizes smaller than what I had been buying when I lived here.

The last surprise of the day came after we had eaten dinner at our favorite beach-side restaurant that night. We were just about to leave and suddenly a group of two young women and two young men came dancing across the beach with torches ablaze, fired up, but in a positive way. The ocean waves crashed behind them in the darkness as they entertained us for several amazingly beautiful minutes.

SURPRISE!!!

From Times Square to Cabo

I love Times Square. Over the past ten years that I have gone to New York to visit Alexis, I have gone to Times Square on nearly every trip, even though Alexis hates Times Square. She was gracious enough, however, to take a slight detour through Times Square on our way back from New Jersey to her upper east side apartment over the Labor Day weekend. She knew her mother would so enjoy all the lights and the millions of people trying not to trample each other flat. (Plus, all three of us needed a little fresh -- well, sort of fresh -- air after the nightmare bus ride of a lifetime we took back into the city.) Harry is not so keen on Times Square either, and the two of them tried their best to keep me moving along as I kept stopping and twirling around in place. It is so different every time you go. Scores of lighted billboards stretching up into the sky, changing as you blink your eyes. It's like no place on earth, .... for me anyway.

New York did get the best of me this trip however. I got really tired racing around at my usual clip. I guess I am getting old (who knew?). I now think New York is a city for the young, like my daughter who can leap onto buses and bound up subway stairs and speed-walk down the street. Or, New York is a great city for the very rich who can order take-out, eat out and take cabs whenever they wish. Rich, poor, young, old, it remains the city that never sleeps and I did a lot of sleeping when I got home to my boring but beloved city of Minneapolis.

Next week, we are headed back to Mexico, where the pace will be more tranquil than in New York. Nature, not the bright lights, will be the wow factor. The Baja peninsula is geographically amazing, mountains, desert, ocean all in such close proximity. We had planned to drive our little blue Subaru up this amazing peninsula last July after our two years in Mexico, but, with Harry's accident, we and our plans were tossed like waves into the beautiful Sea of Cortes. We bobbed up, still afloat, and flew home. Sirius, as Harry calls our Subaru ("the brightest car on the roads"), remains waiting for us in San Jose. Our friend Mel has had all his scratches and dents removed so he will look like new again. Life was tough for Sirius in Mexico: like Harry, he took some hard knocks. We leave here Sept. 25th, and are very excited to see again all the wonderful people who became our friends in Cabo. Mexico truly became like home for us because of all the people we got to know and love there.

Once in San Jose, we will spend a week and then fly to the mainland for a five day trip to Oaxaca, the largest city in the southern part of Mexico, not too far from the Guatemalan border. Our native Mexican friends encouraged us to see this unique city with its wonderful foods, arts and crafts, and history. We had planned to take the trip in early April over spring break on the school calendar, but we came home late March so Harry could have a second surgery. My plan in Oaxaca is to find a dress for my granddaughter, eat lots of their famous mole, see the ruins of Monte Alban, put on weight, and buy some art for the condo. Just where I will put another piece of something "arty" is the question. Those who have been to our condo know it is chock full of tchatchkis and pictures which I have bought on our travels the last ten years. Clutter sure doesn't bother me!

We will begin our 3,500-mile drive back to Minnesota sometime in October. Harry has been diligently mapping the trip using Triple A maps and guides. Driving up the Baja alone is one thousand miles. We now think we will sight-see our way to the Grand Canyon, Sedona, Santa Fe, and Mesa Verde. Harry loves the Grand Canyon and I have never seen it. (These foreigners sure do travel nowadays.) I have had a love affair with Georgia O'Keeffe for most of my life and I want to go to her home and museum in Santa Fe. I have saved the last remaining piece of bare wall space in the condo, over the bathtub, for a Georgia print.

After these stops we will head to St. Louis to stay a few days with our kids, Ivan and Joanna and grandchild, Eva Juliet. Our family eagerly awaits a new member due in March. Then we will be on the road back to the cold and snowy tundra. I plan to take my computer and camera and will blah-blah-blog about the adventures as they happen ... the ones planned and the ones not so planned. Stay tuned..............

Postscript:

My Spin instructor today at LAFitness, who is about my age and thus very wise, told us she begins all her spinning classes with a quotation for the day. Today's quotation seemed to hit a meaningful note for me, sort of like what a good fortune cookie fortune can sometimes do for you after you finish eating too much Chinese take-out. Her words were:

If you don't change your direction, you will end up where you were going.

We are changing direction again in life and I have learned that when you do that, you can never be sure where the road will lead. The road less traveled is always beckoning you to travel its way, without a map. I guess that is better than thinking you know exactly what you are doing and where you are going. I used to be like that. It doesn't work for me anymore. I hadn't planned on seeing Times Square on this trip to New York, but as we reached the subway station Monday night, I looked up and there it was. Lexi's eyes met mine, she smiled and said, "We can walk through Times Square if you want to, Mom."

Tea for three

Alexis took Harry and me to a darling little (25 seats max) English restaurant in Chelsea when we visited her in New York to celebrate her 30th birthday over Labor Day weekend. We had the waitress take our picture as we ate Shepherd's pie, salmon and cream cheese tea sandwiches and a salad with walnuts and Stilton. The food was quite divine, like being back in England. They even bring you your own china teapot when your order your tea, filled with boiling water (unlike the very fancy place where we had dinner that night), just like they do in "jolly old."

Alexis recently moved to the upper east side near the Hunter Graduate School of Social Work where she started classes in late August. She can walk to school and her internship at another CUNY university is nearby. Her new elevator-free apartment is only two floors up, unlike the six-floor walk-up she inhabited in Queens. We were grateful to La Fitness as we were not panting for breath when we reached her apartment door. Her cute new apartment is New York small, but has a new kitchen and bathroom. She is a block from a scenic part of the East River and a short bus ride to Central Park.

Living in New York is not for the faint of heart, and on this trip I felt a bit faint at times. The noise and pace of the city is intense. Even our noisy spot in St. Louis Park, with all the highway construction noise outside our windows, seems quiet compared to life in Manhattan. We went to the Museum of Natural History, and the MMA, and we spent a couple hours quietly reading in Central Park. We took a stroll through Times Square at night (my favorite!) and went back by day to a National Geographic King Tut Exhibition, which was fantastic. Our last lunch together, near Lexi's apartment, found us listening to workers drilling holes in the street as we ate Reuben sandwiches at our sidewalk table. I must say I have never had a better Reuben in my life nor have I eaten with so much noise going on, but after five days in New York we hardly noticed.

We took a series of subways and a bus to New Jersey on Sunday to meet Lexi's roommate Jana's family. We were running late, needing to catch the two o'clock bus to Clifton, New Jersey. We made the New Jersey bus, just barely. Harry and I were trucking along as fast as we could. I cannot believe how fast my daughter can walk! I flashed back to how she and her Dad used to speed-walk around Lake Harriet. Little did I know what great training this would eventually be for when she moved to New York. Jana cooked us a great meal on the grill and we got to meet her extended Slovakian family.

We had a great time in New York, but most importantly, it is very rewarding to see your kid pursuing her dreams.