Understanding the Meaning

So I can do this two ways: find the starting point of it all and go from there, or trace it backwards going dot by dot.  OR, I can just do it my own way, which is to do it both ways...
Okay, let's start with last night - not the final penny dropping into the slot, but still a good place to start.  I was sitting on the couch in the dark, with a shot of tequila, my thoughts, and a pad of paper and pen.  As I noted at the top of the page, I was writing down my Thoughts in the Dark - a glorified To-do list if you will.
About halfway down the page, I thought, I should blog again, and I wrote it down, and added, "think of something to blog about".
This morning I woke up super early.  It's my first day of vacation and I don't quite know what to do with myself, or rather, that's how I was feeling last night, which was why I made myself a list!  So I jumped out of bed, because the first thing on my list was 'coffee and computer stuff'... As I plugged in my password to one of my accounts, I was frustrated for the zillionth time that I had keyed it in wrong and had to do it again, and I thought, just change the damn password.  And that's when the penny dropped.  You see, the potential password I came up with to replace the complicated one I was using is in fact the title of this blog!  (I'm fond of using concepts for passwords, although I intersperse them with symbols and numbers to throw any would-be hacker off the trail). 
Lately, I've been seeing the meaning of a lot of things, and I've come to the conclusion that Meaning is the definition of that certain force beyond ourselves.  I know this force as Good minus one of the 'o's, although 'Good' in itself works well too come to think of it!  But I don't want to infringe on anyone's right to believe or not to believe, and to call what they believe in whatever name they believe is correct.  What I have discovered, at any rate, is this:  if you find meaning in something, then it follows logically that there's something behind that meaning.  Meaning by definition can never be be meaningless!  The point is, meaning is stimulated by circumstances outside ourselves; we perceive meaning and make it part of ourselves.  Finding and understanding meaning gives us reasons to live.
Here's how I came to that conclusion:  I was driving to work the other morning, very early as usual.  It was the morning after the 3rd night of the full moon, so the moon was still going down, gigantic, full and white.  As I wound around a curve, taking several quick glances out my window to marvel at the moon hanging next to the Popo volcano, I also took a second to look out the passenger side window, where lo and behold, the sun was coming up, huge, round and orange, at the exact diagonal to the moon going down.  It was so breathtaking, looking out my window to the moon, and then turning my head to see the sun!  And I was crossing under the arc, right at the middle, made by the symmetrically perfect synchronization of these two events. It was some trip, let me tell you!
Now I could have continued on my way, seeing what I saw as just what it was: sun coming up on one side, moon going down on the other.  Simple everyday occurrence.  But the way I was driving through the middle of it, able to turn right and left to see one natural phenomenon and then the other, happening at an exact diagonal to each other, at an exact ratio of rise to set... it sent a shiver down my spine and brought a lump to my throat.  Tears came to my eyes.  It was clear to me that what I was seeing was not just an "everyday occurrence".  It was something absolutely miraculous! 
And yet, it does happen every day... so that's when I finally put it all together.  You see, I could have driven by a few minutes later, and seen nothing unusual, but I got to see the exact moment where the meaning was visible.  I got to be part of the miracle unfolding.  That's all I needed to understand about it. 
Knowing it was there, and I had seen it, been part of it, and understood the meaning of it up to that point took me to the final and most important realization:  There's a message in the Meaning!

And the message I got was: The possibilities are limitless!

Whew!  Now that's what I call a revelation! 

Heads or Tails

So the thing is, I'm not sure what I want to do.  You know what I'm talking about, don't you? One minute you're driving along, steering your life with cool intelligence, and the next, you find yourself stopped completely, idling at the fork in the road, unable to decide, and suddenly you're all mixed up. 
I hate that - not being able to decide.  What I like is when the decision is easy to make, so that it doesn't feel like a decision is being made at all.  When it's like that, I feel powerful, victorious, enlightened with the sense of who I am.  But when I can't decide, when no alternative beckons to me, or when those tedious side issues appear, distracting me and interfering with the decision process, then I go into escape mode.  I stop thinking about it altogether, find a place where I can curl up and read, go for a walk or get into bed, or do any other activity where I can be alone and not think. 
At some point, I inevitably decide on one of the paths open to me, either by process of elimination, or by circumstances dictating, or by someone else's agenda colliding with and changing the course of mine, or because what I really want to do in terms of the alternatives available finally becomes visible and viable to me.  At that point, however, the sense of victory is reduced to a sigh of relief.
So here I am, standing at the fork in the road, that place of not being sure what I want to do. I'm in escape mode at the moment, though blogging about it can at least be seen as a constructive escape as opposed to getting into bed and watching a movie.  And I've already decided one thing - and that's to give it a bit more time... I feel pretty sure that as soon as I post this, I'll know what I want to do... blogging does that for me. 

Love and Partnership

The discussion began with a question of what “normal” is in the sense of being able to have a healthy relationship with a person.  We were talking about loving and being loved and the things inside us that prevent us from loving and accepting being loved. We entered into the pros and cons of being alone vs. being in a relationship and how strange it can feel when your friends have relationships and you don’t.  Eventually, an argument arose that childhood events and Life itself shape us into individual persons with certain deficiencies in the areas of loving and being loved, upon which “experts” were quoted, categorizing people into groups with this or that hang-up.  At that point, I felt I had to mention that I don't accept being categorized by anyone except myself. And since I’m no expert, I don't usually categorize myself.

But regardless of what the “experts” may say about being alone vs. being in a relationship, or about loving and being loved, there’s one thing I know for sure about myself:  I don’t love as much as I probably could and I don’t expect to be loved as much as I probably should.  Because here's the thing: I’ve always seen myself as detached, ever since I was a little girl writing stories in what the teacher had just explained as the omniscient point of view.  By writing in the third person, you get to stay on the outside of things and see everything from all sides.  From the moment I knew how to do that, I found that I liked living life in that way too... alone, on the outside looking in, and I secretly longed for a partner who could live that way with me... a partner with a capital P.

When you have a relationship where loving and being loved are constantly in competition, you often experience things like hurt, remorse, doubt and self-doubt, suspicion, anguish, self-pity, jealousy, etc., etc.  But a partnership is always equal.  You’re either partners, or you’re not.  Inside the partnership, of course you love and you are loved, but it’s on a less emotional level.  This doesn’t mean it’s not exciting or passionate - it’s very exciting and extremely passionate.  The difference is that you can go in and out of those states as you will, without hurting your partner’s feelings because s/he is on the same wavelength so to speak.

In loving relationships with family and friends, I also prefer to keep a distance.  I guess it sounds cold, selfish, maybe even cowardly, but I like the fact that we all live separate lives and when we come together, it’s to enjoy the moment.  We can be as close as we want in the moment we connect, but there’s always the moment we each return to our own day-to-day, wishing each other well as we take our leave and looking forward to the next time. 

With my kids, it’s an interesting situation.  I’ve never been the most loving of mothers in the traditional sense, for the reasons I just explained, and I guess time will tell whether this was a good or a bad thing (if you can narrow it down to that).  It seems to me now that we’re all kind of detached when it comes to showing emotion, i.e. love.  Yet, we know how to make a moment meaningful.  And we're not afraid to express ourselves with an intense hug and a special look, when that's how we feel...

The end of the discussion was about the evolution of a loving relationship, i.e. how respect and the golden rule fit into it, and finally the question came up of whether I would ever ‘find someone else’.  Well, all I can say is:  I’m not looking for a relationship.  That doesn’t mean I wouldn’t be into living with a partner again, but not if I have to go looking for it.  On the other hand, if someone completely sweeps me off my feet by proposing my kind of partnership,  I’ll let you know. 

Shower reflections on the go

This is one I've been meaning to write for awhile now... The original idea was to write about a reflection I had while taking a shower a few weeks ago, but since I have to leave in 30 minutes, I'll need to be concise, which might be tricky, since I tend to ramble.
Okay, so I was in the shower reflecting on the question my sister often interrupts me with when I'm wondering aloud to her about options, courses of action, etc., which is: "If you could do anything you wanted, what would make you the happiest?"  Now that is a nice question to reflect on... but it conflicts with what I've often told my kids (and myself); the idea I got from the Rolling Stones - you know: "you can't always get what you want, but if you try..., you might find you get what you need..."  I ended by rinsing off the whole thing with one of my all-time favorites, which is simply:  'So what?' and then thought: save it for a blog. 
Now how do these things fit together?  Well, in answer to my sister's question, it's not that easy!  What would make me happy?  If I could do whatever I wanted, what would make me the happiest?  Hmm, seems easy to pick and choose on the surface, but each decision has consequences... could be in terms of economics, logistics, ecology, or a million other factors, but there are always consequences... and if you stop to think about them for a moment, you might find it necessary to change your mind about what would make you happy.  So you have to do some critical thinking in there before you give a snap answer.
Which brings me to the RS concept of getting what you need, which is almost equal to getting what you want, which would probably make you happy.  Sometimes I think that's the closest best answer to the whole 'be happy' philosophy.  When you have what you need, you can feel pretty good, don't you think?  And that's where 'so what' comes into play.  Because if you're getting what you need, then so what if you're not totally happy???
Okay, that's all I have to say about this.  It really sounded better in the shower, when it seemed important for some reason! But so what?

Balance: Exercise, Inspiration and the Human Element

I've been trying to psyche myself up to take better care of myself.  You know, eat better, sleep more, get exercise, get a check-up, etc.  All of these things, as well as enjoying the moment, not wasting time worrying about possible negatives, and letting my creative streak flow, are part of my ongoing inner-based minshap enhancement cycle .  When you get right down to it, the key word here is "balance".  Don't we all know it!  Whether we use that word or some other to describe it, what we need and what we have to work at is balance.  It might be a roller coaster ride, but if it keeps you moving and you don't fall off, it's okay.  What we can't abide is not being able to keep on course... on some sort of course... which each of us devises for ourselves of course!
So, here's what I've discovered over the last few days of philosophizing over balance and its derivatives.
On the one hand, now that we're nearing the conclusion of our six-month experiment, it throws me into a mini-panic at times, thinking about having to say good-bye.  You get used to being somewhere called home and you let people into your life there, and when you have to say good-bye, it hurts.  Having the comfort of being able to tune into each other in a messenger chat, or with skype, or even thru FB, which I thought I'd never succumb to, is a relief.  It's not really good-bye, but rather hello whenever we want.  Maybe I'm just playing tricks on myself, but it helps tremendously to think of substituting good-bye with TTYL and leaving it at that.  If that's all it takes to keep me from going off the deep end of sadness, I'll gladly accept it.
The other stuff about leaving, like sorting out what to take and what to leave - things - is no problem for me.  We'll take what we want or physically can fit, and give away the rest.  We haven't really accumulated much at any rate, though what we have accumulated is mostly BIG stuff... taking up lots of space!  So we'll have to plan it out, but that's okay with me.
What really gets me though, is having to do the tedious stuff, like giving notice on the apt., something we just did, and there and then received a rude awakening.  Turns out, we are required by the terms of our lease to pay one more month than we had assumed.  We counted out the 6 months and thought we were okay, but turns out that in effect, the 6 months didn't start until the second month's rent... so we are supposed to pay September, when we will be gone by mid-August!  We had a meeting with the administrators, but they would make no mutually beneficial agreement with us - for example if we found another renter so they wouldn't lose any money, or if we paid for the first week of March, which was not counted in our first month's rent, or if we left them our deposit - nothing moved them.  At the end of the interview, when the manager finally came into the discussion and said she was sorry and that she understood our concerns and point of view and said we had signed a contract and there was just nothing she could do, I said quietly, "but of course there is something you can do.  Contracts can be amended, if both parties agree.  The truth is, you simply don't wish to do that.  We came here hoping to appeal to you from the standpoint of the human element, but there seems to be no room in your organization for such consideration, which I find truly sad.  It seems to be a sorry trend and we'll simply have to make sure the next contract we sign will be with people who don't subscribe to it." 
We then took our leave, and we told ourselves, and each other, that we'd done the best we could, we'd made our point, we and they knew we were in the right, and they would most certainly feel bad about their actions for awhile... We reconciled ourselves to paying the money and considering it just one more lesson learned, but the truth is I haven't totally given up and may still find a way to get through to them in some way.  It's not only the money you see, it's the human element!  I hate to give up if there's still a chance I can get through to them on that level.
Meanwhile, I woke up the other morning and saw it was a good time to do some yoga.  So I did, and the next morning, I woke up again and did it, and this morning, again.  But it's not exactly yoga, or at least not totally.  It's this combination of movements. I start with some basic yoga exercises I learned many years ago from a book, interspersed with those standard exercises we did in gym class and before swim practice when I was really young, which all blends together into a sort of "stretchy calisthenics" which, by adding more continuous movement, turns into an aerobics hodge-podge. Very interesting.  I never know exactly what I will do, but it works, it's exhilarating, and it's graceful in a way I never thought was possible as I've never been particularly graceful in exercising (I could never follow an aerobics teacher/routine).  Yesterday I kept at it for over 40 minutes!  I had this neat idea of doing it with others, outside somewhere, each person moving to their own rhythm... What starts out in kind of a slow-motion stretching of arms, legs, torso, neck, etc. evolves into a sort of dance that takes you where it will, for as long as you will, spontaneously!  Afterwards, I find myself wondering what it would have looked like on film, or to music...
I put the word "inspiration" in the title, and there's a reason for that.  You see, when I was questioning the sense of replacing my "coffee and computer wake-up" for a "yoga and grapefruit wake-up" as my morning routine at this late stage, (50 ++), I immediately thought of my mother and her age and how she is always ready to make changes.  So in effect, if you think of yourself as reaching 80+ or even 90+ years, there are still a good 25-40 years to go!  Which is plenty of time to establish and grow into a new morning routine. 
At any rate, old habits do die hard, and after the fruit, there does come a good moment for that coffee, which I'm just finishing now.... goes well with blogging, don't you think?  The sun just peeked out, reminding me it's time to go out and greet the day.  Have a great one everyone!

Dad, Politics and Magical Vocabularians

Well maybe it started when I found the book of poems by E.E. Cummings. I used to love reading poetry by him, even put one of his poems to music when I was in high school. I found a book of his poems for a song, so of course I bought it. And there we were driving to be with my dad on Father's Day, and Sam was driving, so I used the time to compose a poem, untitled at the time, but referring to

The Art of Dadding. You know, it talked about Daddity, and Dadness, and how to dadden and dadify, and the importance of Dadship, and it really felt right to me, that words could expand to mean more than we realized if we just experimented with them more often...

Meanwhile, on a previous trip, I had gone to see old friends from high school. It was an incredible afternoon, in the course of which we got to talking passionately about vocabulary, or more specifically, phonology, but with a focus on vocabulary, a subject I am immensely fond of. So as we spoke about the word bank of the average 4 year-old, what it should be but actually isn't in some cases, from the perspective of Gina who has been working with such children for as long as I've lived in Mexico, and as I threw in my perception of things from the standpoint of my present job which is coaching middle-school and high school students in a program focused on creating self-study habits through tutoring software, a picture began to emerge. This picture showed how the lower echelons of society do not necessarily have the tools to keep up with those who can afford to be in the right place at the right time to acquire such and subsequently use them. So they get left behind and you can see this in each new generation. Things like deficiencies in reading ability, speech, creating ideas with words, making oneself understood and understanding others through words... We are truly in need of a new profession I would call Vocabularianism... I would like to offer my services as a Vocabularian as a matter of fact. I'm still trying to come up with the specifics of the job, but it would definitely have to do with opening up new avenues of communication through words. We've got imagery down, but what about the words to describe it!!! Like lovely old country roads, they are getting swallowed up in the huge freeways of video-streaming.

Finally, in the most recent trip to visit my parents, I got into a talk with my dad - that father I described in my poem as being "the daddest of all Dads" - about politics, and he mentioned how there is a debate going on about raising taxes in order to fund more Pre-K programs - which was what Gina had been talking about that day of our reunion - and suddenly all the pieces fell into place. Thanks to my father, who is such an upbeat octogenarian and so knowledgeable about the world that I listen to him enthralled whenever he shares his points of view with me (which is not to say I agree with him on everything, but rather that I am in awe of his grasp of the big picture in many cases), I finally understood that it's truly a full circle kind of thing. Here are the young children in the lower socioeconomic sector, not reaching their full potential by far, having the phonology level of children much younger, all because their parents don't realize what they can do to prevent this: mainly talk to their kids, discuss things with them, read and talk about what they read together, debate and listen to their opinions... these things do not happen often in the homes of families who have spent generations working to build up a comfortable life. As Gina says, once you get there, it's easy to stay poor. You get your material needs down - shelter, t-shirts and tennis shoes, TV and videos, cell-phones and iPods, fast food and prepackaged food - and you talk at your kids, not with or to them. Get this, do that, see you here, meet you there, no Q&A about ideas or meanings or ideals or wonderings.

So of course, the gov't feels a need to make sure the whole society doesn't disintegrate into non-intelligible beings, and that means: let Pre-K do the parenting!

Gina, I want to tell you, you have the right idea trying to get to the parents and asking: is this what you really want? You can avoid the need for Pre-K, or enhance the whole experience of it if you help your children discover their powers of reasoning and creating ideas from the moment they begin to speak to you.

Dad, I thank you and Mom for making sure we found ours... and to my own kids, I hope Car and I have helped you find yours... because it’s not about power... although being able to reason, create ideas, and express yourself certainly are powerful tools, but more than power, what you can discover and pass on through words - spoken, written, read, heard, sung, devoured, spit out, but most importantly, understood - is magic!
P.S. Sam, that's what I tried to say in the song I wrote last week!



Into the second month now... work is a routine, leaving lots of free time for bike rides, reading, painting, translating... I've bought some paints and decided to set some time tomorrow aside for that... today was a typical Monday - rushing around doing last-minute revisions, accounts, grocery shopping... now I've put the groceries away and have just enough time to blog and get on my way to work.
Unsettling, this idea: we're here in a city flooded with variety - in music, food, activities, natural beauty.  And yet, we don't pursue these things.  Why?  Maybe it really is the money question, but it seems to me to be something else.  Everything has not only a price but a set of rules, or a time slot, or specific conditions governing how to go about whatever it is you want to do.  They may not be written down, but they're there.  People explain to you all the time the way something has to be done, where exactly you should go to do some particular thing, what time exactly you can and can't do something else... I know it's normal, but it seems confining, so foreign to my naturally spontaneous way of being.  It's hard to just walk out of your house and happen upon some event.  Most times you won't look in the right place and simply go around without finding anything happening. There's so much to do, but you have to spend time scouting and sorting it all out before you actually do something, because if you don't, you'll miss it!  Even if you do make a decision, it could conceivably end up being a nonproductive one, as happened to us last night, driving out to a place that was advertising an open mike, and discovering that it had closed down between the time the event was advertised and the night it was supposed to happen!
Of course, many have their networks, so they get the scoop all the time... but for us, it's mostly hit and miss... that's how we missed Jake Shimabukuro who was actually here the other night!!!!  We're not gonna miss Gipsy Kings, however, not if I can help it!  Even if I did have to call the place this morning to ask about all the "fees" tacked onto the price of the tickets...
Which is of course, another aspect of this puzzling sequence.  You decide on doing something, think you have the money to do it, then find out that you need to add in all sorts of other costs that weren't included but are part of the deal... so what looked to you like doable becomes maybe-ish.
This is ridiculous.  I'm outta here.  I'll leave you to contemplate a picture of one of my favorite houses of all time... See there!  You can still go bike-riding down peaceful streets and find something beautiful like this spontaneously and it will still make you feel good...

6 months/24 weeks - sometime 3rd week

So what have I learned?  Why am I asking myself that?  I've had this idea that I've discovered something about moving and starting again somewhere, but it's a laughable realization, and the truth is, I've known it all along, but just let myself ignore/forget it, so it seems as if it's this big discovery...  You see, when you start over somewhere (and haven't I done that before?!), you create a whole nother life for yourself.  It's a process somewhat like cell division, except, in this case, I'm still in the stage of binary fission, where I have subdivided and each part is still developing within the same cell.  My DNA (so to speak) has split - part of it still thrives in Mexico, requiring constant upkeep and awareness.  Meanwhile, I'm in the other part of the cell, which is developing at an alarming rate.  When I moved to Mexico all those years ago, I willingly let the cell divide, but this time, I'm resisting it, preferring to stay split inside the same cell.  Unfortunately, I didn't stop to consider the possibility that the 6-month (mis)(ad)venture might become all-absorbing.  Just yesterday, I almost let the deadline go by for some payments I have to make in Mexico, and there are other things coming up soon that I'll have to give attention to, and yet what's going on here is much more immediate and anchoring. 
The lease itself is binding, as you know, and the job, though finite, is a clutch of sorts nevertheless.  Then there are the countless things that we must acquire in the process of living day-to-day.  Take the case of the hair dryer for example. 
We don't use those hairblowers for our hair, yet today, I may be going out to buy one.  Why?  Well it turns out our apt. has what may be bedbugs... we have finally (after many bites on both our bodies) actually found two bugs, which, when squashed revealed a good storage of blood.  We've investigated and found that heat does kill these bugs - for example, you can steam-heat them to death, but we can't find a way to rig up a steam-blower.  A vaporizer with a hose is what we need for that... meanwhile, you can take a hairblower, put it at the hottest speed and aim it at your bed and if there are any of those creatures, they'll come out to where you can kill them.  Supposedly, it kills their eggs too... but of course, you need to keep up regularly on thorough vacuuming for that...
As to the vacuuming aspect, here we lucked out.  Our good friend lent us an ancient Hoover.  She says it actually might be worth something as an antique, but if you saw it, you would think it's junk.  Sam got it working however, and it still has suction and does a nice a job, after all its years of dormancy.
Oh, and the apt. administrators put us on the list for pest extermination, but that doesn't really lift our hopes.  Pest control around here is about roaches, not about bedbugs or other bloodsuckers, which require different recourses.  I didn't say anything to Veronica, the girl who takes the orders, because I know she'd fob me off with something optimistic, and anyway, we have those little roaches too...
So another thing I've learned is that apt. living is not the luxurious thing it looks like from the pictures.  This is actually the first time I've ever lived in one; the last time I lived here, I lived in different houses, but no apartments.  Still, I should have known about the potential dangers of living in large complexes with close contact to others.  The carpeting may be brand new, but it can still host little creatures that were in the cracks between the baseboards before it was set down.  The kitchen may be sparkling white, the appliances gleaming and perfect, but back in the cupboards, those little roaches are having a merry time of it... and you can even be sitting at your table, typing away at your computer, when you are suprised by a valiant critter who thought he would try to dart across your table while you weren't looking.  Tough luck for him!  I did look and he's a goner... and I've always been someone who didn't like to kill anything... with the exception of flies and mosquitos... okay we'll just have to add roaches, bedbugs, fleas, and whatever other bothersome intruders are lurking around to that list.
To sum up, I'm metamorphizing as the days go by.  I try to make the metamorphosis something positive, but there are things that give me pause and make me wonder what the next step should be.  If I buy a hairblower, will it do the trick?  Will I also need to invest in a vaporizer?  Maybe I should go to the doctor.  That's another consideration, as my bites seem to be infected.  I'm taking an antibiotic, and have used it topically too, but if that doesn't work...
Sam was feeling more positive this morning, and that's good.  So far, he's been the one needing the pep talks, as he feels the situation is way out of control.  But this morning we both woke up with no new bites, so he thinks maybe we will be able to get rid of the critters after all...
What will happen to me in the long run, I wonder... will the cell finally divide, with me becoming one with the life here, will I go back and be a completely different person, will I go somewhere else and start the process again??  Those are some of the options.
I'm outta here now... on my way to wash possibly contaminated blankets at the hottest temp possible, dry them in a dryer at the hottest temp possible, then store them in the van, which is hopefully still bug-free.  If possible I will bring back a hairblower.  Then I'll use it around the apt., vacuum once again, and throw out the vacuum bag.  If the antibiotic doesn't show me better results after today, I'll go to a doctor, no matter what that ends up costing... meanwhile, I'll investigate to find out what my options are on that before I leave for work.  It's nice that I have a job that doesn't start till 4 pm, right?
Okay! Now doesn't that sound positively doable?  Wish me luck!

6 wks/24days-wk1,post3: A job, a chair and a rainy day

 Yesterday I got the job! That is, I will start on Monday, and then, after they check me out –this job includes fingerprinting and drug-testing as part of the check – if I pass the tests, I will continue to have the job. The pay is excellent, it’s only 5 hours a day, afternoons/evenings, and it seems like it will be extremely pleasant work…tutoring by phone and computer. The only downside is that it’s far from home, but a straight route, so maybe I can find a way to do it by bus, though it might be a harrowing ride at 9:00 pm. Oh well, I’ll work that out later.

Yesterday, after I got the job, I went to see about a little table for the apt., and what did I find? A chair! But not just any chair. A VERY VERY COMFORTABLE reclining chair. The old fashioned leather kind that have all these little dots of metal around the edges. My grandmother had furniture like that. I simply couldn’t resist it for 19.95. So I bought it, lugged it home and here it sits, waiting to be read in. I have the books, but we need the lamp. The living room here has no light fixtures!

Meanwhile, it rained all day yesterday, and it started up again this morning. Tough luck. We’re going out anyway. Got errands to do and library to visit.

More later. Here are some pictures of the chair, the apt., and the rainy day.

6 months / 24 weeks – Week 1, continued

So this morning I’d like to talk a bit about the title for this series, namely: 6 months / 24 weeks.  When Sam and I were looking for a place and jobs – and btw, I have an interview today for the job I blogged about yesterday that I was hoping to get; wish me luck! – we kind of balked at having to think about signing a lease of any sort.  We knew it would probably be next to impossible to find a place that didn’t require a lease and/or came with all bills paid – though we actually did find one such place in a co-op during our first week here, but we would have had to share a room in their big house and would have paid double what we’re going to end up paying for this little apt. (though when you think about it, by the time we pay for food and utilities, which were all included in the quote at the co-op, it will probably come out to be the same) – so we decided that we would specify the need for a lease of 6 mos. maximum.  

-           A word about the co-op:  we did think about it as a good option, the people being very friendly and the house being centrally located, but at the time, they told us we had to register on their website and be chosen to live there by their board, and it would be weeks before we would be able to move in, if we were chosen at all.  With all that to think about, we decided to keep looking, hoping we’d find something more private and more immediate.

Back to the main story about the title for these posts, when we finally were in the position to really sign a lease, after a whole month of looking and looking for a place, we still hesitated.  So, I told Sam, let’s think of it like this: it’s 6 months, right?  That’s only 24 weeks.  We can do that.  We can decide that each week will represent a new activity and/or goal and/or acquisition.  For example, I want to get a bike.  Sam already has one.  But the bike for me comes after I get a real job.  So this week, my tangible acquisition will be a little end table to put in the corner of the dining area.  Then we can put our coffee and plates on that as we use the table for playing cards or using our laptops.  I saw such a little table at one of the thrift shops we’ve been to and wrote it down.  Now I just have to go back and get it.  Of course the reward system can fail you too.  I had picked out this really neat chess set to get on the day we found out we had the apt. but when we went back to get it, it had been sold.  Such is life.

As for new activities: yesterday I conquered the bus system.  I made a day of it and during the course of my day, I got the call for the interview, which made everything even better.  I parked the van at the station, took 30 minutes to read all the info about the different bus routes / times / fares, and then caught my first bus.  It was a great way to get around without having to do the driving.  I can’t believe how bad some of the streets are here.  We all complain in Mexico about the streets, and those of us from other countries always say how ‘our’ streets are so well-maintained in comparison.  But that turns out to be untrue.  The main avenues here that cross the city are full of holes, uneven stretches, confusing signs, and illogical indications, just like Mexico.  Take the example of trying to find the Light company yesterday.  The address they gave me is on a street that is really named something else.  Crazy! 

However, though the ride to town was everything and more than I could have hoped for in terms of positive and easy and fast, the ride back was the exact opposite.  Woe to those who must use the bus system at 4:30 in the afternoon, from downtown to the north end.  The bus was TOTALLY packed, people squished together standing in the aisles (I had a seat), and the people themselves! Ugh.  The smells of sweat, beer, and other harsher smells permeated the close confines of the bus.  Many of the people spoke loudly and crudely, shouting out things so that we all had to hear their diatribes… a huge black woman sat next to me and muttered, clicked her tongue, sang, and rapped to herself the whole time… it was rather unnerving… I didn’t look at her.  She got off before I did so I had to get up to let her get out, since I was on the aisle and I saw how her arms were covered with black bumps… scary.  This morning I looked in the mirror and my face has these red splotches, I don’t know from what animal or insect.  They don’t hurt or itch, but they are bumps, and I cringe to think she might have had something contagious and I’ve now got it.

Okay, not going to worry about that anymore.  We’re going to check if the apt. has been or should be fumigated.  Or, could be I've had an allergic reaction to the air mattress!

But the goal for me now is of course to get a job.  Leaving now to start the day.

More later.

6 months / 24 weeks - Week 1, Day 2

Hello!  This is me writing from a new place in a new, albeit temporary life, in the country of my birth, after 20+ years of not having lived here.

In fact, apropos of the above, I found out yesterday that I might be deceased.  What’s that??, you say.  Yes, there is a red capital D next to my SS# which most people can’t see in their systems, but which the electric company found when checking me out as I tried to connect the electricity for our apt by phone.  They said my 'Social' (that's how they refer to your social security number) had “issues” and asked me to come in with two picture IDs.  Naturally, I was concerned, and when I finally found the place – another interesting detail about how the streets run here, and how they are named, renamed, and unnamed along the way (which I thought was a characteristic particular to Mexico but not here, in the land of logic and practicality) – I asked right away what the “issues” were. The man there, who btw was so nice that I actually asked him (in a rhetorical way) if there were any jobs available there, told me that someone else seems to have been issued my ss number which is why there is a red “D” with a question mark next to my name.  He said it could have been a typo when someone was registering their number somewhere, but that I should check on it, which is just one more thing to do that I’ve added to my list.

I’d like to take a paragraph here to talk about bureaucracy today in the US.  EVERYWHERE we go, people check you out.  They call it a background check.  You need to get car insurance? You go and they ask you for all your history, and then do a check on you.  You want to live somewhere?  Same process.  You want to get a job?  Same process.  And these checks they do on you are very privacy-invading and you have to agree, the alternative being you won’t be able to get the insurance, or the house, or the job.  They check your credit, your criminal background, your driving record, and whatever else they can think up to check.  Since you’ve given them all your ID numbers, they’ve got the right to do it, and you sign a paper saying you understand that.  I have felt very sad in the last few weeks about this situation.  It’s so demeaning.  It seems that if you move to a new place, you should be able to do it ONCE, get some kind of plastic or official document that says you’ve been THOROUGHLY CHECKED and not have to go through it at every individual step of your bureaucratic life as you try to get settled.  Cars are inspected in such a way, right?  You get it inspected, and you get a sticker saying they’re safe to drive.  But I guess it wouldn’t work because the truth is, there is no trust here.  WAIT! There is an exception to the rule.  The libraries!  I got my library card with a minimum of hassle, and I’ve been to two others since, and all the people at each library are extremely helpful, nice, nonjudgmental people.    

One thing interesting I found in moving to this apt. yesterday as we did is that we moved in on a full moon.  It was so beautiful, and I want to tell NONE-OTHER, that she’s lucky she got a full moon for her birthday!  That’s always a lucky sign.  We inaugurated the apt with a delicious pre-dinner of chips and hot sauce and Shiner Bock.  Before sitting down to partake of such refreshments at our card table and folding chairs, we brought in some essential stuff from the van, pumped up and sheeted the air mattresses, which held our weight most comfortably all during the night, lined the cabinets with newspapers, and set up our laptops in the hope of finding internet for free floating around; no such luck there guys.

After the snacks, we went back to work, bringing in more things, washing up the boxed dishes, making the real dinner – you guessed it, mac n cheese (although I had gone shopping and we did have great salad ingredients, but in the end, we didn’t feel like making up a salad).  So Sam played the guitar as I finished washing the dishes, and then we decided to try out the beds and put a movie on my laptop.  That worked great, and I fell asleep in the middle of the movie, though he watched to the end and turned everything off. 

Now it’s morning.  We’re here at our little table.  I’ve just made my list of THINGS-TO-DO, and he’s reading 1984, which he has on his computer, and eating a bagel and cream cheese with his coffee.  I’m blogging this now and will upload it when I go to the library in a little while.  I like the fact that Sam doesn’t have to go to work so early.  Gives us time to have a leisurely morning.  I need to check my mail though.  I sent in my résumé to someone offering a job I would REALLY LIKE to get – something right up my alley as they say… I hope I get an answer on that, though I haven’t gotten answers on any of the other 10 jobs I’ve applied for online.  Maybe I’ll be pleasantly surprised today!

There is another thing – I do have an interesting little job that’s sort of inventing itself, and it came about in a spontaneous sort of way.  Sam and I went to check out this apt that was very near his work.  As it’s a central location, it was more expensive than our budget allowed, but Richard, the manager of the apts, started telling me how I could help him out and he would pay me and that would help out with the rent.  Sam didn’t really believe him – he thought Richard had other interests in mind – but I felt no such vibe from him.  He’s a guy from Guatemala who migrated to Texas by way of California… and he’s a very open friendly person.  He told me how the owner of the apt complex believed in him and gave him one responsibility after another, and now he’s doing pretty good.  He’s even got a little business of his own doing bodywork on cars.  He told Sam he could maybe work there on weekends.  And he told me my translating skills could be very useful in writing up contracts (he does them in Spanish but has a hard time putting them in correct English) and maybe even answering phone calls. 

As it turned out, we turned down the apt. and found something better for us financially, and with more to offer, as this place has “amenities” whereas the other had nothing – not even a little pool.   Still, Richard called me yesterday and asked if I was still interested in the work.  I told him of course, went out to where he was working and helped him with the paperwork.  He’s very nice.

Well, Sam’s going to work now.  Guess I’ll get going too.  More later.

Where have I gone?

The truth is, I don't know where I've gone.  I know where I am, but somehow I also know I've gone somewhere that I can't seem to find.  That's ridiculous of course.  If I know who I am and where I am, then of course that's where I've gone.  But no... it's something else. 
I did leave though.  I left the place I was living in and started driving and ended up at the place I'm at, but I don't know if this is where I'll stay or not.  I have so many options, it's hard to say which one will follow.  Can I maybe take all the alternatives and do them one by one?  That's what I'm hoping for.
Meanwhile, I came here with Samo and he has to do something, though he's not sure what.  So tomorrow we shall go out into the lovely cold but clear and shiny sunshine and find what it is we need to do.
I want to explain better, but now I don't seem able to just let it all out the way I once did in my blogs.  And it's not like I have a million readers, so I shouldn't worry about saying more than I should.  Who would know?? 
Well, one thing I could start with is that I've been telling myself all this is a delayed reaction to being widowed.  I spent over two years just not letting myself dwell too much on that and continuing my life as it was going.  Then suddenly, last summer, I started feeling that I needed a change.  It would come upon me suddenly that I was doing the same ol' same ol' every day, every week... At work, I felt that having to accept and follow all the new administrative demands, weekly or even daily procedural modifications, frustrating deficiencies in the communication hierarchy, and constant irrational deadlines was not fun.  Instead of getting to teach classes and learn from my students, I was at the computer, filling out questionnaires, writing e-mails, filling in grade sheets, pay sheets, receipt information, and such, not to mention having to check my mail several times a day so I wouldn't miss some new task or obligation required of me.  I took it in stride though, kept up with all my own learning activities in art and languages, but it wasn't enough.  When you don't enjoy your work, no matter what you do in your off-time, it won't change the fact that you don't enjoy your work... by November, I was taking two different language courses, going to art classes 3 or even 4 times a week, spending more time on the computer than ever, and teaching fewer classes.  All the teachers were worried about losing hours, but I found I just didn't care.  And that's when I knew I had to leave.  I had to let the other teachers have a chance to have more hours and just go do something else myself. 
This is not what I want to say.  This has all been thought out and said before.
There's something else.  But it's just beyond my reach.  All I have at the moment are questions!
Maybe tomorrow I'll find enough of an answer to be able to spell it out for you.