Wednesday, 21 December 2011
I don't know what to write tonight. I am here in Belize. Mission accomplished. The car is in park.
All of the things chasing me on the trip, that I didn't have time to process because We Have to Get There, I now have time to process. Oh God. My nephew Scott was killed last week in a car explosion.
I used to ask Why all of the time. I had a running list of ways that (it could be argued) God failed me and was not helping and was not merciful because Life is Too Hard. When I kept the list, I had a sense of entitlement to know Why. If you are going to mess with my life in this way, I Deserve to Know. Everything that was not what I wanted was God's fault. It was one way to see life. It left me frustrated and angry and not seeing life clearly at all.
I was driving in a caravan of trucks and cars-hauling-cars through the possibly perilous maze of Matamoros, Mexico, when Rebecca called me on my just-bought Mexico phone to say, "Scott was killed last night..."
What? What? What? This is not one of the possible variables of what might go wrong on this trip. What?
I thought of how many times our trip had been delayed, why hadn't there been one more to keep us there for this family crisis? How we had just crossed into Mexico the night before. How there was no easy way to turn back and mourn our loss together with our family. How Scott was gone, my heart was wrenched, and I was not there. The only thing to do was keep going on. It seemed Wrong. But I knew it was Right. Sometimes your mind tells you "I have to do this!" but your heart quietly knows: "The other is the path to go."
In these instances, it doesn't matter how things look or what people think or whether everyone agrees. You sometimes just Know what to do. And life is (infinitely) smoother when you heed that sense in your heart, and do it.
I don't think I said, "Why did Scott die?" (or maybe I did but it wasn't foremost). God has shown me nothing in the last year if not that Life Is Short. Live It Now. You don't know if you have even this afternoon, never mind tomorrow. Forgive people, move on, live with abandon, live without fear. If death does not have the power to change the number of your days (and it doesn't...) then what is there possibly to fear? Not even dying.
Maybe I say this a lot. Maybe I have blogged this a lot. It is what God has impressed on my heart in these months of struggle with the words the doctor had for me: "Yup, it's melanoma. That's the bad cancer. You don't want that one." Sheesh.
But I have that one. Or maybe "had", past tense. That's the hope. And having it makes you have to think about a really short foreseeable future. You can't look away. That might be the point of these life-jarring matters. We spend a lot of time ignoring what we don't want to see in daily life. To keep the peace in our own heads. Realizing death looms (for every one of us) makes you not look away, not ignore what you're too tired to fix. A broken friendship, a decade of resentment, fear that has immobilized you, the arm's-length place you like to stay from God.
If you think you have, say, 18 months, you involuntarily think about life after you're gone. You think about how you would Hope to leave things. You don't, as far as I can tell, get vindictive; you don't have a penchant for telling people off; you don't speed up the getting back at people who have done you wrong. Those are temporary-world traits. When you realize that what you have done and who you have been to date might be all you have to contribute, it makes you seriously think. Am I good with that?
And, if you have a finite number of days to build on that, what becomes most important to do? Who, frankly, do you want to be when you die?
I don't know if Scotty had the chance to think of life that way. But a death, sudden and inexplicable, like his makes the rest of us start to think...
Whatever God has for each of us to accomplish or process and Become in this life, He completes. He is not small that He can be thwarted. His design comes to pass no matter our opinions, our choices. We are not the great determining factor of the universe. But there is no way merely humanly to look at Scott's life and think it was completed. He left disconnected, battling his demons, in a place of suffering.
We want resolution. We want the storybook ending where all is well just before the fatal end. Then the tragedy, we think, is tempered by the precious resolution.
In most of real life, tragedy is not tempered, I think. Except by grace - knowing that the worst was held back, that God does not require of us more than we can bear. I know Scotty must have questioned that as he struggled in his life. I did.
The thing is, we were not meant for the untempered tragedy. We were meant for walking with God, who goes before us, whose angels surround us, who tenderly loves us through the tragedies that make us into who He created us to be. Without Him paving our way, we don't rise above, we sink beneath. Without crying out to Him, we bear the impossible weight alone that doesn't build us up, but tears us down. We become weaker, not stronger. Without Him, tragedy destroys a part of us and makes us bitter, cynical. Without Him, there is no redeeming value to the grievous loss.
I know that stings. I feel it. But I know that more joy and truth and strength and Reality come into our lives through suffering than through anything else. If we will have it.
The Why is simply life. It is a joyous, perplexing, painful, and profound existence that feels terribly imperfect. It is what it is. Why did we think it would be otherwise? Why would things mend when they fall, rather than break. It is not the nature of the life we live. Breaking is easy, mending is hard.
I used to Demand to know why. It is our human reflex, and it's part of processing something terrible. But now, the Why season is shorter and I Trust. I trust that my circumstances are in God's hands. That an inexplicable car explosion is not out of God's reach. He was not tricked into losing his child. He was not busy with someone more important. He was not looking away. He was present. Scott probably did not know the horrors of how he died. Those are details we, left behind, sort through. Scott only knew the hand of Jesus, reaching down to pull him from this life, into the great expanse of the next. Where everything Scott was made on earth to do has become his joy in heaven. If we live out in heaven the talents God has given us on earth (and I think we do), Scotty is writing songs and playing instruments and dancing a cool move and kicking a soccer ball, and creating things, and telling stories with his sweet half smile. Maybe some about his Auntie Sue. He loved me.
Scotty knew from life with my sister that God loved even a castaway child from a refugee camp. That he was valuable and had potential and could rise above his past.
He was in that process, trying to understand his pain in the context of God. And then he was gone. We are the ones deeply sad about this. Scott finally understands. He finally can see, face to face, life in the context of God - and it is sweet.
I will miss you Scotty. It will only be the blink of an eye til we are there with you. Understanding fully what we can right now only see in part. You were brave, and you fought in the way you knew how. I will always cherish you and your beautiful spirit.
Until then, sweet boy...
Friday, December 23, 2011
Wednesday, December 21, 2011
My Belize
Tuesday, 20 December 2011
I walked the dogs down the street in Orange Walk, Belize, tonight.
Here I am, in my Belize.
It has been a long two months of working to come here (and a nearly longer two weeks Driving to come here). What do you do when you get to where you have been going? I am smiling and my heart is light. I am too tired for anything else!
We stopped at a gas station to ask about hotels. The one we found in Corazol, just across the border, rejected us due to pups. But a wonderful Asian woman, Lynn, (the only hour-long best friend I've ever had) at the Shell station outside of Corazol let me plug in my dead Belize phone to buy minutes and try to call Michelle in Cayo to tell her we had arrived. Lynn told me about a hotel in Orange Walk but said she should call her sister Sherri instead and we should stay with Sherri. Because it was so late, because we had the dogs....
Overwhelmingly kind.
We drove through Orange Walk and waited by the hospital parking lot for Sherri and her husband to come on a scooter to meet us. He said they had guests at their house, but would take us to the hotel in town and introduce us.
I have never been introduced at a hotel in order to get a room! This was so gracious and just awesome. Maybe this is the Asian way? I don't know.
We secured a room at the delightful Orchid Palm Inn in Orange Walk. Such a relief from our last and most miserable hotel in Mexico that my dad slept about 12 hours...and could have slept longer I think. It's a charming place with tropical plants and flowers and a gated place to park where the pups could stay in the car just outside our door. We both woke up this morning and laughed with relief.
We are in Belize!
We had a good night's sleep (except for the neighbor dogs barking at my dogs in the car, who were uncharacteristically quiet. They are so disoriented now that I am wondering if they will ever return to their usual selves.)
I wandered out into Orange Walk with the dogs at night to find something for them to eat after we arrived. Once we open the emergency bag of dog food, there's no closing the back hatch of the car again. It's all packed in like puzzle pieces, one misplaced item and it's a total repack. (I exaggerate...). I left the Enroute Bucket of Pup Food on the top of a cabinet in a hotel in Texas or somewhere, so we've been buying meat and bones along the way for the dogs since then. And sharing the remnants of our delicious fish dinners with them. They are a little skinnier. They don't care. They believe life as they have known it is over. They believe they are only Car Dogs now, with no hope of rabbit chases left in life. Perhaps not rabbit, pups, but I think an iguana or even a gecko will give you a good run in a day or two.
I did not find anything for the dogs at this hour. But I found a center of town with a lit Christmas tree and food vendors and families milling around. Orange Walk is very picturesque - I had never been here in my summer visit to Belize.
We had no problems at customs, tomy relief and amazement. I had nothing left in me for problems.
When you cross the border here, there's no clear step to take. There's a casino and insurance agencies and a throng of parked cars and you just wonder "Where do I go?" And no one tells you. It's as though you are already in Belize and can just go about your business. So I kept driving. Then came the gates and fences and Officials. A man came to me and told me he was Melvin, a customs agent here to help me. He was so welcoming and helpful that I was suspicious.
"Are you a customs agent or a broker?" I asked. I didn't want another broker.
"I work for customs, it is my job to help you through." he replied.
Oh my. Melvin took the dogs and walked me in to the building where we went with the dogs into a small room. They were to be examined and paperworked. Then the car matters would come next - a temporary permit for the car covered with seven-some US states of dirt and the whole Gulf Coast of Mexico too. And then a review of our Belongings.
Considering all that had to happen - customs was a breeze. It was worse to get into Mexico - and far more expensive! Leaving Mexico - paperwork and return on my deposit promising I would leave and not be a tourist - took from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. and coming through Belize customs took from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m. That was all!
Melvin kept wanting to take the dogs from me. He asked me if they would make a mess in the building.
"Oh, no," I assured. They won't do that. (You know, except under extreme stress when they have been traveling for two weeks and they are taken away from me by a stranger in a large building of hundreds of people milling about...then it's really unknown. Unknown no longer.)
Melvin burst into the BAHA office (Bureau of Animal Health and Agriculture?) where I was explaining that I did not bring the cat after all and he thrust one of the pups at me.
"Your dog poop in the building!" he accused me.
Ay yi yi. I had promised he wouldn't. Nothing is easy. Maybe don't keep trying to take my dogs from me in a strange place where they will be more stressed out than two weeks of car travel has already made them, I thought. Why can't they just stay with me....?
In spite of the international spectacle made by Eli, they let us through. I paid a smidgen of duty on gifts brought in and they didn't sift through my belongings or make us stay through the night and the Insurance Man, who was our next stop, clued me in on getting a temporary six-month permit for the car, which will allow me not to pay duty. Whew. All of my online research has told me that I would have to pay up to 56% value of the car in duty, so that made me happy.
In a time when everything could have gone Awry, I feel like God planted all of these Helpers in my path. The Ana's and Lynn's of the trip. From Melvin walking me through customs and cleaning up after Eli, to the insurance man giving me Great relief about the car process, to Sherry "Introducing Me" at the hotel. And I didn't mention the guy on the Mexico side who worked through all of the papers and made calls for me to be able to get through under the wire before Mexico closed at 5 p.m.
The way was paved before me. So much could have gone horribly wrong - and nothing did. Why, again, have I been so stressed and Irritable this whole way? I hate that. Everything has worked out. Everything was going to work out. There was never any wonder.
Even when I do not feel the relief of it, God always paves my way. Paved in Mexico where none of us - people or dogs - encountered any harm. We saw the accidents on the side of the road with drivers who had passed us, but we weren't in any of those accidents. Our cartop bins that could (though don't) hold items of intrigue for people in the night, were never sliced from their place on the roof while we slept. The banditos and all of the nefarious people in the news terrorizing Mexico did not cross our path. We didn't get the least bit sick from food or water (or our own medical frailties) on the trip. These are not nothing. They are showerings of grace - blessings undeserved whether I have been able to see and receive them or not (such as....through almost all of Mexico.)
There are moments when things do not go well. When the back hatch will not close. When the luggage flies from the back of the car onto Eli as we drive. When we are stuck behind trucks we can't pass and night falls and we are still driving in Mexico and there are No Known Hotels within two hours. When a biopsy comes back and it is melanoma. When you go to the doctor again and there is Another Suspicious Spot. When your 24-year-old nephew is suddenly gone. No goodbye, no last "I love you." This is still grace. What a mystery. Even what we call bad is still a withholding of the worst - grace that will not allow more burden than we can bear (no matter what our opinion of that limit may be).
I am grateful and relieved and quietly exuberant to be in Belize. I don't know what these months hold, but it will be wonderful and full of grace, the path paved before us.
Love and Adoration,
Susana en Belice (Bay-Lee-Say, as they say in Mexico)
I walked the dogs down the street in Orange Walk, Belize, tonight.
Here I am, in my Belize.
It has been a long two months of working to come here (and a nearly longer two weeks Driving to come here). What do you do when you get to where you have been going? I am smiling and my heart is light. I am too tired for anything else!
We stopped at a gas station to ask about hotels. The one we found in Corazol, just across the border, rejected us due to pups. But a wonderful Asian woman, Lynn, (the only hour-long best friend I've ever had) at the Shell station outside of Corazol let me plug in my dead Belize phone to buy minutes and try to call Michelle in Cayo to tell her we had arrived. Lynn told me about a hotel in Orange Walk but said she should call her sister Sherri instead and we should stay with Sherri. Because it was so late, because we had the dogs....
Overwhelmingly kind.
We drove through Orange Walk and waited by the hospital parking lot for Sherri and her husband to come on a scooter to meet us. He said they had guests at their house, but would take us to the hotel in town and introduce us.
I have never been introduced at a hotel in order to get a room! This was so gracious and just awesome. Maybe this is the Asian way? I don't know.
We secured a room at the delightful Orchid Palm Inn in Orange Walk. Such a relief from our last and most miserable hotel in Mexico that my dad slept about 12 hours...and could have slept longer I think. It's a charming place with tropical plants and flowers and a gated place to park where the pups could stay in the car just outside our door. We both woke up this morning and laughed with relief.
We are in Belize!
We had a good night's sleep (except for the neighbor dogs barking at my dogs in the car, who were uncharacteristically quiet. They are so disoriented now that I am wondering if they will ever return to their usual selves.)
I wandered out into Orange Walk with the dogs at night to find something for them to eat after we arrived. Once we open the emergency bag of dog food, there's no closing the back hatch of the car again. It's all packed in like puzzle pieces, one misplaced item and it's a total repack. (I exaggerate...). I left the Enroute Bucket of Pup Food on the top of a cabinet in a hotel in Texas or somewhere, so we've been buying meat and bones along the way for the dogs since then. And sharing the remnants of our delicious fish dinners with them. They are a little skinnier. They don't care. They believe life as they have known it is over. They believe they are only Car Dogs now, with no hope of rabbit chases left in life. Perhaps not rabbit, pups, but I think an iguana or even a gecko will give you a good run in a day or two.
I did not find anything for the dogs at this hour. But I found a center of town with a lit Christmas tree and food vendors and families milling around. Orange Walk is very picturesque - I had never been here in my summer visit to Belize.
We had no problems at customs, tomy relief and amazement. I had nothing left in me for problems.
When you cross the border here, there's no clear step to take. There's a casino and insurance agencies and a throng of parked cars and you just wonder "Where do I go?" And no one tells you. It's as though you are already in Belize and can just go about your business. So I kept driving. Then came the gates and fences and Officials. A man came to me and told me he was Melvin, a customs agent here to help me. He was so welcoming and helpful that I was suspicious.
"Are you a customs agent or a broker?" I asked. I didn't want another broker.
"I work for customs, it is my job to help you through." he replied.
Oh my. Melvin took the dogs and walked me in to the building where we went with the dogs into a small room. They were to be examined and paperworked. Then the car matters would come next - a temporary permit for the car covered with seven-some US states of dirt and the whole Gulf Coast of Mexico too. And then a review of our Belongings.
Considering all that had to happen - customs was a breeze. It was worse to get into Mexico - and far more expensive! Leaving Mexico - paperwork and return on my deposit promising I would leave and not be a tourist - took from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. and coming through Belize customs took from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m. That was all!
Melvin kept wanting to take the dogs from me. He asked me if they would make a mess in the building.
"Oh, no," I assured. They won't do that. (You know, except under extreme stress when they have been traveling for two weeks and they are taken away from me by a stranger in a large building of hundreds of people milling about...then it's really unknown. Unknown no longer.)
Melvin burst into the BAHA office (Bureau of Animal Health and Agriculture?) where I was explaining that I did not bring the cat after all and he thrust one of the pups at me.
"Your dog poop in the building!" he accused me.
Ay yi yi. I had promised he wouldn't. Nothing is easy. Maybe don't keep trying to take my dogs from me in a strange place where they will be more stressed out than two weeks of car travel has already made them, I thought. Why can't they just stay with me....?
In spite of the international spectacle made by Eli, they let us through. I paid a smidgen of duty on gifts brought in and they didn't sift through my belongings or make us stay through the night and the Insurance Man, who was our next stop, clued me in on getting a temporary six-month permit for the car, which will allow me not to pay duty. Whew. All of my online research has told me that I would have to pay up to 56% value of the car in duty, so that made me happy.
In a time when everything could have gone Awry, I feel like God planted all of these Helpers in my path. The Ana's and Lynn's of the trip. From Melvin walking me through customs and cleaning up after Eli, to the insurance man giving me Great relief about the car process, to Sherry "Introducing Me" at the hotel. And I didn't mention the guy on the Mexico side who worked through all of the papers and made calls for me to be able to get through under the wire before Mexico closed at 5 p.m.
The way was paved before me. So much could have gone horribly wrong - and nothing did. Why, again, have I been so stressed and Irritable this whole way? I hate that. Everything has worked out. Everything was going to work out. There was never any wonder.
Even when I do not feel the relief of it, God always paves my way. Paved in Mexico where none of us - people or dogs - encountered any harm. We saw the accidents on the side of the road with drivers who had passed us, but we weren't in any of those accidents. Our cartop bins that could (though don't) hold items of intrigue for people in the night, were never sliced from their place on the roof while we slept. The banditos and all of the nefarious people in the news terrorizing Mexico did not cross our path. We didn't get the least bit sick from food or water (or our own medical frailties) on the trip. These are not nothing. They are showerings of grace - blessings undeserved whether I have been able to see and receive them or not (such as....through almost all of Mexico.)
There are moments when things do not go well. When the back hatch will not close. When the luggage flies from the back of the car onto Eli as we drive. When we are stuck behind trucks we can't pass and night falls and we are still driving in Mexico and there are No Known Hotels within two hours. When a biopsy comes back and it is melanoma. When you go to the doctor again and there is Another Suspicious Spot. When your 24-year-old nephew is suddenly gone. No goodbye, no last "I love you." This is still grace. What a mystery. Even what we call bad is still a withholding of the worst - grace that will not allow more burden than we can bear (no matter what our opinion of that limit may be).
I am grateful and relieved and quietly exuberant to be in Belize. I don't know what these months hold, but it will be wonderful and full of grace, the path paved before us.
Love and Adoration,
Susana en Belice (Bay-Lee-Say, as they say in Mexico)
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
Adventures in Mexico
Monday, 19 December 2011
We had excellent roads outside of Vera Cruz this morning. I wonder if the very bad roads through the first half of Mexico (superseded only by very bad drivers - who well may be my fellow transmigrantes, not locals) are an intentional scheme to make you choose the toll roads whenever you have the opportunity.
The toll road out of Vera Cruz was like a dream. As though all of the roads we had traversed til now were not even real; this was the pleasant drive through the beauty of Mexico that we wanted. Thud. Well, almost. You have to be alert and Adept at averting potholes even, strangely, on a newly paved road. And they are deep. Some might be 12 inches. (I didn't measure. But a misstep could have cost me a wheel rim.) My dad explained why potholes could be so deep on a new road. Something about an improper foundation...he knew exactly...
So we are drawn like magnets to toll roads but we have been out of pesos to pay for them for awhile. The bond-man (Nacho) in Texas told us we would need to change $300 US to get through Mexico. However, Ana, the only best friend I have ever had for only one day (because then we lost her in the caravan), pshawed the need for that much.
"Your car doesn't use much gas. You need $100 at the most," she instructed.
It's the only bad advice she gave me in all of the hours I knew her.
I changed $200 with apologies to her saying I really felt better to have at least that much. What I really needed was to change $600, what with this long drawn-out trip and meals for two and hotels for two. (Remember, my dad's wallet left there at the diner in Oklahoma. Or was it Kansas? With much of his cash and his only credit cards. So my cash is now for two) And we've found no place since the border to change dollars to pesos (partly since our biggest need fell on the weekend.)
We've drawn out cash at cajeros (ATMs) thinking "Now we have enough!" because $100 US is about $1345 pesos. It's so hard to think in multiples of 13. This is a life instance where elementary school math matters. But then we run into a gas station that takes only cash and a lunch that is about $20 US for us both and a few tolls and a hotel and - out of pesos again. A constant battle for pesos. One website says I will pay $800 pesos in toll before I cross into Belize. This is somewhere around $60 but the multiples of 13 sound like so much. Still, once you drive the non-toll-roads, you will pay it. You don't know what you're getting with toll roads either, but you pay in the vague hope of something better...
The great (toll) roads outside of Vera Cruz were short lived. Soon we were dodging potholes again, and, worse, clinging white knuckled to the steering wheel. We were back to two lanes - sometimes one. Winter in Mexico is like Summer in Wisconsin: Construction Season. Every road we were on had a good portion under construction. I think 2013 is the year to drive through Mexico (thinking the construction projects will be complete.) I wasn't for some reason, worried about us, but for the perilous drivers around us, passing three semis in a row on a blind hill, with oncoming semis appearing over the crest and using the center line as a lane unto itself. This was not one renegade driver, this is the Mexico Way. We have seen 6 or 7 accidents in the ditch. 2 or 3 were semis turned over. One was a disaster with at least four cars in the ditch. Most involved a car we had seen barrel past on the road. If I am exaggerating, it is only by one. It's terribly sobering.
* * *
We've had a few very hard days in a row in Mexico. I haven't had internet or much cell service to keep you apprised. I can't explain the stress of this trip. It's exactly what I should not be doing for my natural regimen to Fight cancer. But it's exactly the right thing to do.
Sometimes that is how life is.
Just like I feel that I should be in Pennsylvania with my sister, grieving with her and helping her through this horrific time with the sudden death of my nephew. But it is the right thing to do to continue on to Belize. (Believe me, I tried to figure out another way... with my dad along and two dogs and a car...it was all more than I could do or coordinate or afford.)
It is right to continue on.
This is the trip of a lifetime for my dad. He is 89 with some aging-mind symptoms, I am finding. It is now or never for such an adventure as this. He has been a trooper and he is having a great trip, as far as I can tell. Meanwhile, I am daily about to crack. Between luggage falling over on the dogs again, to my dear Dad's 17th time of asking the meaning of "Vera Cruz" (Will someone please tell me?! so we can settle that!) to no pesos, to no sleep in hotels with 24-hour restaurants and blaring TVs and idling semi trucks...
It has been a hard time. I keep wondering what I am supposed to learn. How can I let go of all of this difficulty and accept whatever comes? And have fun and let it be an adventure?
It is ugly to see ourselves at our worst. It feels like that is me now. Mad about no sleep, mad about pesos, mad about the translation of Vera Cruz. But God is merciful to me even when I am at my worst...It's a good day this morning (Tuesday). The hotel from hell is behind us. We found a restaurant in Escarsega that served the best and only breakfast I've found in Mexico compliant with my diet - vegetable and rice soup that reminds me of Escabeche in Belize (onion soup). i am thankful for small mercies. I cheated (on my diet) and had coffee so I will be awake for the very short trek from here to the border. Where they probably will not let us across because I was out of cell minutes and have had no internet for days to alert the Bureau of Pup Dogs and Other Animals, with the required 2-day advance, of our border crossing. They will inspect Elias and the Gute to insure the dogs are up to snuff for life in Belize.
Ah well. In the scope of all things, it is simply miraculous to be Near Belize. What is another day of waiting for a jaguar to lick your forehead? (This is what my dad is looking forward to first... :-) the zoo where you can be in a cage in the jaguar pen and see him up close and let him lick your forehead through the bars...)
One day I'll tell you about the Absolute Worst Day of Mexico when the rooftop carrier was deafening and no amount of retying could fix the noise, so we drove for five hours in horrific, dangerous traffic, unable to speak or hear, the dogs catatonic in the back seat with the bamming noise, nearly the whole route was driving through construction, and we saw the most accidents of the whole trip and - no, say it isn't true - wound up in the same town we had started in. One day I will tell that terrible story and it will be very very funny instead of nightmarishly beleaguering...
I love Mexico, in spite of all of this! I would do it again...(and I will, around about May 1!) but not in the same way. This has just been an unusual set of remarkably difficult circumstances. We're eager for Belize! Even customs can't daunt me now...
Love and adoration,
Susan for
Me and Dad and the Pups
We had excellent roads outside of Vera Cruz this morning. I wonder if the very bad roads through the first half of Mexico (superseded only by very bad drivers - who well may be my fellow transmigrantes, not locals) are an intentional scheme to make you choose the toll roads whenever you have the opportunity.
The toll road out of Vera Cruz was like a dream. As though all of the roads we had traversed til now were not even real; this was the pleasant drive through the beauty of Mexico that we wanted. Thud. Well, almost. You have to be alert and Adept at averting potholes even, strangely, on a newly paved road. And they are deep. Some might be 12 inches. (I didn't measure. But a misstep could have cost me a wheel rim.) My dad explained why potholes could be so deep on a new road. Something about an improper foundation...he knew exactly...
So we are drawn like magnets to toll roads but we have been out of pesos to pay for them for awhile. The bond-man (Nacho) in Texas told us we would need to change $300 US to get through Mexico. However, Ana, the only best friend I have ever had for only one day (because then we lost her in the caravan), pshawed the need for that much.
"Your car doesn't use much gas. You need $100 at the most," she instructed.
It's the only bad advice she gave me in all of the hours I knew her.
I changed $200 with apologies to her saying I really felt better to have at least that much. What I really needed was to change $600, what with this long drawn-out trip and meals for two and hotels for two. (Remember, my dad's wallet left there at the diner in Oklahoma. Or was it Kansas? With much of his cash and his only credit cards. So my cash is now for two) And we've found no place since the border to change dollars to pesos (partly since our biggest need fell on the weekend.)
We've drawn out cash at cajeros (ATMs) thinking "Now we have enough!" because $100 US is about $1345 pesos. It's so hard to think in multiples of 13. This is a life instance where elementary school math matters. But then we run into a gas station that takes only cash and a lunch that is about $20 US for us both and a few tolls and a hotel and - out of pesos again. A constant battle for pesos. One website says I will pay $800 pesos in toll before I cross into Belize. This is somewhere around $60 but the multiples of 13 sound like so much. Still, once you drive the non-toll-roads, you will pay it. You don't know what you're getting with toll roads either, but you pay in the vague hope of something better...
The great (toll) roads outside of Vera Cruz were short lived. Soon we were dodging potholes again, and, worse, clinging white knuckled to the steering wheel. We were back to two lanes - sometimes one. Winter in Mexico is like Summer in Wisconsin: Construction Season. Every road we were on had a good portion under construction. I think 2013 is the year to drive through Mexico (thinking the construction projects will be complete.) I wasn't for some reason, worried about us, but for the perilous drivers around us, passing three semis in a row on a blind hill, with oncoming semis appearing over the crest and using the center line as a lane unto itself. This was not one renegade driver, this is the Mexico Way. We have seen 6 or 7 accidents in the ditch. 2 or 3 were semis turned over. One was a disaster with at least four cars in the ditch. Most involved a car we had seen barrel past on the road. If I am exaggerating, it is only by one. It's terribly sobering.
* * *
We've had a few very hard days in a row in Mexico. I haven't had internet or much cell service to keep you apprised. I can't explain the stress of this trip. It's exactly what I should not be doing for my natural regimen to Fight cancer. But it's exactly the right thing to do.
Sometimes that is how life is.
Just like I feel that I should be in Pennsylvania with my sister, grieving with her and helping her through this horrific time with the sudden death of my nephew. But it is the right thing to do to continue on to Belize. (Believe me, I tried to figure out another way... with my dad along and two dogs and a car...it was all more than I could do or coordinate or afford.)
It is right to continue on.
This is the trip of a lifetime for my dad. He is 89 with some aging-mind symptoms, I am finding. It is now or never for such an adventure as this. He has been a trooper and he is having a great trip, as far as I can tell. Meanwhile, I am daily about to crack. Between luggage falling over on the dogs again, to my dear Dad's 17th time of asking the meaning of "Vera Cruz" (Will someone please tell me?! so we can settle that!) to no pesos, to no sleep in hotels with 24-hour restaurants and blaring TVs and idling semi trucks...
It has been a hard time. I keep wondering what I am supposed to learn. How can I let go of all of this difficulty and accept whatever comes? And have fun and let it be an adventure?
It is ugly to see ourselves at our worst. It feels like that is me now. Mad about no sleep, mad about pesos, mad about the translation of Vera Cruz. But God is merciful to me even when I am at my worst...It's a good day this morning (Tuesday). The hotel from hell is behind us. We found a restaurant in Escarsega that served the best and only breakfast I've found in Mexico compliant with my diet - vegetable and rice soup that reminds me of Escabeche in Belize (onion soup). i am thankful for small mercies. I cheated (on my diet) and had coffee so I will be awake for the very short trek from here to the border. Where they probably will not let us across because I was out of cell minutes and have had no internet for days to alert the Bureau of Pup Dogs and Other Animals, with the required 2-day advance, of our border crossing. They will inspect Elias and the Gute to insure the dogs are up to snuff for life in Belize.
Ah well. In the scope of all things, it is simply miraculous to be Near Belize. What is another day of waiting for a jaguar to lick your forehead? (This is what my dad is looking forward to first... :-) the zoo where you can be in a cage in the jaguar pen and see him up close and let him lick your forehead through the bars...)
One day I'll tell you about the Absolute Worst Day of Mexico when the rooftop carrier was deafening and no amount of retying could fix the noise, so we drove for five hours in horrific, dangerous traffic, unable to speak or hear, the dogs catatonic in the back seat with the bamming noise, nearly the whole route was driving through construction, and we saw the most accidents of the whole trip and - no, say it isn't true - wound up in the same town we had started in. One day I will tell that terrible story and it will be very very funny instead of nightmarishly beleaguering...
I love Mexico, in spite of all of this! I would do it again...(and I will, around about May 1!) but not in the same way. This has just been an unusual set of remarkably difficult circumstances. We're eager for Belize! Even customs can't daunt me now...
Love and adoration,
Susan for
Me and Dad and the Pups
Thursday, December 15, 2011
In Mexico at Last
Dear friends, I received terrible news just before posting this entry. My nephew Scott was killed last night. Please pray for my sister Rebecca's family and all of us grieving our loss. Scott would have been 25 on New Year's Eve.
I am in my room at the hotel outside of Mexican customs where across the 3/4 wall is the sound of friendly banter in Spanish. It is my new friend Ana and her friend Hector who have helped us all day through the unnavigable customs process at the border. My dad is asleep with Guthrie on his bed and Eli on mine. Even the pups are exhausted. Though they much preferred laying around and under the car at customs all day than riding in the car. And we were there all day.
First we were with Mario's cohorts in Texas. Nacho and Kevin. They checked off our items on a list and bonded us, or they were bonded. Or maybe our things were bonded. The pups lay under the car there because it was hot and they could watch the chickens on the other side of the rutted empty lot where we were parked and hear an occasional bray from the donkey tied to a feathery-leafed, down-hanging branched Texas tree.
Then we learned how much cash we needed for this whole escapade and I Understood why yesterday's US border patrol didn't believe that we had enough cash with us. Sheesh. There is one cash machine in Los Indios, where we would cross. We can use credit/debit cards in Belize, but not much in Mexico. Even gas stations take cash.
So maybe going through a broker, I would fly through customs. I envisioned us spending the night in Ciudad Victoria, three hours past the border. Instead, we are staying 1/3 mile past the border at a little place called "Hotel" as far as I can see. The vacant land all around it is full of the vehicles we saw yesterday - semis hauling mangled cars, school buses pulling boats...you see a strange array of vehicle combinations. My friend Ana is in a semi cab hauling another semi cab on which stubby rig rides a pickup truck balanced on a tractor tire. Who can explain it? I didn't ask Ana.
We were the only Leisure vehicle as far as we could see. Everyone knows something I didn't know. Next time maybe I will take my dad around the Entire World in order to save a little money on our winter trip.
We did not "fly" through customs. We flew through Pedro's section - he was Mario's man. And then I followed the truck in front of me through the lanes and ended up trying to exit when I was supposed to go to the inspection line. But I and my goods and the man who did the paperwork are bonded, I wanted to say. In order to go to the inspection line, the only English speaking customs agent I met had the semi (with full trailer) behind me Back Up so I could backup and swoop around the whole lot to the Back of the Line.
"Look for the one in a blue shirt who has your name," a helpful vested agent told me.
I envisioned a line up like at the airport with chauffeurs in suits bearing placards of the name of their international guest. It was not like that. There were many agents in reflective vests (I will write a letter to Mexico later suggesting a spiffy uniform on their customs agents would really make the experience a better one. Why should I give a guy in a mere reflective vest the title to my car? It doesn't seem right.
We parked and I latched Elias and the Gute to the u-ring of the (open) back door with a caribeaner. And put out a bowl of water. They were placid all day except to two men. I love this about dogs. They are unabashedly prejudiced about nonsensical things. Or about very sensible things that are beyond our capacity to perceive.
Eli, after all, knew there was cancer on my leg before I or the doctor thought to look. He would put his Wet Snout right on the mole on the back of my leg when I was wearing shorts and then look up at me expectantly. "CAnt you smell it?" he wondered. It bugged me, I didn't like him touching the spot. Eli knew. Guthrie likely also knew but felt if he kept quiet it might mean that his next home would be a family of Rabbit hunters, and he'd like to see that happen while he is still in his hunting prime.
This is when I was hit up for $11.
I paid $200 to Mario and $350 to Nacho and $600 to the United States of Mexico (of which $540 will be returned if I depart to Belize as I promised.) Can you imagine me quibbling then about $11? What is $11?! It made no sense at all but I wanted to understand.
It turns out he wanted $11 to search my car. I'd actually rather you don't search my car, I thought. Then we can just call it even...
It turned out to be okay at the back of the line because I met Ana. She and Hector are headed to Honduras and we will caravan with them most of the way to Mexico. Til Vera Cruz where my dad and I may stay one day (depending on energy) and then finish our trek to Belize. At first I couldn't not see Mexico no matter how much I tried to think and plan that part of the trip. It was only all about Belize. After a day in customs, I would like a little Mexico playtime before facing my Second Customs Scenario in Belize.
Ana helped me with every single step of customs. We spent five hours sitting and waiting. When the blue-shirt girl at last came with my Papers, she glanced through the windows of the car and said "Pobrecitas!" (Poor things!) about the dogs splayed out on the blacktop next to the car and then nodded.
"You're ok."
What? I waited five hours and you aren't going to search my things or count teabags or see that I gave away in Texas the machete that I had under the back floor of the wagon so I wouldn't be traveling with any possibly weaponry? At Least ask me for my hard-fought International Travel Certificates for the dogs and let me tell you why I do not have the listed cat in my charge.
Ana helped me figure out what people were saying to me. She is Salvadoran and lives in Houston. She helped me know what was next. She told me I still needed to take my passport in to immigration after the approval of the car.
I didn't listen. I meant to, but I asked and asked. "Que hago ahora?" (What do I do now?)
Go, they told me with a motion to skidaddle.
But I have papers for the dogs, what about my passport.
Go, they motioned to an open lane that used to be full. My road into Mexico. I took it. Thank God for Ana who came to our shared hotel room later and said, "You didn't do your passport. You need it stamped."
Ah, no one had stamped my passport. Of Course I needed it stamped. How confusing. Why did they tell me to go, only to be stopped later by Federales and appear to be a rogue American at large in Mexico without a Stamp.
We can go now, she said. It was 5:30. I will go with you, there are many lines and I will help you through.
Is she an angel, not a real person?
We went to Immigration and our passports were stamped just under the wire. The cash window was closed so I couldn't pay. Apparently a deal was worked out. I give the agents $10 each and they give some necessary approval on the form. Then when I leave the country, I pay another $20 each. As my discipline for not getting to the cash window before 6 p.m.
I think what I did was pay a bribe. But I didn't know it til Ana explained later that I would have to pay again.
What I didn't tell you is how I wound up in Room #8 at the Hotel. I told Ana that Jorge, the customs agent, told me to stay overnight at The Hotel on the other side of customs so we wouldn't drive at dusk.
It's not that everyone had told me not to drive at dusk, it's that no one has not told me - every single person who knows anything about Mexico says not to drive at dawn or dusk. From customs agents to Mexico map sellers online to arbitrary friends.
Yes, Ana agreed. It is very important to plan to stay at the hotel tonight and start out at 6 in the morning with the caravan of all of the vehicles traveling our route. (we get to be in a caravan!)
"It's too bad there won't be rooms left after all of these cars go through customs," she said. "But do it anyway."
"Do what?" I wondered.
"Sleep in your car if there's no room. No matter what, don't drive at night."
I looked at my dad working on his next scrabble word on the Deluxe edition board that has ridges to hold the letters. I wondered about brining the bigger box of the Deluxe edition. It was the right choice. He held the board on his lap and my tray of letters sat on the dashboard. I didn't thinkI could bring myself to make my dad sleep in the car overnight.
What if we call ahead and get a room, I asked Ana.
We can walk, she said. She checked with a vested man. Yes, indeed, we could enter Mexico without our cars, without our passports stamped, just walk on through and rent a hotel room.
We stood in line in the little square room, max cap 4 people, and saw a lone key on the wall. #8. The man before us asked about it, shook his head no and accepted soap and toilet paper from her and went on his way.
Only one room is left, Ana translated for me. It has four beds.
Can we share it? I asked her. We both liked the idea. Share we did. She and Hector on one sideof the half wall, he drinking rum and they talking in happy Spanish. My dad and I and the pups on the other side of the half wall. Bone tired.
I asked my dad at customs, "Did you ever think I would put you through something like this?"
"No, never," he responded. And we laughed.
I am in my room at the hotel outside of Mexican customs where across the 3/4 wall is the sound of friendly banter in Spanish. It is my new friend Ana and her friend Hector who have helped us all day through the unnavigable customs process at the border. My dad is asleep with Guthrie on his bed and Eli on mine. Even the pups are exhausted. Though they much preferred laying around and under the car at customs all day than riding in the car. And we were there all day.
First we were with Mario's cohorts in Texas. Nacho and Kevin. They checked off our items on a list and bonded us, or they were bonded. Or maybe our things were bonded. The pups lay under the car there because it was hot and they could watch the chickens on the other side of the rutted empty lot where we were parked and hear an occasional bray from the donkey tied to a feathery-leafed, down-hanging branched Texas tree.
Then we learned how much cash we needed for this whole escapade and I Understood why yesterday's US border patrol didn't believe that we had enough cash with us. Sheesh. There is one cash machine in Los Indios, where we would cross. We can use credit/debit cards in Belize, but not much in Mexico. Even gas stations take cash.
So maybe going through a broker, I would fly through customs. I envisioned us spending the night in Ciudad Victoria, three hours past the border. Instead, we are staying 1/3 mile past the border at a little place called "Hotel" as far as I can see. The vacant land all around it is full of the vehicles we saw yesterday - semis hauling mangled cars, school buses pulling boats...you see a strange array of vehicle combinations. My friend Ana is in a semi cab hauling another semi cab on which stubby rig rides a pickup truck balanced on a tractor tire. Who can explain it? I didn't ask Ana.
We were the only Leisure vehicle as far as we could see. Everyone knows something I didn't know. Next time maybe I will take my dad around the Entire World in order to save a little money on our winter trip.
We did not "fly" through customs. We flew through Pedro's section - he was Mario's man. And then I followed the truck in front of me through the lanes and ended up trying to exit when I was supposed to go to the inspection line. But I and my goods and the man who did the paperwork are bonded, I wanted to say. In order to go to the inspection line, the only English speaking customs agent I met had the semi (with full trailer) behind me Back Up so I could backup and swoop around the whole lot to the Back of the Line.
"Look for the one in a blue shirt who has your name," a helpful vested agent told me.
I envisioned a line up like at the airport with chauffeurs in suits bearing placards of the name of their international guest. It was not like that. There were many agents in reflective vests (I will write a letter to Mexico later suggesting a spiffy uniform on their customs agents would really make the experience a better one. Why should I give a guy in a mere reflective vest the title to my car? It doesn't seem right.
We parked and I latched Elias and the Gute to the u-ring of the (open) back door with a caribeaner. And put out a bowl of water. They were placid all day except to two men. I love this about dogs. They are unabashedly prejudiced about nonsensical things. Or about very sensible things that are beyond our capacity to perceive.
Eli, after all, knew there was cancer on my leg before I or the doctor thought to look. He would put his Wet Snout right on the mole on the back of my leg when I was wearing shorts and then look up at me expectantly. "CAnt you smell it?" he wondered. It bugged me, I didn't like him touching the spot. Eli knew. Guthrie likely also knew but felt if he kept quiet it might mean that his next home would be a family of Rabbit hunters, and he'd like to see that happen while he is still in his hunting prime.
This is when I was hit up for $11.
I paid $200 to Mario and $350 to Nacho and $600 to the United States of Mexico (of which $540 will be returned if I depart to Belize as I promised.) Can you imagine me quibbling then about $11? What is $11?! It made no sense at all but I wanted to understand.
It turns out he wanted $11 to search my car. I'd actually rather you don't search my car, I thought. Then we can just call it even...
It turned out to be okay at the back of the line because I met Ana. She and Hector are headed to Honduras and we will caravan with them most of the way to Mexico. Til Vera Cruz where my dad and I may stay one day (depending on energy) and then finish our trek to Belize. At first I couldn't not see Mexico no matter how much I tried to think and plan that part of the trip. It was only all about Belize. After a day in customs, I would like a little Mexico playtime before facing my Second Customs Scenario in Belize.
Ana helped me with every single step of customs. We spent five hours sitting and waiting. When the blue-shirt girl at last came with my Papers, she glanced through the windows of the car and said "Pobrecitas!" (Poor things!) about the dogs splayed out on the blacktop next to the car and then nodded.
"You're ok."
What? I waited five hours and you aren't going to search my things or count teabags or see that I gave away in Texas the machete that I had under the back floor of the wagon so I wouldn't be traveling with any possibly weaponry? At Least ask me for my hard-fought International Travel Certificates for the dogs and let me tell you why I do not have the listed cat in my charge.
Ana helped me figure out what people were saying to me. She is Salvadoran and lives in Houston. She helped me know what was next. She told me I still needed to take my passport in to immigration after the approval of the car.
I didn't listen. I meant to, but I asked and asked. "Que hago ahora?" (What do I do now?)
Go, they told me with a motion to skidaddle.
But I have papers for the dogs, what about my passport.
Go, they motioned to an open lane that used to be full. My road into Mexico. I took it. Thank God for Ana who came to our shared hotel room later and said, "You didn't do your passport. You need it stamped."
Ah, no one had stamped my passport. Of Course I needed it stamped. How confusing. Why did they tell me to go, only to be stopped later by Federales and appear to be a rogue American at large in Mexico without a Stamp.
We can go now, she said. It was 5:30. I will go with you, there are many lines and I will help you through.
Is she an angel, not a real person?
We went to Immigration and our passports were stamped just under the wire. The cash window was closed so I couldn't pay. Apparently a deal was worked out. I give the agents $10 each and they give some necessary approval on the form. Then when I leave the country, I pay another $20 each. As my discipline for not getting to the cash window before 6 p.m.
I think what I did was pay a bribe. But I didn't know it til Ana explained later that I would have to pay again.
What I didn't tell you is how I wound up in Room #8 at the Hotel. I told Ana that Jorge, the customs agent, told me to stay overnight at The Hotel on the other side of customs so we wouldn't drive at dusk.
It's not that everyone had told me not to drive at dusk, it's that no one has not told me - every single person who knows anything about Mexico says not to drive at dawn or dusk. From customs agents to Mexico map sellers online to arbitrary friends.
Yes, Ana agreed. It is very important to plan to stay at the hotel tonight and start out at 6 in the morning with the caravan of all of the vehicles traveling our route. (we get to be in a caravan!)
"It's too bad there won't be rooms left after all of these cars go through customs," she said. "But do it anyway."
"Do what?" I wondered.
"Sleep in your car if there's no room. No matter what, don't drive at night."
I looked at my dad working on his next scrabble word on the Deluxe edition board that has ridges to hold the letters. I wondered about brining the bigger box of the Deluxe edition. It was the right choice. He held the board on his lap and my tray of letters sat on the dashboard. I didn't thinkI could bring myself to make my dad sleep in the car overnight.
What if we call ahead and get a room, I asked Ana.
We can walk, she said. She checked with a vested man. Yes, indeed, we could enter Mexico without our cars, without our passports stamped, just walk on through and rent a hotel room.
We stood in line in the little square room, max cap 4 people, and saw a lone key on the wall. #8. The man before us asked about it, shook his head no and accepted soap and toilet paper from her and went on his way.
Only one room is left, Ana translated for me. It has four beds.
Can we share it? I asked her. We both liked the idea. Share we did. She and Hector on one sideof the half wall, he drinking rum and they talking in happy Spanish. My dad and I and the pups on the other side of the half wall. Bone tired.
I asked my dad at customs, "Did you ever think I would put you through something like this?"
"No, never," he responded. And we laughed.
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Border Patrols and Oranges and Casanova Brokers
It's not as easy to go to Mexico as you might think.
First the bridge for transmigration (we who are only passing through Mexico, not visiting there) is not marked very well. You just drive one way down the Military Highway that skirts the border and when you don't find anything, you turn around and go the other way. Then there's a big fiLling station where everyone gassing up is towing a bashed in car behind them. Cars headed for Mexico (and Belize) that someone will fix up and resell there.
We knew we were on the right track to the free trade bridge when we saw the warnings about firearms.
First we encountered US border patrol.
"She's going to Belize!" our guy shouted to someone, or everyone, else. Apparently that was a red flag. A man in a serious disposition and a somehow spiffier uniform came around to our car. He took my title and insurance card and told me to pull over. Hmm. Those are the words you don't want to hear at the border. It means Time Will Be Spent.
Have you gone to Belize before? So this is your second time? You've never been there before that? Why are you going? How much cash are you carrying? (And he didn't believe my answer. I guess we are light on cash.) What is your budget in Belize? (Are you allowed to ask these questions? I wondered.) I told him. He looked incredulous (about the cash again). I have access to money in the US while I am down there, I defended.
Oh, you have access to cash, he said, as though that explained everything.
Finally, after more questions, he sent me off. "We are just looking for firearms," he said.
"That was the US, next is Mexico!" I announced to my dad, prematurely it turned out.
The first men in orange safety vests waved me on. Then a shriek of a whistle and another vested man motioned me to stop.
"Buenas Tardes!" He smiled. "Are you a tourist?"
"No, transmigrante," I proudly used the word I had learned online from Mexico Mikes website. A passer-through, not a stayer.
Where are your papers?
I have a manifest, I started to say, again proudly because I knew in advance that it had to be translated into Spanish too.
Oh, he moaned to look at it. (Too much detail, I thought, always my problem.)
You need a broker, he told me.
No, I insisted, I called the broker from Wisconsin but because I was only bringing personal things (and because the broker and bonder together cost nigh unto $540) he said I didn't need one.
No, you need one, he told me. You go back to the US and get the paperwork.
I called Mario the broker. I had him in my cell phone.
"He doesn't even look official," I told Mario. "He's wearing an orange reflector vest and tells me I need to have a broker. You had thought I wouldn't need one."
"I hoped not, but it is up to them," he said. "You better come back to the US and meet me in Brownsville."
So I turn around, but...
It's not as easy to return to the US as you might think. Even if you haven't been allowed into Mexico.
I had to explain again and again (to the same guy) that we had Just been on the other side of the median 15 minutes ago, going through US border patrol. Then we were turned around by Mexican customs. We did not get to go anywhere.
I know the multiple questioning is to make sure your story doesn't change in the slightest. It's a truth-telling test. But it, at first impression, make it seem like we have not put our brightest minds at the border. How many times do I have to explain we were turned away and did not enter Mexico?!
It turns out that you cannot take oranges and apples over to the Mexico side, get turned back, and reenter the U.S. No Fruit that has touched Mexico air may be brought back into the U.S. it seems. This seems like a regular rule. I just don't travel across international borders by car all of the time.
"I'm sorry," I told the patrol. "Do we just throw them away?"
"No, they will have to be collected by the Dept. of Agriculture and incinerated," he said.
It seemed so harsh.
"So what else are you bringing back?" he wanted to know.
I'm not bringing anything back, I haven't been anywhere! I thought.
"You understand I didn't go into Mexico, right? They turned us away at the border." This is where I began to wonder about the brightest minds thing.
"Yes," he replied. "So what else are you bringing back?"
Stop saying I am bringing things back!
"No, nothing else" I said. "My dad wants to know if we can just eat these."
"You could ask the Dept. of Agriculture," he said. "We would still need to confiscate the peels. No citrus is allowed to come in that has been over to Mexico."
a) I have Not been to Mexico, and b) when was I supposed to have time to contact the Department of Agriculture? And would they really be interested in my orange situation?
We took it upon ourselves to eat the clementines as a blue-gloved woman walked over. (It turns out that she was the Dept. of Agriculture) and I was sad about the loss of three Braeburn apples, now doomed to be incinerated with the orange peels.
After a check through our vehicle, pups and parent removed, they sent us on our way to Brownsville to meet with Mario Casanova (real name - what are the chances?), the broker.
I was not going to be daunted by the grilling from the U.S. agents and the turning away by the Mexican officials. It's an adventure, I told myself. Then at about 9 p.m., after a confusing conversation with Mario at the local Burger King, a two-hour session in a hot stuffy office with an insurance agent to buy $58 of car insurance for Mexico, and another unpacking and repacking of the car to write the inventory in the way Mario instructed me, I thought I would crack.
We came back to the hotel and the dogs climbed in bed with my dad and I took a picture. He loves having them with us and they have chosen him.
"Do you think we'll run into the same problems tomorrow?" my dad asked as he fell asleep.
I laughed. It wouldn't be so good if I went into it thinking so.
Looking for a little peace and rest tonight and to have a goodnatured spirit tomorrow whatever may come. (That would be an act of God, btw.)
Believing tomorrow I will be feasting on fresh salsa en Mexico...
Susana
First the bridge for transmigration (we who are only passing through Mexico, not visiting there) is not marked very well. You just drive one way down the Military Highway that skirts the border and when you don't find anything, you turn around and go the other way. Then there's a big fiLling station where everyone gassing up is towing a bashed in car behind them. Cars headed for Mexico (and Belize) that someone will fix up and resell there.
We knew we were on the right track to the free trade bridge when we saw the warnings about firearms.
First we encountered US border patrol.
"She's going to Belize!" our guy shouted to someone, or everyone, else. Apparently that was a red flag. A man in a serious disposition and a somehow spiffier uniform came around to our car. He took my title and insurance card and told me to pull over. Hmm. Those are the words you don't want to hear at the border. It means Time Will Be Spent.
Have you gone to Belize before? So this is your second time? You've never been there before that? Why are you going? How much cash are you carrying? (And he didn't believe my answer. I guess we are light on cash.) What is your budget in Belize? (Are you allowed to ask these questions? I wondered.) I told him. He looked incredulous (about the cash again). I have access to money in the US while I am down there, I defended.
Oh, you have access to cash, he said, as though that explained everything.
Finally, after more questions, he sent me off. "We are just looking for firearms," he said.
"That was the US, next is Mexico!" I announced to my dad, prematurely it turned out.
The first men in orange safety vests waved me on. Then a shriek of a whistle and another vested man motioned me to stop.
"Buenas Tardes!" He smiled. "Are you a tourist?"
"No, transmigrante," I proudly used the word I had learned online from Mexico Mikes website. A passer-through, not a stayer.
Where are your papers?
I have a manifest, I started to say, again proudly because I knew in advance that it had to be translated into Spanish too.
Oh, he moaned to look at it. (Too much detail, I thought, always my problem.)
You need a broker, he told me.
No, I insisted, I called the broker from Wisconsin but because I was only bringing personal things (and because the broker and bonder together cost nigh unto $540) he said I didn't need one.
No, you need one, he told me. You go back to the US and get the paperwork.
I called Mario the broker. I had him in my cell phone.
"He doesn't even look official," I told Mario. "He's wearing an orange reflector vest and tells me I need to have a broker. You had thought I wouldn't need one."
"I hoped not, but it is up to them," he said. "You better come back to the US and meet me in Brownsville."
So I turn around, but...
It's not as easy to return to the US as you might think. Even if you haven't been allowed into Mexico.
I had to explain again and again (to the same guy) that we had Just been on the other side of the median 15 minutes ago, going through US border patrol. Then we were turned around by Mexican customs. We did not get to go anywhere.
I know the multiple questioning is to make sure your story doesn't change in the slightest. It's a truth-telling test. But it, at first impression, make it seem like we have not put our brightest minds at the border. How many times do I have to explain we were turned away and did not enter Mexico?!
It turns out that you cannot take oranges and apples over to the Mexico side, get turned back, and reenter the U.S. No Fruit that has touched Mexico air may be brought back into the U.S. it seems. This seems like a regular rule. I just don't travel across international borders by car all of the time.
"I'm sorry," I told the patrol. "Do we just throw them away?"
"No, they will have to be collected by the Dept. of Agriculture and incinerated," he said.
It seemed so harsh.
"So what else are you bringing back?" he wanted to know.
I'm not bringing anything back, I haven't been anywhere! I thought.
"You understand I didn't go into Mexico, right? They turned us away at the border." This is where I began to wonder about the brightest minds thing.
"Yes," he replied. "So what else are you bringing back?"
Stop saying I am bringing things back!
"No, nothing else" I said. "My dad wants to know if we can just eat these."
"You could ask the Dept. of Agriculture," he said. "We would still need to confiscate the peels. No citrus is allowed to come in that has been over to Mexico."
a) I have Not been to Mexico, and b) when was I supposed to have time to contact the Department of Agriculture? And would they really be interested in my orange situation?
We took it upon ourselves to eat the clementines as a blue-gloved woman walked over. (It turns out that she was the Dept. of Agriculture) and I was sad about the loss of three Braeburn apples, now doomed to be incinerated with the orange peels.
After a check through our vehicle, pups and parent removed, they sent us on our way to Brownsville to meet with Mario Casanova (real name - what are the chances?), the broker.
I was not going to be daunted by the grilling from the U.S. agents and the turning away by the Mexican officials. It's an adventure, I told myself. Then at about 9 p.m., after a confusing conversation with Mario at the local Burger King, a two-hour session in a hot stuffy office with an insurance agent to buy $58 of car insurance for Mexico, and another unpacking and repacking of the car to write the inventory in the way Mario instructed me, I thought I would crack.
We came back to the hotel and the dogs climbed in bed with my dad and I took a picture. He loves having them with us and they have chosen him.
"Do you think we'll run into the same problems tomorrow?" my dad asked as he fell asleep.
I laughed. It wouldn't be so good if I went into it thinking so.
Looking for a little peace and rest tonight and to have a goodnatured spirit tomorrow whatever may come. (That would be an act of God, btw.)
Believing tomorrow I will be feasting on fresh salsa en Mexico...
Susana
Monday, December 12, 2011
Susana and the Magic Bag of Chips
I don't suppose you would believe me if I told you we arrived in Harringen, Texas, with a bag of chips on the roof? And a gallon of water. I can't explain to you how this could happen again, except while I was in a 1-hour stint of copying documents at the office supply store, my dad ran out to find the International Travel Certificates for the dogs in my Pink Bag in the back seat. In his search, he placed said (and same) bag of chips on the roof, as well as a gallon of water.
We arrived at Room 120 at the Harringen La Quinta and there, to my amazement, were the very same chips riding on the roof. Again.
It's like a dream, where the same meaningless and uncanny situation repeats itself and you wake up and try to make sense of it when there's no sense to be made.
Susana and her magical bag of chips.
Contrary to rumors and facebook musings we did Not cross over into Mexico today. My dad preferred to stay the night in Harringen and cross in the morning. It's the best plan. Especially after that hour of copying and organizing Papers.
Tonight I am updating our manifest - a list of Every Single Item in our possession as we cross the border from the spare tire in the car (and the flat boxes of Quinoa that I packed under the floor with the spare tire) to the half bag of cashews sitting in the front seat.
Then I need to translate it into Spanish. ! Let's just hope bablefish doesn't create an international incident by Mistranslating one of our items, because I will be none the wiser until the customs agent looks at me sideways and tells his cohort "Tenemos problema" (We have a problem.)
Our plan has always been to cross the border at 9 am. What is another day? The pups' international papers expire tomorrow (good for 14 days), but as long as we started on our trip in the 14 day window, we are good. Unless a customs agent or federale wants to invoke his right to split hairs.
Texas today was wonderful. My dad points out all of the relay towers along the way and counts the dishes on each. He marvels over technology and knows something about everything. He laughs now at the comparative ridiculousness of hundreds of miles of telephone poles and wires. How it used to be a marvel and now it's all outdated.
I point out to him all of the pear cactus in the brush on the side of the road, but they go by too quickly for him to see. He has grown the same cactus in pots in the house my whole life. He loves all tropical vegetation - which is one reason I wanted him to come to Belize - to see it all in its natural habitat, not just his plant pots! We saw only a few oil rigs - we thought we would see many more. And my dad saw two Texas "10 gallon" hats. He may have been disappointed that not every man in Texas wears a cowboy hat.
We had our first rain on the trip today - very slight. Texas is in a drought right now, having had no substantial rain in the last year. The rain we drove through probably didn't help much.
We found another great restaurant in Harringen - La Playa Mexican Cafe. Authentic Mex without the Tex, AAA said of them. More midday happiness for good edible food!
The pups are starting to acclimate. Eli is resigned to his lot. I took a great picture of my dad and I in the front seat and between us in the back seat, Eli is sitting forlorn (as though his name were Eyore) in an actual dog pout. But he is not whining so much anymore. He knows an intolerable amount of time in the backseat is to be expected and then there will be a glorious (to dogs) hotel room of nothing but comfort and beef bones.
TOMORROW, Lord willing, we will line up at the border at 9 am, be waved in to Mexico and have minimal interaction with Federales 21 km in. This is the checkpoint where they may ask us to dump the contents of the car like a purse when you can't find your keys: every item out. Or, they could have mercy on us and simply say Thank You for Visiting Mexico even though everyone you know must have told you Not To Come.
This week of travel has been eye opening about Best Laid Plans, and elderly parents who age before your eyes in the car as you are traveling, and how you can spend 20 years honing a principle of simple living and still end up hauling so many provisions in your little station wagon that the Mexicans and the Belizeans will be right to wonder if you are honest that these are All for Personal Use. I have a feeling it's only going to become more eye opening from here!
Goodnight United States of America, Good morning Estados Unidos de Mexico!
Love,
Susana
We arrived at Room 120 at the Harringen La Quinta and there, to my amazement, were the very same chips riding on the roof. Again.
It's like a dream, where the same meaningless and uncanny situation repeats itself and you wake up and try to make sense of it when there's no sense to be made.
Susana and her magical bag of chips.
Contrary to rumors and facebook musings we did Not cross over into Mexico today. My dad preferred to stay the night in Harringen and cross in the morning. It's the best plan. Especially after that hour of copying and organizing Papers.
Tonight I am updating our manifest - a list of Every Single Item in our possession as we cross the border from the spare tire in the car (and the flat boxes of Quinoa that I packed under the floor with the spare tire) to the half bag of cashews sitting in the front seat.
Then I need to translate it into Spanish. ! Let's just hope bablefish doesn't create an international incident by Mistranslating one of our items, because I will be none the wiser until the customs agent looks at me sideways and tells his cohort "Tenemos problema" (We have a problem.)
Our plan has always been to cross the border at 9 am. What is another day? The pups' international papers expire tomorrow (good for 14 days), but as long as we started on our trip in the 14 day window, we are good. Unless a customs agent or federale wants to invoke his right to split hairs.
Texas today was wonderful. My dad points out all of the relay towers along the way and counts the dishes on each. He marvels over technology and knows something about everything. He laughs now at the comparative ridiculousness of hundreds of miles of telephone poles and wires. How it used to be a marvel and now it's all outdated.
I point out to him all of the pear cactus in the brush on the side of the road, but they go by too quickly for him to see. He has grown the same cactus in pots in the house my whole life. He loves all tropical vegetation - which is one reason I wanted him to come to Belize - to see it all in its natural habitat, not just his plant pots! We saw only a few oil rigs - we thought we would see many more. And my dad saw two Texas "10 gallon" hats. He may have been disappointed that not every man in Texas wears a cowboy hat.
We had our first rain on the trip today - very slight. Texas is in a drought right now, having had no substantial rain in the last year. The rain we drove through probably didn't help much.
We found another great restaurant in Harringen - La Playa Mexican Cafe. Authentic Mex without the Tex, AAA said of them. More midday happiness for good edible food!
The pups are starting to acclimate. Eli is resigned to his lot. I took a great picture of my dad and I in the front seat and between us in the back seat, Eli is sitting forlorn (as though his name were Eyore) in an actual dog pout. But he is not whining so much anymore. He knows an intolerable amount of time in the backseat is to be expected and then there will be a glorious (to dogs) hotel room of nothing but comfort and beef bones.
TOMORROW, Lord willing, we will line up at the border at 9 am, be waved in to Mexico and have minimal interaction with Federales 21 km in. This is the checkpoint where they may ask us to dump the contents of the car like a purse when you can't find your keys: every item out. Or, they could have mercy on us and simply say Thank You for Visiting Mexico even though everyone you know must have told you Not To Come.
This week of travel has been eye opening about Best Laid Plans, and elderly parents who age before your eyes in the car as you are traveling, and how you can spend 20 years honing a principle of simple living and still end up hauling so many provisions in your little station wagon that the Mexicans and the Belizeans will be right to wonder if you are honest that these are All for Personal Use. I have a feeling it's only going to become more eye opening from here!
Goodnight United States of America, Good morning Estados Unidos de Mexico!
Love,
Susana
We arrived in Beeville, Texas with a bag of chips on the roof of the car. It rode all the way from San Marcos (106.7 miles per my AAA trip tik app). You see, the vegguide.org does not have ideas for you in Texas. I guess there is just too much meat here. Every Texas location I asked about - including Fort Worth (surely a major city has vegetarian options even at a carnivorian place...) came up empty. "No Recommendations For Your Area." "No Recommendations For Your Area." So I defaulted to the AAA-approved restaurant choices and we happened upon Palmers of San Marcos. Hereafter known to me as the best restaurant in Texas.
We drove into Palmers, Elias yelping like the car was on fire, and Guthrie rising from his fetal position on the floor of the car, which is how he rides always, no matter where we are, now invading Eli's small amount of space on the seat. So I walked them briefly and then thought smartly, Hmm, I will put the new bag of tortilla chips on the roof, where I am sure to see it when I come back, so that while we are gone, the dogs are not feasting on them. So I put them on the roof, in plain view. I couldn't not see them when I came back to the car. Unless it was dark out.
It was dark out. So, there they rode, an open bag of chips in an Albertson's plastic bag with a large-numbered alarm clock Also purchased at Albertson's.
It's like carrying a pitcher of water on your head that you don't spill because you don't think about it. Ok, that's not possible, but neither is this. Surely if I had been driving with chips on the roof intentionally, the bag would have blown off and exploded against the windshield of a semi and caused some 7 car pile up."27 Injured in Rogue Tortilla Chip Incident" or "Let the Chips Fall Where They May..." the Bee Examiner would have read the next morning.
So Palmer's is the best restaurant in Texas. Not the heavy fried southern food you have heard about but a gourmet delight. Melvin made tableside guacamole for us as good as my own :-) and the vegetarian tortilla soup left me wishing I'd ordered a cup not a bowl. Then I had pecan-encrusted salmon with lime coulis and steamed vegetables. It was all I could have hoped for. Dad was happy too. His verdict: He would do it again. (This is my litmus test for whether he really enjoyed something or is just not complaining, because you can't always tell with him. Though last night, he was clear. "The sooner I forget this meal the better," he said of Applebees. (Where, you remember, he was so inclined to go.)
"Don't finish it if you don't like it," I had suggested.
"Well it's still food," he had said and finished every bit of his Applebee's bland chicken fettucini.
A generation that will eat bad food rather than waste it for palate considerations alone. That's something to consider...
We could have gotten to the border today but instead we went spelunking. Inner Space Caverns was right off the highway, or, technically, under the highway. It was found in 1963 when the state was test drilling through rock to check the stability of the land to build Hwy 35. In 10 places they drilled down and hit air pockets, and in one instance they lost their drill bit. Not wanting to lose the equipment, they lowered a guy named Jackson, I think, down a 2-foot Wide and 50-foot deep hole, tied to the end of a drill bit (?!) to retrieve the lost drill. It was probably not so good to be Jackson that day at first, until he dropped to the ground inside a chain of remarkable caves thousands of years old with stalactites and stalagmites, guano of a long-extinct variety of football-sized bats, and remains of other extinct animals who in their day fell through the sink hole on the surface and could not survive the tumble. Then I suppose Jackson was the man for the big discovery.
So we had a spelunking adventure and here we are now, some two hours from the border. I love Beeville, Texas, mostly because of the name, and that it is situated in Bee County, as is Bee River. It's all about bees. And, a small bee-sized town does not usually have an art museum, but Beeville does. Though I won't have a chance to see it. I am headed for Belize.
Our observation about Texas is about their highway ramps. They are elevated into the sky. My dad calls the interchanges Gordian Knots. They are loop upon loop of concrete on pillars two and three stories high circling in and around each other for some utilitarian purpose that could not have been met on the ground. They remind him of the Knot that Sir Galahad (or Alexander the Great?) confronted that could not be undone (except with a bold slash of his sword).
We did not drive in the sky on the Gordian knots, we mostly drove under them. We saw the skyline of Austin. I liked Austin (we did not stop). And having stopped in San Marcos for the best restaurant in Texas, we parted ways then with Interstate 35, which has seen us through most of the U.S. It has been all two-lane Texas highway from there - Highway 123 out of San Marcos, on to 181 to Beeville and tomorrow to unexplored places along Highway 77.
At last we will arrive in Brownsville and cross over into Mexico. We will probably not arrive in Belize til next weekend, since it seems that neither of us has a propensity for driving 9 hours a day. I don't know what our computer access will be in Mexico, but I'll check in as I am able with stories from The Tropics and you surely will know when we have made it to Belize.
God is blessing every turn of our trip. Tonight we have a hotel room with one door that goes to breakfast and another door that goes out to our car, where we can tie the dogs and keep an eye on our car top goods (besides the chips). We've had no car trouble at all and we both have had plenty of sleep and plenty of energy for the adventure. The melatonin has helped Eli not to whine, though he pants and paces like a regular dog, which he does not usually do. Guthrie keeps his feelings inside. There's no telling if he is upset; he has a forlorn hound disposition at all times.
It is morning now. We have had our Texas-shaped waffles (with butter and maple syrup I smuggled in) and are retying the car...heading for the border.
More soon from the other side!
love,
Susan
We drove into Palmers, Elias yelping like the car was on fire, and Guthrie rising from his fetal position on the floor of the car, which is how he rides always, no matter where we are, now invading Eli's small amount of space on the seat. So I walked them briefly and then thought smartly, Hmm, I will put the new bag of tortilla chips on the roof, where I am sure to see it when I come back, so that while we are gone, the dogs are not feasting on them. So I put them on the roof, in plain view. I couldn't not see them when I came back to the car. Unless it was dark out.
It was dark out. So, there they rode, an open bag of chips in an Albertson's plastic bag with a large-numbered alarm clock Also purchased at Albertson's.
It's like carrying a pitcher of water on your head that you don't spill because you don't think about it. Ok, that's not possible, but neither is this. Surely if I had been driving with chips on the roof intentionally, the bag would have blown off and exploded against the windshield of a semi and caused some 7 car pile up."27 Injured in Rogue Tortilla Chip Incident" or "Let the Chips Fall Where They May..." the Bee Examiner would have read the next morning.
So Palmer's is the best restaurant in Texas. Not the heavy fried southern food you have heard about but a gourmet delight. Melvin made tableside guacamole for us as good as my own :-) and the vegetarian tortilla soup left me wishing I'd ordered a cup not a bowl. Then I had pecan-encrusted salmon with lime coulis and steamed vegetables. It was all I could have hoped for. Dad was happy too. His verdict: He would do it again. (This is my litmus test for whether he really enjoyed something or is just not complaining, because you can't always tell with him. Though last night, he was clear. "The sooner I forget this meal the better," he said of Applebees. (Where, you remember, he was so inclined to go.)
"Don't finish it if you don't like it," I had suggested.
"Well it's still food," he had said and finished every bit of his Applebee's bland chicken fettucini.
A generation that will eat bad food rather than waste it for palate considerations alone. That's something to consider...
We could have gotten to the border today but instead we went spelunking. Inner Space Caverns was right off the highway, or, technically, under the highway. It was found in 1963 when the state was test drilling through rock to check the stability of the land to build Hwy 35. In 10 places they drilled down and hit air pockets, and in one instance they lost their drill bit. Not wanting to lose the equipment, they lowered a guy named Jackson, I think, down a 2-foot Wide and 50-foot deep hole, tied to the end of a drill bit (?!) to retrieve the lost drill. It was probably not so good to be Jackson that day at first, until he dropped to the ground inside a chain of remarkable caves thousands of years old with stalactites and stalagmites, guano of a long-extinct variety of football-sized bats, and remains of other extinct animals who in their day fell through the sink hole on the surface and could not survive the tumble. Then I suppose Jackson was the man for the big discovery.
So we had a spelunking adventure and here we are now, some two hours from the border. I love Beeville, Texas, mostly because of the name, and that it is situated in Bee County, as is Bee River. It's all about bees. And, a small bee-sized town does not usually have an art museum, but Beeville does. Though I won't have a chance to see it. I am headed for Belize.
Our observation about Texas is about their highway ramps. They are elevated into the sky. My dad calls the interchanges Gordian Knots. They are loop upon loop of concrete on pillars two and three stories high circling in and around each other for some utilitarian purpose that could not have been met on the ground. They remind him of the Knot that Sir Galahad (or Alexander the Great?) confronted that could not be undone (except with a bold slash of his sword).
We did not drive in the sky on the Gordian knots, we mostly drove under them. We saw the skyline of Austin. I liked Austin (we did not stop). And having stopped in San Marcos for the best restaurant in Texas, we parted ways then with Interstate 35, which has seen us through most of the U.S. It has been all two-lane Texas highway from there - Highway 123 out of San Marcos, on to 181 to Beeville and tomorrow to unexplored places along Highway 77.
At last we will arrive in Brownsville and cross over into Mexico. We will probably not arrive in Belize til next weekend, since it seems that neither of us has a propensity for driving 9 hours a day. I don't know what our computer access will be in Mexico, but I'll check in as I am able with stories from The Tropics and you surely will know when we have made it to Belize.
God is blessing every turn of our trip. Tonight we have a hotel room with one door that goes to breakfast and another door that goes out to our car, where we can tie the dogs and keep an eye on our car top goods (besides the chips). We've had no car trouble at all and we both have had plenty of sleep and plenty of energy for the adventure. The melatonin has helped Eli not to whine, though he pants and paces like a regular dog, which he does not usually do. Guthrie keeps his feelings inside. There's no telling if he is upset; he has a forlorn hound disposition at all times.
It is morning now. We have had our Texas-shaped waffles (with butter and maple syrup I smuggled in) and are retying the car...heading for the border.
More soon from the other side!
love,
Susan
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Toward the Border!
We drove through all of the open acres of Kansas today. In this wintertime everything is shades of...tan. Vast stretches of brown land without a tree at all. And then a house with a stand of bare brown trees nearby. In the summer it would be a different sight. Today it is plain after neutral tone plain as far as the eye can see (which is far). Perhaps this is why they call them "plains."
I expected Oklahoma to be the same, but it was not. Oklahoma had hills and slopes of land and small manageable chunks of pasture fenced. And Oklahoma has trees and whole woods. And the occasional pond or river. Oklahoma also has Guthrie.
We pulled off the road from our beeline for the border to pose by the green highway sign marking Guthrie, Oklahoma. Then my dad and the pups posed by the Welcome to Historic Guthrie, more elaborate, sign stating that this is the Garden City (or town). If there are rabbits in those gardens, it is aptly named. Now we just need to find an Eli town and I will feel I've been fair about things to the dogs.
My dad kept mentioning Applebees today. When we stopped for the night in Fort Worth Texas (Yes, indeed, we made it to Texas! That's no mere inch on the map!) our LaQuinta Inn (dogs stay free!) was next door to an IHOP. I mentioned that we get 20% off there, with our room key. So my dad asked if we were going to use our room card for supper at Applebees.
IHOP, I corrected. I think all they have is pancakes, let's go there for breakfast.
The hotel desk clerk suggested Olive Garden and told us how to get there. So we headed for Olive Garden.
"Are we looking for Applebees?" my dad wondered as we were driving.
"Olive Garden, Dad, she told us about Olive Garden." And I pulled of the highway to the place I thought she told me it was.
"Is this where Applebees is?" he wondered.
"No," I laughed. "We're looking for Olive Garden. It's after Don Pablo's...I don't know where any Applebee's is."
But we found no Olive Garden, no Don Pablos. We were somehow in the wrong area. There was only a mall, a mattress store and...an Applebees.
Maybe he somehow knew.
Tomorrow we head for the Border. Away from the cold of even Texas (where it is 45 and we are wearing our coats!) It hasn't sunk in yet for me that this is a Tropical excursion. But when the language changes and the climate changes and we see Color in the landscape...then we will realize We Are Going to Belize!!!
Toward the border!
Susana
I expected Oklahoma to be the same, but it was not. Oklahoma had hills and slopes of land and small manageable chunks of pasture fenced. And Oklahoma has trees and whole woods. And the occasional pond or river. Oklahoma also has Guthrie.
We pulled off the road from our beeline for the border to pose by the green highway sign marking Guthrie, Oklahoma. Then my dad and the pups posed by the Welcome to Historic Guthrie, more elaborate, sign stating that this is the Garden City (or town). If there are rabbits in those gardens, it is aptly named. Now we just need to find an Eli town and I will feel I've been fair about things to the dogs.
My dad kept mentioning Applebees today. When we stopped for the night in Fort Worth Texas (Yes, indeed, we made it to Texas! That's no mere inch on the map!) our LaQuinta Inn (dogs stay free!) was next door to an IHOP. I mentioned that we get 20% off there, with our room key. So my dad asked if we were going to use our room card for supper at Applebees.
IHOP, I corrected. I think all they have is pancakes, let's go there for breakfast.
The hotel desk clerk suggested Olive Garden and told us how to get there. So we headed for Olive Garden.
"Are we looking for Applebees?" my dad wondered as we were driving.
"Olive Garden, Dad, she told us about Olive Garden." And I pulled of the highway to the place I thought she told me it was.
"Is this where Applebees is?" he wondered.
"No," I laughed. "We're looking for Olive Garden. It's after Don Pablo's...I don't know where any Applebee's is."
But we found no Olive Garden, no Don Pablos. We were somehow in the wrong area. There was only a mall, a mattress store and...an Applebees.
Maybe he somehow knew.
Tomorrow we head for the Border. Away from the cold of even Texas (where it is 45 and we are wearing our coats!) It hasn't sunk in yet for me that this is a Tropical excursion. But when the language changes and the climate changes and we see Color in the landscape...then we will realize We Are Going to Belize!!!
Toward the border!
Susana
Friday, December 9, 2011
An Inch on the Map
I walked Eli the hound down the hallway of the Super 8 Motel on the seedy side of Wichita and let him sniff at each door. They say that the way dogs use their olfactories is how we use our eyes - we look around to get our bearings. They sniff around to get their bearings. Poor Elias is traumatized by this car trip. He has very little room in the car and is utterly alarmed that we and a portion of our worldly goods are fleeing (kind of a slow-motion fleeing) for parts unknown. He doesn't like change. (He used to get frantic when I would move his crate in the kitchen to mop underneath it. He would also get frantic if his dog blanket was rumpled in the least. Nice and smooth is best. Guthrie was the opposite, he would twirl his up, or sometimes Eli's. Thus the frantic-isms on Eli's part.)
So I let him sniff at doors. In dog sense, it seems only fair to be able to smell the neighbors on his way outside. Sniff, sniff, blow, at the righthand corner of the door. Sniff, sniff, blow at the other corner. And the muffled conversation in Room 101 stopped short. Suddenly, I realized that the occupants of all of these rooms we'd been sniffing could possibly hear the sniff, sniff, blow. (Especially the blow, which is short and abrupt and could, to an untrained ear, sound like a snort of disbelief.) I don't know if the family in Room 101 had any idea who or what was doing the sniffing. But they knew they had been sniffed. I stifled a laugh and exited with Eli out the nearby side door before there was time for inquiry.
It's been a long few days. As though we've been driving through molasses. We are, proudly, in Wichita, Kansas, a mere 700 some miles from home, having taken three days to accomplish a little more than one day's worth of driving. One of our high points comes every time we return to the car and the tubs are still strapped to the car top rails. It makes us happy that no one has stolen our stuff. Another high point (for me) is that there's a website vegguide.org that tells me vegetarian-friendly food options in every city. This is a big deal for my very difficult diet. As my dad said yesterday, after I returned to the buffet at India Palace in Ames Iowa for the Third time, when you find something you can eat, you better "load up." Indeed.
My dad and I have become Proficient at using all of the GPS-type apps on my iPad. We find our destinations, our hotels, our meals, and - very important for everyone's peace of mind - local dog parks, wending our way through cities using these tools. Amazing. They always know where we are. So when we left Winstead's Diner (Proudly serving Kansas City for 70 years) and Easily found the best dog park on earth for the pups to run briefly and my dad realized his wallet was missing, we could GPS our way back to the diner where no wallet had been turned in and ID, a medical card, and $100 some dollars were in the wind. Ah well. They were all replacement cards. My dad's first wallet for the trip was lost in Eau Claire.
"I'm setting some kind of record for number of cities for losing wallets," he commented.
It's all good. Frankly I'm glad it's gone. It was a stress to worry that he might lose his wallet. Now it's done I'm sorry about the $100 but it's a small price to pay for less worry, I decided.
So I come back to the room from Eli's sniffing escapade and Dad is sitting on the bed in his undershirt.
"Something else happened," he said.
"Oh? What is that?" I asked.
"I can't find my money belt." The traveller's belt worn under your clothes to keep your cash and passport hidden.
Wha? I looked up in alarm only to see the black money belt hanging around his neck, under his undershirt.
"It's right there!" I say.
"That's $800 gone," he replies in distress.
"Dad, it's around your neck," I say.
"What?"
"You hung it around your neck!"
And I laugh. He scared me.
There's really a lot to remember when you are remembering for two.
My knee, which I twisted painfully last night when Eli flung me to the pavement in the parking lot at the La Quinta Inn Kansas City, in a fast move with his leash, while I was carrying in baggage, is better today. I am favoring it, but all is well. And it made me have to stop and think. Why are so many things going wrong?! (When I am trying so hard, is the implication.) And when I finally ask the question, the answer is usually: because you're trying too hard. LIfe with God as my travel agent (and provider and source of Peace and everything good) means trusting Him and letting go of My Vision for What Should Happen, and knowing that my circumstances are in His hands. Don't fret over luggage or timetables or wallet absconders. Circumstances are not circumstantial. There's intricate purpose in the way things fall together (or they don't) and it always is for the best for me, however hard, (and most difficult to see that when I am Impeding it with all my might as I sometimes do). For all I know, there's a guy on duty at the border who would have it in for us but he's off on Sunday or Monday or whenever we'll be passing through now, and we will never know what calamities we circumvented by living out Plan B instead of Plan A. We will never know. Except we do know - not the specifics, but that every good and perfect gift comes down from the Father of heavenly lights, that He knows each time a sparrow falls and how much more does He care for and give good gifts to His children than to sparrows. (I'm mixing verses.) He carries out good on my behalf. Not because of me but because it brings Him glory and He is all about His glory. So, when I, too, am all about His Glory and His plan and relinquishing my inclination to Control Circumstances, leaving them in His hands, and roll with the punches and twisted knees of life, even my little speck of a short existence on earth shines out a little glory of God. Oh to keep this in mind when the melatonin doesn't work on Eli who is frantic in the back seat, wanting to get out of the car, and I am looking to see if this is our exit, and my dad is wondering where the CD of the "Cathedral Singers Male Quartet" (which my mom did not send with us) is. That's a good time to remember: Hold Plan A loosely. Plans B through Z are great.
(This is the first trip I've wondered if I might even make it to a plan Z!)
Praying for a little more than an inch on the map tomorrow, but good with however it goes!
Love and Adoration,
Susana buscando Belize
(Susan in search of Belize)
So I let him sniff at doors. In dog sense, it seems only fair to be able to smell the neighbors on his way outside. Sniff, sniff, blow, at the righthand corner of the door. Sniff, sniff, blow at the other corner. And the muffled conversation in Room 101 stopped short. Suddenly, I realized that the occupants of all of these rooms we'd been sniffing could possibly hear the sniff, sniff, blow. (Especially the blow, which is short and abrupt and could, to an untrained ear, sound like a snort of disbelief.) I don't know if the family in Room 101 had any idea who or what was doing the sniffing. But they knew they had been sniffed. I stifled a laugh and exited with Eli out the nearby side door before there was time for inquiry.
It's been a long few days. As though we've been driving through molasses. We are, proudly, in Wichita, Kansas, a mere 700 some miles from home, having taken three days to accomplish a little more than one day's worth of driving. One of our high points comes every time we return to the car and the tubs are still strapped to the car top rails. It makes us happy that no one has stolen our stuff. Another high point (for me) is that there's a website vegguide.org that tells me vegetarian-friendly food options in every city. This is a big deal for my very difficult diet. As my dad said yesterday, after I returned to the buffet at India Palace in Ames Iowa for the Third time, when you find something you can eat, you better "load up." Indeed.
My dad and I have become Proficient at using all of the GPS-type apps on my iPad. We find our destinations, our hotels, our meals, and - very important for everyone's peace of mind - local dog parks, wending our way through cities using these tools. Amazing. They always know where we are. So when we left Winstead's Diner (Proudly serving Kansas City for 70 years) and Easily found the best dog park on earth for the pups to run briefly and my dad realized his wallet was missing, we could GPS our way back to the diner where no wallet had been turned in and ID, a medical card, and $100 some dollars were in the wind. Ah well. They were all replacement cards. My dad's first wallet for the trip was lost in Eau Claire.
"I'm setting some kind of record for number of cities for losing wallets," he commented.
It's all good. Frankly I'm glad it's gone. It was a stress to worry that he might lose his wallet. Now it's done I'm sorry about the $100 but it's a small price to pay for less worry, I decided.
So I come back to the room from Eli's sniffing escapade and Dad is sitting on the bed in his undershirt.
"Something else happened," he said.
"Oh? What is that?" I asked.
"I can't find my money belt." The traveller's belt worn under your clothes to keep your cash and passport hidden.
Wha? I looked up in alarm only to see the black money belt hanging around his neck, under his undershirt.
"It's right there!" I say.
"That's $800 gone," he replies in distress.
"Dad, it's around your neck," I say.
"What?"
"You hung it around your neck!"
And I laugh. He scared me.
There's really a lot to remember when you are remembering for two.
My knee, which I twisted painfully last night when Eli flung me to the pavement in the parking lot at the La Quinta Inn Kansas City, in a fast move with his leash, while I was carrying in baggage, is better today. I am favoring it, but all is well. And it made me have to stop and think. Why are so many things going wrong?! (When I am trying so hard, is the implication.) And when I finally ask the question, the answer is usually: because you're trying too hard. LIfe with God as my travel agent (and provider and source of Peace and everything good) means trusting Him and letting go of My Vision for What Should Happen, and knowing that my circumstances are in His hands. Don't fret over luggage or timetables or wallet absconders. Circumstances are not circumstantial. There's intricate purpose in the way things fall together (or they don't) and it always is for the best for me, however hard, (and most difficult to see that when I am Impeding it with all my might as I sometimes do). For all I know, there's a guy on duty at the border who would have it in for us but he's off on Sunday or Monday or whenever we'll be passing through now, and we will never know what calamities we circumvented by living out Plan B instead of Plan A. We will never know. Except we do know - not the specifics, but that every good and perfect gift comes down from the Father of heavenly lights, that He knows each time a sparrow falls and how much more does He care for and give good gifts to His children than to sparrows. (I'm mixing verses.) He carries out good on my behalf. Not because of me but because it brings Him glory and He is all about His glory. So, when I, too, am all about His Glory and His plan and relinquishing my inclination to Control Circumstances, leaving them in His hands, and roll with the punches and twisted knees of life, even my little speck of a short existence on earth shines out a little glory of God. Oh to keep this in mind when the melatonin doesn't work on Eli who is frantic in the back seat, wanting to get out of the car, and I am looking to see if this is our exit, and my dad is wondering where the CD of the "Cathedral Singers Male Quartet" (which my mom did not send with us) is. That's a good time to remember: Hold Plan A loosely. Plans B through Z are great.
(This is the first trip I've wondered if I might even make it to a plan Z!)
Praying for a little more than an inch on the map tomorrow, but good with however it goes!
Love and Adoration,
Susana buscando Belize
(Susan in search of Belize)
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Bound For Belize - Day 1
Things did not start out as we expected. It's one thing to pack. It's another to Pack a Vehicle. Oh my, pack and repack, and leave out the three, three-gallon water bottles that were going to last us through Mexico. The whole matter of packing and strapping down the cartop is really a special skill I did not prepare for. Was there a class I could have taken? After possibly five stops and attempts to squelch the loud thwaping, I learned that quiet seems quieter than usual after noise stops.
We left the house around noon and stopped for lunch with Mom (and for me to organize Maps and Important Documents). At that time, my mom lobbied for Beltashazzar the cat to stay with her instead of traveling to his namesake of Belize (he has long been called "Bellie Belize" even before I knew where Belize was). She, my mom, had a sudden and intolerable invasion of mice at the house, out in the country, and traps were not sufficing. To my own surprise, I agreed. Bellie stayed with her to continue to carry out his real calling. One of the stresses of driving was going to be the number of times we would be in and out of the car. The dogs were one thing, and no small task to catch if escaped, but Bellie is a little bolt of lightening when he decides to be. He is not catchable. He believes himself to be a wildcat.
So, we left the cat. Last I heard Bellie was in the garage, too scared to go into the house. Or too busy catching dinner. Now two pets, not three, are going Belizeward.
We drove through the beautiful rolling hills of western Wisconsin and across the "mighty Mississippi" river, as my dad would say. Then across flat plains of Minnesota, passing the town of Austin, the worldwide headquarters of Spam, the unidentifiable meat product in a can (not to be confused with the electronic junk mail that stole the name.) You know you're near because of the big billboard "Meat historians, Rejoice! Spam Museum, Austin, Minn." it says. It's in huge print so you have multiple opportunities to read it as you approach. Is it a typo? "Meet historians," the editor asks. If not, what are "meat historians"? Oh, Spam. Those crazy Spam people. What could possibly be in a Spam museum? It's effective marketing - evidenced by the paragraph I just spent telling you about it.
So we stopped further down the road in Albert Lea for the night. Not much of a dent in our 3000 mile trip, but enough for what the day was. I went for a swim in the pool and came back to find all three of the others asleep. Guthrie and Eli curled up on the bed with my dad! As I write, all three are happily snoring on that side of the room. Guthrie takes the prize for volume. :-)
Goodnight my friends! Tomorrow we conquer the highways of Iowa and beyond.
Blessings!
Susan(a)
We left the house around noon and stopped for lunch with Mom (and for me to organize Maps and Important Documents). At that time, my mom lobbied for Beltashazzar the cat to stay with her instead of traveling to his namesake of Belize (he has long been called "Bellie Belize" even before I knew where Belize was). She, my mom, had a sudden and intolerable invasion of mice at the house, out in the country, and traps were not sufficing. To my own surprise, I agreed. Bellie stayed with her to continue to carry out his real calling. One of the stresses of driving was going to be the number of times we would be in and out of the car. The dogs were one thing, and no small task to catch if escaped, but Bellie is a little bolt of lightening when he decides to be. He is not catchable. He believes himself to be a wildcat.
So, we left the cat. Last I heard Bellie was in the garage, too scared to go into the house. Or too busy catching dinner. Now two pets, not three, are going Belizeward.
We drove through the beautiful rolling hills of western Wisconsin and across the "mighty Mississippi" river, as my dad would say. Then across flat plains of Minnesota, passing the town of Austin, the worldwide headquarters of Spam, the unidentifiable meat product in a can (not to be confused with the electronic junk mail that stole the name.) You know you're near because of the big billboard "Meat historians, Rejoice! Spam Museum, Austin, Minn." it says. It's in huge print so you have multiple opportunities to read it as you approach. Is it a typo? "Meet historians," the editor asks. If not, what are "meat historians"? Oh, Spam. Those crazy Spam people. What could possibly be in a Spam museum? It's effective marketing - evidenced by the paragraph I just spent telling you about it.
So we stopped further down the road in Albert Lea for the night. Not much of a dent in our 3000 mile trip, but enough for what the day was. I went for a swim in the pool and came back to find all three of the others asleep. Guthrie and Eli curled up on the bed with my dad! As I write, all three are happily snoring on that side of the room. Guthrie takes the prize for volume. :-)
Goodnight my friends! Tomorrow we conquer the highways of Iowa and beyond.
Blessings!
Susan(a)
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Subarus, Cup-Holders, Tiredness, and Rest.
I came back to the U.S. with the most imperceptible of tans that only God and I could see, probably, and here I am, two months later, back to my translucent pallor. Oh, it's time to get back to the sun! (For the power of Vitamin D, you understand, and whatever healthy sheen is its byproduct.)
December 3 is the day. My dad and I will load up the dogs and cat and a wealth of healthy car snacks and head for Belize. We are taking the Subaru.
I have wanted a Subaru for awhile. They are handy cars with all-wheel drive. We have a family lot that is mostly vertical land leading down to a swampy lake and wetlands that is my favorite place on earth. The asphalt laid sometime before I was born has long since chunked up and deteriorated. Even if blacktop remains under there somewhere, the years upon years of decomposed leaves on top of it make traction in any other car I've driven just unlikely. Especially if it is at all moist. So I have talked to my dad about getting a Subaru. Then we went out for our annual Veteran's Day breakfast and decided to test drive Subarus. We found one in need of work and half the price of any we tested from dealers. It has leather seats (very good for porting pets), the aforementioned all-wheel-drive (suited not only to the leaf bed at the lake but also the rocky and unpredictable backroads of Belize), and some nice amenities. (The key fob, for instance, can turn on the car. Which I didn't know til yesterday when I took the dogs out of the car and walked to the house, gripping seven things at once in my hand and - viola - the car started behind me. And I started.)
("What?" I asked the neighborhood. And I tried every button on the fobs (there are two of them) to turn it back off. It would not comply. Even when I put the key back into the ignition (having dumped the dogs and my six other in-hand items inside the basement door) and tried to turn it off, the car was electronically predetermined to be On and would not turn Off. I put it in gear and drove forward, and then the key in the ignition trumped any previous orders and the car turned off and sat quietly in my driveway til morning.)
And, there was also a broken cup-holder (passenger side). The seller had a line up of people interested in the car. It is hard to snag a used Subaru in Eau Claire. I have tried, and they are always gone before I can even test drive them. But we had gotten there first this time.
I liked the models of this car we had driven before (an Outback) but (as a non-mechanical person) didn't know about all of the work it needed. Because of that, I wasn't sure enough about this car to sell my little Mazda for it. That was my litmus test. But as we sat there in the owner's shop, asphyxiating with the previous weeks' cigarette smoke still hanging in the air of the shop, my dad was sure.
"Really?" I said.
It seemed a little rash to buy a car on the spot. Especially because there was another family test driving it now. I didn't want to buy something just because someone else might get it. And how would I know how much that motivated my decision? What about the repair work it needed? It would be sold As Is. But maybe it was better to fix everything on our watch and know it was fixed than to Assume all was well with a pre-fixed dealer's car and end up needing, say, a timing belt in Tampico, Mexico, or in Santa Elena, Belize (where duct tape is one of the main repair tools in every mechanic's shop. Very resourceful mechanics when parts are in short supply). But, as mentioned, my dad was sure.
"The only thing between us and that car is a broken cupholder," my dad replied.
I laughed. The cupholder was the deal breaker, then. Surely that could be fixed.
"Ok," I said. And we bought it and we had the axles replaced and we had the headgaskets (and timing belt and fluids and what-have-you) replaced and we had the Cupholder Fixed. We now have a resilient little Subaru Outback to traverse the roads of Belize.
My living room is laid out with all of the things we Might Take. A car allows you a lot more space than a few suitcases on the plane. But it's still not limitless space. Especially when you need room for two hounds and their cat and provisions for each. So the next week of my time will be winnowing down the piles into things we Will Actually Take.
This, and sleep, is all I am doing. I've been amazingly exhausted since I returned to the U.S. I knew it would be taxing, right at the time I am supposed to be mellow and peaceful and fostering Healing in every way. But this fatigue is so extreme that I went and had my blood checked for iron or thyroid problems. Or lyme's disease (which has run rampant in my family in the last year). The doctor was delighted to report that all of my numbers were excellent. I was not as delighted. As I have said, it's easier to deal with something clear cut: like take more iron. If all of my numbers are fine then why am I sleeping sometimes 10 hours at night and then five more during the day?
"I don't know," he said. (Helpful.) He thought I'd have to launch into very expensive tests to find out. And to do that, I'd need to go to an oncologist, in case it was related to melanoma. Well, that's the medical paradigm, which I have decided not to take. (For now.) So I decided to try to be ever-more rigorous with my program. It's so hard to follow. It's hard for me to even take the supplements I'm supposed to take. Nevermind the crazy restrictive diet. The only way I have gained 10 (needed) pounds back since I came home is from bending the rules. Occassional fish. A pound of nuts while I watch TV online on Hulu. But I was uncomfortably thin. I felt Frail and Bony. And I guess I am too vain to want to be frail and bony. It looks old on you.
So I started taking protein powder. At first I thought it helped a lot. I had two weeks of regular energy. Then I slept from 3 pm on Sunday til 8 am on Monday with only a short time awake to blearily eat two pounds of steamed vegetables (I may exaggerate) and go back to sleep. The good thing is that after such copious amounts of sleep, I feel fine, not tired. And I might have good energy for three days. In my lifestyle of 10 years ago, I would have pressed through. Made myself function. Drunk lots of caffeine to do so. And ignored my body crying "Sleep!" (Maybe that's why I'm in this situation now.) So, whatever I seem to need, I am doing. Some nights that is to sleep 13 hours and some days that is to eat every fruit and vegetable in sight. Amazing amounts of produce you could never imagine I could consume. All day long. As though I were a bear and my life's work was only to feed myself. It seems ridiculous, but it's working out. I'm also keeping up on the protein powder. How on earth does any vegan get enough protein? I just don't see how it's possible. I can eat tons of beans and nuts and it's just not enough.
I'm very aware that all of the tiredness might not be nutritional or even physical, it might be emotional. And then I guess the solution is to rest, too. Both kinds of rest. Resting in Bed. Resting in my Maker. Leaning on Him because He is not mystified by iron or thyroid or protein or Lyme's disease, and not by melanoma. He knows exactly what I need and He promises to provide when I am leaning (resting) on Him. (Proverbs 3.5, and all of Luke 12:22-34 and so many other places...)
So if you pray for me, pray for safety crossing through Mexico for us, especially on the morning of December 6. I think the dogs will make quite a spectacle of any banditos that have their eye on our cartop cargo. The only real danger is getting through the border and about 30 minutes in. After that, it's probably as safe to drive in Mexico as in the U.S., all things considered. And pray that I will know how to rest in all ways and restore this body to health and life. Pray that this will be, as we imagine, the trip of a lifetime for my dad and I, and my mom who will join us in Belize in January. (And all of you who have a free place to stay in the tropics as soon as we find one!) And pray for my brave parents who at 76 (mom) and 89 (dad) are venturing into the unknown!
Bless you for reading again! Sorry I've taken so long to update you. (I've been sleeping). I hope to be able to post more often from the road when we stop every night on this 3,000 mile trek!
Love and inexpressible adoration,
Susan
December 3 is the day. My dad and I will load up the dogs and cat and a wealth of healthy car snacks and head for Belize. We are taking the Subaru.
I have wanted a Subaru for awhile. They are handy cars with all-wheel drive. We have a family lot that is mostly vertical land leading down to a swampy lake and wetlands that is my favorite place on earth. The asphalt laid sometime before I was born has long since chunked up and deteriorated. Even if blacktop remains under there somewhere, the years upon years of decomposed leaves on top of it make traction in any other car I've driven just unlikely. Especially if it is at all moist. So I have talked to my dad about getting a Subaru. Then we went out for our annual Veteran's Day breakfast and decided to test drive Subarus. We found one in need of work and half the price of any we tested from dealers. It has leather seats (very good for porting pets), the aforementioned all-wheel-drive (suited not only to the leaf bed at the lake but also the rocky and unpredictable backroads of Belize), and some nice amenities. (The key fob, for instance, can turn on the car. Which I didn't know til yesterday when I took the dogs out of the car and walked to the house, gripping seven things at once in my hand and - viola - the car started behind me. And I started.)
("What?" I asked the neighborhood. And I tried every button on the fobs (there are two of them) to turn it back off. It would not comply. Even when I put the key back into the ignition (having dumped the dogs and my six other in-hand items inside the basement door) and tried to turn it off, the car was electronically predetermined to be On and would not turn Off. I put it in gear and drove forward, and then the key in the ignition trumped any previous orders and the car turned off and sat quietly in my driveway til morning.)
And, there was also a broken cup-holder (passenger side). The seller had a line up of people interested in the car. It is hard to snag a used Subaru in Eau Claire. I have tried, and they are always gone before I can even test drive them. But we had gotten there first this time.
I liked the models of this car we had driven before (an Outback) but (as a non-mechanical person) didn't know about all of the work it needed. Because of that, I wasn't sure enough about this car to sell my little Mazda for it. That was my litmus test. But as we sat there in the owner's shop, asphyxiating with the previous weeks' cigarette smoke still hanging in the air of the shop, my dad was sure.
"Really?" I said.
It seemed a little rash to buy a car on the spot. Especially because there was another family test driving it now. I didn't want to buy something just because someone else might get it. And how would I know how much that motivated my decision? What about the repair work it needed? It would be sold As Is. But maybe it was better to fix everything on our watch and know it was fixed than to Assume all was well with a pre-fixed dealer's car and end up needing, say, a timing belt in Tampico, Mexico, or in Santa Elena, Belize (where duct tape is one of the main repair tools in every mechanic's shop. Very resourceful mechanics when parts are in short supply). But, as mentioned, my dad was sure.
"The only thing between us and that car is a broken cupholder," my dad replied.
I laughed. The cupholder was the deal breaker, then. Surely that could be fixed.
"Ok," I said. And we bought it and we had the axles replaced and we had the headgaskets (and timing belt and fluids and what-have-you) replaced and we had the Cupholder Fixed. We now have a resilient little Subaru Outback to traverse the roads of Belize.
My living room is laid out with all of the things we Might Take. A car allows you a lot more space than a few suitcases on the plane. But it's still not limitless space. Especially when you need room for two hounds and their cat and provisions for each. So the next week of my time will be winnowing down the piles into things we Will Actually Take.
This, and sleep, is all I am doing. I've been amazingly exhausted since I returned to the U.S. I knew it would be taxing, right at the time I am supposed to be mellow and peaceful and fostering Healing in every way. But this fatigue is so extreme that I went and had my blood checked for iron or thyroid problems. Or lyme's disease (which has run rampant in my family in the last year). The doctor was delighted to report that all of my numbers were excellent. I was not as delighted. As I have said, it's easier to deal with something clear cut: like take more iron. If all of my numbers are fine then why am I sleeping sometimes 10 hours at night and then five more during the day?
"I don't know," he said. (Helpful.) He thought I'd have to launch into very expensive tests to find out. And to do that, I'd need to go to an oncologist, in case it was related to melanoma. Well, that's the medical paradigm, which I have decided not to take. (For now.) So I decided to try to be ever-more rigorous with my program. It's so hard to follow. It's hard for me to even take the supplements I'm supposed to take. Nevermind the crazy restrictive diet. The only way I have gained 10 (needed) pounds back since I came home is from bending the rules. Occassional fish. A pound of nuts while I watch TV online on Hulu. But I was uncomfortably thin. I felt Frail and Bony. And I guess I am too vain to want to be frail and bony. It looks old on you.
So I started taking protein powder. At first I thought it helped a lot. I had two weeks of regular energy. Then I slept from 3 pm on Sunday til 8 am on Monday with only a short time awake to blearily eat two pounds of steamed vegetables (I may exaggerate) and go back to sleep. The good thing is that after such copious amounts of sleep, I feel fine, not tired. And I might have good energy for three days. In my lifestyle of 10 years ago, I would have pressed through. Made myself function. Drunk lots of caffeine to do so. And ignored my body crying "Sleep!" (Maybe that's why I'm in this situation now.) So, whatever I seem to need, I am doing. Some nights that is to sleep 13 hours and some days that is to eat every fruit and vegetable in sight. Amazing amounts of produce you could never imagine I could consume. All day long. As though I were a bear and my life's work was only to feed myself. It seems ridiculous, but it's working out. I'm also keeping up on the protein powder. How on earth does any vegan get enough protein? I just don't see how it's possible. I can eat tons of beans and nuts and it's just not enough.
I'm very aware that all of the tiredness might not be nutritional or even physical, it might be emotional. And then I guess the solution is to rest, too. Both kinds of rest. Resting in Bed. Resting in my Maker. Leaning on Him because He is not mystified by iron or thyroid or protein or Lyme's disease, and not by melanoma. He knows exactly what I need and He promises to provide when I am leaning (resting) on Him. (Proverbs 3.5, and all of Luke 12:22-34 and so many other places...)
So if you pray for me, pray for safety crossing through Mexico for us, especially on the morning of December 6. I think the dogs will make quite a spectacle of any banditos that have their eye on our cartop cargo. The only real danger is getting through the border and about 30 minutes in. After that, it's probably as safe to drive in Mexico as in the U.S., all things considered. And pray that I will know how to rest in all ways and restore this body to health and life. Pray that this will be, as we imagine, the trip of a lifetime for my dad and I, and my mom who will join us in Belize in January. (And all of you who have a free place to stay in the tropics as soon as we find one!) And pray for my brave parents who at 76 (mom) and 89 (dad) are venturing into the unknown!
Bless you for reading again! Sorry I've taken so long to update you. (I've been sleeping). I hope to be able to post more often from the road when we stop every night on this 3,000 mile trek!
Love and inexpressible adoration,
Susan
Saturday, September 10, 2011
Casa Blanca, Independence, Learning Again (and Again)
(This post has been waiting in my drafts for months, and here I finally post it. Much more has transpired since this...a jaguar licked my head, I swam in the aquarium that is the Caribbean Sea, I returned momentarily to these United States, and I have a big return trip by Land coming up. Soon you will hear about these, but for now, the post from Sept. 10...)
It is 5:45 on Saturday morning. My room at the Casa Blanca Hotel has a curtain and a drape that is never closed because then there is no air circulation. So I leave them open at all times and it means that there is no sleeping much past 5 a.m. when the sun comes up and - of all of the region of Cayo - hits my window first.
Yesterday was the anniversary of St. George's Caye. This was the battle that lead to Belizean independence, so they celebrate it first and then 11 days later celebrate Independence Day. This allows a double celebration using only one round of street decorations.
I was here at my hotel on the balcony facing the main street when they hung the pennant flag streamers, zig zagging between buildings and when local artists penciled in a Belizean Anniversary Mural on the face of one building and spent three days painting it. This meant that for one Thursday night there was no outdoor movie (which is hosted by one of the mural artists). We wandered down and watched them painting the mural instead.
My time for this Belize segment is coming to a close. I need to go home to close up my house or rent it or sell it, get passports for my parents, tell my pup dogs I am still alive, help my cat to forgive me for being gone so long, buy US clothes that fit my lesser weight (a side effect of this peckish vegan diet) and pack one more suitcase of Things You Can't Get in Belize.
Then I plan to come back. I hope it will take me just a month at home. No snow for me this winter, no great ice skating rink of a driveway for my parents to fall and break hips, no compulsion to tuck into bed at 4 p.m. when darkness falls. I will spend this winter in the Tropics - Lord willing.
I revisited my "Cancers Ethereal and Tangible" post this morning. I thought I had something there that would inform my heart, which today is troubled.
We have something circular about us, in a good way. You go through something trying in life and you learn and you grow and you have this sense that you shoot forward in a straight beautiful flight toward who you were created to be, like a bird freed from entanglement and set loose. But though the bird appears to fly straight, if he were to fly endlessly, he would meet his starting point again. We live on a round planet where things that are straight are ever so slightly curved. And we don't learn lessons once. We learn them again and again. Not because we didn't learn the first time, but because we did and there's a greater depth to go on the same topic next time. I wonder how many times we circle our own personal globes...
I did not learn about Cancer of the Spirit to know it and be done. I learned about Cancer of the Spirit to slough off the first layer of callouses and embedded debris. On this topic, I think I will be learning til I see Jesus and He can pronounce me Cancer Free on arrival.
It still feels like going backwards to see the same terrain below me (as I shoot off as the bird in flight, if you've lost me in my metaphors).
I remember thinking geometry was it. The pinnacle of math. Then came advanced algebra. What? More math. Is there no end to math? No, Susan, there is no end to math. One could conceivably study math one's whole life and still learn more. It's good that I make the analogy to math, which is not my forte, because it makes the realization that there is more to be learned about Cancer of the Spirit seem less daunting. It's surely better than having to learn more math.
All of my 5:00 a.m. mornings with God (which are fewer now that I am not at the Keller's with the wake-up kitchen noises at 4:30 a.m.) anchored me. Now, six weeks later I wake up suddenly adrift. Did storms just flood where I am anchored and I should wait for the water to go down, or did someone pick up the anchor in the night and I've drifted off? This morning I am not sure. All I know is that life and its circumstances have taken a mighty twist, and I am pausing. The lessons are all on the same topics as before. Character issues, I'll say. But the landscape has changed. How do I apply what before was transformational to Now? I feel like someone has turned off the radar and I need to read the elements manually. Where is north? Where is the wind coming from? How fast are we moving? Is it friend or foe who just jumped on deck from another ship? Does our mission ever change midstream? Am I really in Belize to fight cancer, or are there other battles here that need to be fought, and what if they detract from fighting cancer by being, say, stressful?
Even when you drop everything and go to the tropics for two (plus) months with a singular purpose, you might find out you're there for something else. God uses all sorts of things to get us where He wants us to be, to accomplish in us what He really wants to accomplish. None of this is anything to Him - He didn't need me in Belize to deal with the physical cancer, but He knew it would be Pleasant for me to do it that way. He didn't need to allow Melanoma to afflict me in order to get me to look at Cancer of the Spirit either, but it certainly worked.
Awaiting and Interested and not so troubled as when I started writing,
with lots of love,
Susan
It is 5:45 on Saturday morning. My room at the Casa Blanca Hotel has a curtain and a drape that is never closed because then there is no air circulation. So I leave them open at all times and it means that there is no sleeping much past 5 a.m. when the sun comes up and - of all of the region of Cayo - hits my window first.
Yesterday was the anniversary of St. George's Caye. This was the battle that lead to Belizean independence, so they celebrate it first and then 11 days later celebrate Independence Day. This allows a double celebration using only one round of street decorations.
I was here at my hotel on the balcony facing the main street when they hung the pennant flag streamers, zig zagging between buildings and when local artists penciled in a Belizean Anniversary Mural on the face of one building and spent three days painting it. This meant that for one Thursday night there was no outdoor movie (which is hosted by one of the mural artists). We wandered down and watched them painting the mural instead.
My time for this Belize segment is coming to a close. I need to go home to close up my house or rent it or sell it, get passports for my parents, tell my pup dogs I am still alive, help my cat to forgive me for being gone so long, buy US clothes that fit my lesser weight (a side effect of this peckish vegan diet) and pack one more suitcase of Things You Can't Get in Belize.
Then I plan to come back. I hope it will take me just a month at home. No snow for me this winter, no great ice skating rink of a driveway for my parents to fall and break hips, no compulsion to tuck into bed at 4 p.m. when darkness falls. I will spend this winter in the Tropics - Lord willing.
I revisited my "Cancers Ethereal and Tangible" post this morning. I thought I had something there that would inform my heart, which today is troubled.
We have something circular about us, in a good way. You go through something trying in life and you learn and you grow and you have this sense that you shoot forward in a straight beautiful flight toward who you were created to be, like a bird freed from entanglement and set loose. But though the bird appears to fly straight, if he were to fly endlessly, he would meet his starting point again. We live on a round planet where things that are straight are ever so slightly curved. And we don't learn lessons once. We learn them again and again. Not because we didn't learn the first time, but because we did and there's a greater depth to go on the same topic next time. I wonder how many times we circle our own personal globes...
I did not learn about Cancer of the Spirit to know it and be done. I learned about Cancer of the Spirit to slough off the first layer of callouses and embedded debris. On this topic, I think I will be learning til I see Jesus and He can pronounce me Cancer Free on arrival.
It still feels like going backwards to see the same terrain below me (as I shoot off as the bird in flight, if you've lost me in my metaphors).
I remember thinking geometry was it. The pinnacle of math. Then came advanced algebra. What? More math. Is there no end to math? No, Susan, there is no end to math. One could conceivably study math one's whole life and still learn more. It's good that I make the analogy to math, which is not my forte, because it makes the realization that there is more to be learned about Cancer of the Spirit seem less daunting. It's surely better than having to learn more math.
All of my 5:00 a.m. mornings with God (which are fewer now that I am not at the Keller's with the wake-up kitchen noises at 4:30 a.m.) anchored me. Now, six weeks later I wake up suddenly adrift. Did storms just flood where I am anchored and I should wait for the water to go down, or did someone pick up the anchor in the night and I've drifted off? This morning I am not sure. All I know is that life and its circumstances have taken a mighty twist, and I am pausing. The lessons are all on the same topics as before. Character issues, I'll say. But the landscape has changed. How do I apply what before was transformational to Now? I feel like someone has turned off the radar and I need to read the elements manually. Where is north? Where is the wind coming from? How fast are we moving? Is it friend or foe who just jumped on deck from another ship? Does our mission ever change midstream? Am I really in Belize to fight cancer, or are there other battles here that need to be fought, and what if they detract from fighting cancer by being, say, stressful?
Even when you drop everything and go to the tropics for two (plus) months with a singular purpose, you might find out you're there for something else. God uses all sorts of things to get us where He wants us to be, to accomplish in us what He really wants to accomplish. None of this is anything to Him - He didn't need me in Belize to deal with the physical cancer, but He knew it would be Pleasant for me to do it that way. He didn't need to allow Melanoma to afflict me in order to get me to look at Cancer of the Spirit either, but it certainly worked.
Awaiting and Interested and not so troubled as when I started writing,
with lots of love,
Susan
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Motorcycles, Mountaintops, and Drumming
Yesterday my mom informed me that my dad Will come to Belize with me! Now I am looking for a place to rent that will accommodate dads and dogs and Christmas Guests. I also will need a vehicle. There's a jeep Cherokee Laredo 1998 that I looked at last night. I like it because the doors squeak and one doesn't close properly and that brings the cost of a car right down. Who needs the fourth door? Pups don't use the doors and elders sit up front.
I went to see Alice yesterday, we had not Adventured in awhile. We chatted and I told her and David about my life in town - Thursday night open-air movies, my second-story balcony wi-fi location where I can people watch, and the Rastafarian drummaker who found me in the back at Greedy's Pizza one night asking if I would like to buy a drum .
"Chris told me I could find you here," he said.
Hmph. That Chris. I sensed a sales pitch coming on.
He turned out to be *Mahkey" (Mark), as they call him, Chris had pointed him out to me before. One of the local kids who had painted a door for Chris when he was 12. Now he is 30-some.
"I can sell you this drum for $50US" he said, offering me a drum he had made which would be too big to take back on the plane. But it sounded nice.
He was very persuasive. The price started coming down, started being quoted in Belize dollars instead of U.S. And, what I was not understanding, he said, was that the drum came with Lessons.
By now Chris himself had joined us, having come from the post office to rescue me from torrential rain on the street, which I and my iPad have been thankful for more than once. (Someday maybe there will be a post of the list of Chris' rescues. They are quite frequent. Remember the rescue on our jaguar hunt when the wheel fell off the car in the middle of nowhere? There have been more. Chris is the friend to have when you are a few wayfaring women set loose in a small country. Below I will write about my adventures with Alice in The Bajo yesterday when her motorcycle fell apart piece by piece. Guess who we called?)
So Chris was there to hear the negotiations. Mark was offering now to create a whole party of it at Chris' house. Invite a few people. Do a little drumming. How I miss my days in Minneapolis when there was a constant flow of guests and parties and uncommon assortments of people at my house regularly. My life in Asheville or Eau Claire never accommodated that in the same way. But Belize.... Life in Belize is still a blank slate. I could still become the Gringa with the most eclectic assortment of people at her parties. Mark started me thinking.
Friday is my birthday. Originally I was to spend my birthday in the Caribbean Sea (remember my Swimming with the Sharks idea?) But when you have an unusual appreciation for having a birthday - do you spend it alone with your Maker and the wildlife of the sea? Or do you spend it with the friends around you who have made your stay in Belize Most Extraordinary and bless them by throwing a party to celebrate...?
I was still deliberating. (What if no one comes?)
So I told these stories to Alice and David, including the drumming party idea.
Then Alice and I took to the back roads on her two motorcycles. We were looking for a place for me to rent in the country. Then it Rained. We stopped to put Alice's cell phone under my bike seat beneath the vinyl packet of bike wrenches so they wouldn't get wet. I put mine in the small leather purse I had slung over my neck that was a gift from Italy. I hoped the leather would keep the phone dry and I hoped the rain wouldn't ruin the leather. There were not other options. As for the pad of paper tucked into the side pocket below the knee in my pants, I could see the words blurring already through the tan cotton fabric. Ah well, it was recipes and places to rent that had come up empty. There are sacrifices to be made for a good bike ride in the tropics.
We filled up the bikes with gas and I checked on the cost of tires for the Jeep I am interested to buy..
We headed back into Spanish Lookout to look for postings about rentals and put up Wanted to Rent signs ourselves.
The post office led us to our next adventure. A man named Jacob had an index card tacked up about selling his 40 acre farm with a 4-bedroom house ready to move into. The price was $125,000 Belize. This is $63,000 US. Seriously. A 40 acre farm. "Nice view." he wrote on the card. Jacob has no idea.
"Maybe he wants to rent a house he can't sell..." I suggested to Alice.
Old world mennonites don't have cell phones, so there was no number to call.
"I know where it is Susan," Alice said. "I know Jacob's place."
I looked interested.
"Right now." she said.
"Right now" in creole means "let's go," it means "yes," it means "in a little while". Very versatile. This time Alice meant "let's go."
We stopped to put up my ads at every store bulletin board along Center Street, the main road through town. "Two bedroom house wanted to rent with yard for gardens and dogs."
"You better say you want electricity," Alice advised. These things are not assumed. I added water too, just in case.
We headed to "The Bajo" where Jacob's house awaited us. I had been on the ride once before with Alice. The Bajo has the most beautiful vistas in Belize that I've seen. Acres of jungle forest and farmland ending with ridge after ridge of mountains on the horizon. Maybe Guatemala, maybe Belize, depending on where you're standing.
We came to the road that leads up to David-The-Mennonite's house. We call him this to differentiate between Alice's David and this one. He is single, looking for a blue-eyed wife. He went all the way to Bolivia to find one but it was not the hotbed of blue eyes that he expected. (I can't explain why he expected this. Alice only laughed when I asked.) He came home empty-armed. Alice wants me to meet him. By the grace of God, he was not home when we stopped on our first visit to The Bajo.
Alice pulled her bike over, off the road. We were at the bottom of a great hill that hosts several Mennonite farms, including David's, and at a corner leading to more farms in each direction.
"Something smells hot," Alice said. Luckily she has a good sense of smell. I do not. Her back wheel was smoking. She put the bike on it's center stand.
"I need to throw water on it," she announced, and went to the ditch to find some. I took the plastic bag from the pepitos I had purchased earlier for the ride. Now they found a convenient home in my low front pocket.
Alice filled the bag with water from the ditch and headed toward the bike. I am not familiar with this approach of dousing the rear wheel, but Alice is extremely knowledgeable. Chris has said more than once Alice can do anything a woman can do and anything a man can do. She is a Resourceful woman. I trusted her about the bag of water. Then she brought two more.
I looked at the chain on her bike. It had a lot of play.
"That chain is dangerous," I observed. "it needs to be tightened." I do know that much.
"I will do it," Alice said. "I need my wrenches from that bike." She pointed to the one I was riding.
To open the seat meant I had to turn off the bike, which I dreaded because it has trouble kick starting. Or I have a wimpy kick. And it doesn't have a clutch so you can't "bump" start it by rolling down a hill and kicking it into gear, as I learned to do when I had my own bike in my hallowed Minneapolis years.
I complied and cut the engine and used the key to open the seat and found the vinyl case of wrenches with Alice's cell phones.
They were the wrong size.
"I don't know how to tighten this one," she said examining the chain.
I can't even remember how I used to tighten a bike chain so I offered valuable advice instead.
"If there's a mechanic nearby, they would know how to adjust a chain." I said this becauauto lot of auto repair places here are just in someone's yard. Almost all of them are. But I forgot where I was. The Bajo, old world mennonite country where they use horse and buggy, not machines. Ay, Susan, I said to myself like Alice would if she'd thought of it.
"David can help us!" Alice announced, referring to the Mennonite up the hill. I smiled. I was going to meet that bearded young Mennonite no matter what, it seemed. Yet, no. We made our way up and around the hill (really, it must be a mountain, I'll have to ask) to David's place. On our last visit, his black dog tried to stave us off. Alice does not like big dogs so it is my job to befriend any big dogs and keep them focused on me and away from Alice. Dogs know who is afraid, so it's no good letting anyone's fear escalate in your party...
This time, no black dog and no David. He has a white wooden stick house on stilts that is tidy and bare. His shed houses a second wagon and a pile of wagon accessories and such. Down the road, his greenhouses grow every kind of produce for market. Next to the house is a small outhouse painted white to match.
Alice needed to use it. She stepped toward the gate and erupted in a gale of laughter and showed me her foot - covered in mud from the ditch. I kept my bike running. I will have to pay Alice for the gas, I thought, I just don't have the umph to kickstart it, it seems. (In my defense, it takes anyone else 3-5 kicks to start it as well...)
Then I heard shrieking. Was she still laughing about the mud? I couldn't hear over the rumble of the bike.
What?! I called to her.
She is calling my name, shrieking. I can't imagine what in an outhouse would make Alice shriek. Me, that's another story. Anything unexpected in an outhouse would make me scream. I tried to hurry and fumbled off my bike to go to see what was wrong. By the time I got to the muddy gate, Alice had already emerged, her pants not quite intact and jumping and squealing "Ants!!"
Oh, ants. Ants are quite an event here. They are tiny, they move about in families of thousands, and they bite. So running into a mass of them could ruin anyone's outhouse experience for some time. She danced and jumped and wrenched off her shoes and wiped her feet free of ants. Alice did not go back into the outhouse or even go back to close the door.
We made it to the next farm and met Nathan, another single Mennonite looking for a wife, Alice informed me. (For the record, I am (specifically) not looking for a Mennonite husband, this is all Alice's concoction and, frankly, her joy to tell me about these opportunities.)
He pointed up to Jacob's farm, which we could see on the very top of the hill, and to another one below it that was also empty, waiting to be sold. Jacob's house looked big. I was intrigued, but we had already come about 10 miles on gravel roads. It would be remote to live out here.
The last mile or two of the road was overgrown since Jacob abandoned the house when he and his family moved to Springfield (the community you read about in " Truck Driving, Mennonites, Hitchhikers and Vanities") and it's steep, and (as you are used to hearing) impassable with rock.
So 40 acres of farmland with a house on a hilltop. You can't imagine it. Not the house, that is nothing, just a wooden structure, sturdily made with only one layer of boards for the outside walls and the same separating the rooms inside. It's two stories with an open attic. Imagine a framed in, unfinished house. That is what you have, but 1x4s hung horizontally for siding. The boards have space between them here and there - airtight is not a tropical advantage.
It's the hilltop that matters. A hilltop in beautiful Bajo. To say the view from the house is breathtaking just sounds trite. The only thing more beautiful would be if you could see the ocean too. The panorama is about 200 degrees of a 25-mile (50?) horizon of tropical farmland, pastures, horses, cattle and then mountains.
So I stood near the edge of the flat top of the hill, mindful of the grass and the beautiful black snake with neon yellow zig zags that we saw slither off the road when we first left Alice's house. (His Mennonite cousin could be living in Jacob's grass, we don't know.) So I didn't venture too far.
The thing about a tropical snake is that everything here is big. Frogs are the size of my hand. Even moths are the size of my hand. I could step into a "safe" spot on the grass that happens to be amid a few of the coils of one lounging snake before I ever have the chance to see whether he is round headed or triangle headed. And that makes all of difference of whether I have to cry out for Alice to grab the rusty saw from beneath Jacob's rain barrel, which I saw on my walk around the house, to slice open the bite and suck out the venom. This I have seen in movies, not in Belize. Here they go for an "anti venom", something you take that neutralizes the poison. I have never heard of that it sounds like a Star Trek cure to me.
"Spock I have the Belizean Viper anti-venom that will save Jim's life!" cries Dr. McCoy. (This references the Old version of Star Trek that people over 40 remember...)
So I stayed away from the thick camouflaging grasses in Jacob's yard. Meanwhile, Alice opened a door to the house and went right in. It was the same layout inside as a house we'd been in in Springfield when the rain pelted down and only the women were home and they invited our non-Mennonite-clad bodies in out of the rain. Their house had been as bare as any I've ever seen. Benches along the walls to sit on. Not even a table to eat at or chairs besides the wall benches. Bare empty rooms, swept clean. No apparent worldly possessions.
Don't let me mislead you, it's not that Mennonites here don't Own stuff. David's shed is chock full of wagon parts and bits. Isaac, the dentist in Springfield could rightfully be called a hoarder of things metal. He has a disorganized acre of every type of scrap. But the houses seem to be Spare.
So the floor plan of Jacobs house.. You walk into a long shallow room that stretches left and right. In front of you, across this entryway, is a wide steep stairway that goes up to the bedrooms. Left of the stair is a first floor bedroom that stretches to the back of the house. Further left in the entryway is a window. To the right in the entryway opens into what at my house would be a dining room. And the dining room wraps around into what could be a kitchen area, but is not because all of their cookery goes on outside. That room reaches around to the wall of the first floor bedroom. Up the stairs we find four bedrooms, one hidden inside the other, looking like a closet door but leading into a full room. Another steeper deeper staircase leads up to an open attic where it appears that boards are laid over rafters as needed for storage and the like. It is clear that this is where the mice live so I turn around without any need to explore empty rafters.
"OK, Susan, right now," Alice says. She is ready to go.
We close up the house and mount our bikes. I speed off ahead of her down the rocky grassy road because I am in Belize and exhilarated by the view and I want to go fast. Fast being relative - 15 mph (a treacherous road). Alice roars behind me on her bike which moves fastest when pointed downhill, but seems to go uphill at about 5 mph wherever we are. These are what we call mopeds, by the way. Engines of 150cc or 200cc. We were not, in case you are wondering, riding Harleys.
I decided if we were doing self appointed open houses that I would explore the next vacant Mennonite house too. I turned in and looked in the windows. They left stuff - an antique treadle sewing machine and two apparently antique bedroom dressers. I didn't try to go in. I strode once around the yard and Alice caught up with me.
We were about to go when I saw The Bird.
A beautiful, small, slender-beaked yellow tropical bird, bigger than a hummingbird but smaller than a robin was trapped in an upstairs window between the screen and the partially opened slats of glass.
"That bird is stuck," I pointed out.
"Let's open the window and let him out," Alice said. She wrenched open the back door below the window with the bird. It led up a stairway to only an attic. This intrigued me coming from the practical Mennonites. A separate outside door leading only to an attic.
I climbed up.
"There is no floor, Alice," I reported back, "Only rafters. I can't get to the window."
She came up and assessed the floorless situation. The rafters seemed to be 1x4 boards doubled into 2x4s. Giving you at most a 2-inch balance beam to walk along to the window.
Alice thought we could do it.
I climbed onto the top edge of the stairway wall and reached to the roof for handholds. The skinny slats could possibly drop me into the living room below but it seemed unlikely. I reached the slatted glass and opened it wide so it was at a right angle with the screen, the bird flopped around but could not get out. And he was tired. His claws and his beak alternately became stuck in the screen. He was lodged in the bottom corner of the window. I thought he was injured.
"He's not coming out." I told Alice.
"Can't you pick him up?" she spurred me on. "He will die."
Alice loves animals. She keeps chickens and cows just for fun. She doesn't eat them. (she does eat other chickens and animals, but not her own...)
I thought of childhood lessons of not touching wild birds because you put your human scent on them, and then they are rejected by their own. I also thought of avian flu and a long pointed beak good for pecking at people who try to Touch Feathers.
"Is there a cloth?" I asked. Alice handed me a white bedspread conveniently near a bed stored in the rafters. I covered my hand with a corner of it and picked up the little bird. I had experience in this because I had just raised 8 guinea hens for my dad before I left. This full grown yellow bird was the size of one of the chicks. You have to wrap your fingers around the wings, not the body. It can squeeze out of your hand if you don't have its wings. His head was poking out of the circle made by my thumb and forefinger as I held him. He didnt protest a lot. I worked my way back to the stairway on the rafters and climbed back down the stairs and out the door. Alice followed.
I was going to loft the bird into the air to help him have a head start, in case he was injured or stunned and couldn't flap. I had no chance. As soon as my thumb loosened he was out of my hand like a shot out of a cannon. A beautiful flight, faster than we would have thought, straight as an arrow until he disappeared from view. A powerful little creature.
I think he knew in the window that his time was up. He didn't struggle or flap like a crazy bird when I went to pick him up. Just a little bit. He was tired from trying to escape. Who knows how long he'd been there? Maybe all day.
Funny how our energy soars with a new lease on life. He thought he had met his end between the screen and the glass. For him, moment now is bonus time. All of the glorious soaring, all of the sun shining off his green and yellow feathers, all of the glory to God that a beautiful creature brings. He has more than he expected. Live little bird, live! Even if there's just a day left, it's a day you didn't know you had. Soar like your freedom is everything!
It was exhilarating to save the bird. Alice and I were happy. I threw the bedspread back up over the rafters, leaving the mystery of how it was moved for the homeowners to figure out.
Alice and I headed down the great hill and we rode along the most stunning panoramic view of the whole ride. Somewhere near the bottom of the hill/mountain,the chain fell off Alice's bike.
"We should leave it here," I said. "Let's go home and ask David to come back for it. "
"Someone will take it," she thought.
So we worked the chain back on and Alice planned to drive even more slowly. I drove fast (20 mph) and slow (5 mph) alternately, keeping an eye on Alice behind me.
We rounded a corner and one cow was out of the fence. I looked at Alice as she approached. She pointed with her chin and her bottom lip for me to continue on. I pointed - with my chin and my bottom lip - to the cow out of the pen. She lip-pointed me on. I lip-pointed the cow. The lip pointing is very Belizean and comes with a slight up-nod.
"They probably let him out, Susan," Alice laughed at me as she came in ear shot. "He is fine."
So we continued on. I going slow and fast, keeping an eye back for Alice. Alice going slow. At one long stretch I raced ahead at 20 mph. Then I stopped to secure my sunglasses in my pocket and wait for Alice. It was too late in the day for sunglasses. I was going to have to bear the dust of the gravel road in my eyes unguarded.
My phone rang.
What are the chances, I thought, just as I've stopped the bike?
It was Alice.
I went a mile back down the road and there was Alice with a spark plug hanging out of the front of the engine. It was too hot to touch. Hmm.
We couldn't get through to David. The network was busy even for the Jaguar Phone. (You will have to read the post "Jaguar Week" to know about the Jaguar Phone.)
We did reach Chris.
"We are riding motorcycles in the Bajo and we have one bike down, one to go," I told him. He didn't understand my silly description. "Can you come to get us by the airstrip?" I asked him, following Alice's instructions. They sorted out which airstrip with me as the go between. The airstrip by Country Garden, a place festivals and fairs are held. He was on his way.
Alice was able to manhandle the bike and run it down the road to the Country Garden gatehouse to leave it in a safe place. We ended up going back on the second bike and meeting Chris at the house. He gave me a ride back to Cayo - Santa Elena, where I am staying. We crossed on the ferry that holds three cars and is moved by a hand crank along a cable, and Jasmine and I went through the 903 photos on my iPad for possibly the fourth time, just for entertainment.
Tonight I have decided there will indeed be a drumming party on Friday. We've picked The Snooty Fox for the venue. It is right on the River (where evidently many foxes run) and the big open porch on the river side has hammock chairs. TV Tom, as he introduced himself, is the owner. He wondered if I wanted a cake. Ah, cake. I remember the days of cake. They are no more. Mahky will bring his friends and drum and play flute and sing. The little white stand across the street with an American-Belizean couple runniing it will make finger foods for us - garnaches and panadas and tostadas plus cut up burritos and lots of salsa.
Now...I hope people will come!
I hear drums now and a flute down the street. I'm sitting on steps along the street across the alley from my morning internet place. I have learned they leave the signal on all night. Nice. I will head toward the music. Good Wednesday night from Belize
Love, Susan
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