What’s In A Name

What’s In A Name

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

            This morning, Ricardo, our waiter, kept track of us by name. Lu became, forevermore, “Hello, Mary Lou, Goodbye Heart”, accompanied by Ricardo not-Nelson, with Spanish accent, embedding the song in our minds for the rest of the day. Ha! Now try to get the tune out of your head!

The two couples were Jerry and “Jerry’s wife” and Jesse and “Jesse’s wife”. Lola threatened to stab Ricardo in the leg with a fork. Sharon just laughed. I began calling Jerry, “Lola’s husband, just to keep things even.

Karen, he renamed “Carmen” and she immediately became dark and sultry. When I said my name, Ricardo replied, “Oh, you same name as the owner.”

I said, “We must be cousins.” Thus I became “cousin of owner”.  

            For the hour and a half it took us to have breakfast, Ricardo had fun with our names. That personal touch means we will always remember both him and the restaurant.

            Names are important. When my friends arrived from the airport, we caused a hubbub in the lobby, hugs and talk and the usual commotion. That was no problem. But we tried to check in and encountered a “boulder in the road”.  

            When finally the desk manager, one whom I’d not yet met, got my attention, he asked for the copy of my reservation from Expedia, which thoroughly confused me. “I made my reservations in person with Amalia,” I explained. “I never used Expedia.”

            He insisted he must have a copy of the elusive reservation in order to give my friends their rooms.

            Obviously we had a communication problem. I tried using different words, sprinkling my explanation with Spanglish. Then I used the lobby phone to speak with Amalia, who said she would clear up the confusion.

            However, the strangeness didn’t go away until another woman approached the desk and introduced herself as Sondra Jean Ashton, holder of the Expedia reservation.

            This woman had my entire name. What are the chances of that? What are the chances of us converging on the same day in the same resort lobby?

With profuse apologies the desk manager straightened us out and set us up with our rooms. I never had a chance to talk with my “same-name stranger” nor did I see her again.

            If I were Billy Bob Smith, I might expect to find entire phone book sections devoted to my name. But Sondra is unusual, a British name, and Ashton isn’t overly common as a last name. I’ve only met one other, Steven Ashton, from when I lived in Poulsbo, Washington. What I remember most is that he and his wife (I want to say Arlene but I’m unsure.) were square dancers.

I regret not talking with the other Sondra. We were rushing in different directions, which is a bit sad, when you think about it.

But, my, what a time! We hit the ground running and haven’t stopped yet.

I love being “tour guide”, introducing a group of friends to “my Mazatlan”. My list of things to do, places to go, is long. Time is short. And, true to form, we don’t always end up where we aimed. That is a good thing. Like the night we landed at the Shrimp Bucket (not our original destination) for, yes, shrimp, and a jazz/rock-n-roll band, accomplished musicians, who played music we all knew and loved.

            An advantage of having lived here is that I know what is “tourist” and what is “Mexican”. My friends have gotten to see the working Mazatlan, the shrimp boats, the tuna factories, the docks,  and  along with the Mercado, the Plazuela Machado, a day of exploring the Golden Zone, tourista central. We went north to La Noria and El Quilete, south to Concordia and Copala. We’ve eaten meals on the street and in fine-dining establishments. We’ve purchased beach junk and quality art, jewelry and clothing.

            Tomorrow we begin the second half of our Class of ’63 Reunion with a bus trip to Zapopan on the edge of Guadalajara.

            There is only one problem: not enough time. There is a solution: this is my friends’ “first” trip, but not the last.

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

February 23, 2017

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

If It Had Been A Rattlesnake

If It Had Been A Rattlesnake

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

            Those familiar dangers we learn from childhood on are such a part of our consciousness that they carry instinctual wisdom and warnings that become second nature. Growing up in the Milk River Valley and the foothills and plains beyond, we know to stay away from the River in flood, stay out of the pasture with the mean bull and don’t pick up a baby rattlesnake, cute or not.

            Such wisdom even tells us if the rattlesnake has just had its head chopped off, leave it for a while. Reflexive action can be dangerous. Let the dead snake alone, like three days, I say. For example, I would never in a million years smash a rattlesnake and immediately reach down to pick it up to put it in the trash.

            Along toward evening last Sunday I was working at my computer, finished my project, closed the program and stood up. My foot squished something crunchy and alive. Fortunately, my feet were clad in sandals. I lifted my foot and looked down to see what had gotten itself put into my path. Immediately I was transported half way across the room and expletives unfit for a family newspaper issued forth from my mouth. Where my foot had been nano-seconds before lay a dead scorpion the size of a small dog. I swear.

            The thing is dead, right. I’m bigger than it is and had squished it heartily. My heart slowed down. I grabbed a paper towel and reached to pick the it up and dispose of the carcass. The dead scorpion reached up as I reached down and stung me on my forefinger. I didn’t know they could do that.

            I left it where it was, carefully stepped around it and sat back at my computer and searched for information on what to do for a scorpion sting. There was a long list of things such as apply Benadryl, go to hospital, ice the affected area, go to hospital, carry anti-venom kit (That’s telling me to lock the barn door after the horse ran away.) on and on and on and go to hospital. So I did what any self-respecting I-can-take-care-of-myself-type person would do. I got ice and a rag and wrapped my finger in ice.

            A few minutes later Lupe walked in the door. “Hi, Hon. Oh, by the way, a scorpion just stung me.”

            “Where?”

            “There.” I pointed to the super-sized mangled body on the floor.

            “No, where did he sting you?”

            “Oh. Here.” I held up my hand wrapped in a rag soaked with dripping, melting ice, my finger numb and tingling and painful.

            Next I remember a series of disjointed scenes, like in a bad movie. I was tucked into the car, my hand still wrapped in ice, careering through the night darkened back streets of Mazatlan. I held on for dear life as we rolled around corners, taking every shortcut. I giggled. This drama hardly seemed necessary. It’s not like the scorpion hit me full strength. We rolled up to the door of the Red Cross Hospital.

            Flash forward. I was lying on a gurney. A nurse injected three hypos of mystery medicine through a tube attached to a needle attached to my inner elbow. I don’t do needles. That part was exciting. Still on the gurney, I had to wait a couple hours, for “observation”. Now and then someone came through and asked my difficult questions such as “Do you know your name.”

            Eventually Dr. Hector called me into his office to make sure I could walk and kept me there another half hour asking the hard questions, “Do you know your name?” He wanted to keep me six hours but I convinced him I could go home. Dr. Hector released me with medication, a list of don’ts which included no alcohol (no problem), no caffeine (painful) and no operating a motor vehicle (easy). He said to stay in bed three days (a joke, right).

             I thought the whole thing a bit melodramatic. One day in bed, okay. I had things to do the next day. A third day was truly excessive. I slept the first day. The second day I thought I would humor Dr. Hector so cancelled things to do and people to see. The third day I got up for an hour, yawned and said to myself, “I think I’ll just lie down for a little nap.” Several times.

Now that I’m back in the land of the truly living, I have learned a world of wisdom and knowledge concerning scorpions. I never put my feet on the floor without looking first. Never go barefoot around the house. Never pick up a dead scorpion. Maybe in three days if it hasn’t moved.

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

February 6, 2014

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

How I Lost My Sense of Humor and Found Dry on Wry

How I Lost My Sense of Humor and Found Dry on Wry

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

            The first day on our scenic detour through the Baja Peninsula was an exercise in holding my breath and shoving phantom brake pedals through the floor of the passenger side of Roshanna Van. I left my fingernails imbedded in the dash. My friend Lupe corkscrewed us up impossible peaks on an itsy-bitsy two-lane with no shoulders, not even a white line in places, a transport truck on every curve. He was focused but calm. 

            One might say I was the slightest bit tense. Lupe’s friends had told him that it took two days to drive from Sonoyta at the border to Mazatlan, same to Los Cabos. In kilometers, close. Wrong comparison. Corkscrew mountain goat-path trails versus four-lane modern toll road. When we stopped for the night, I knew how far we had not come. My title was holder and folder of the map. 

           I had committed to a trip I didn’t really want to take. That night I rooted around in my bag of survival tricks for an old friend I had not seen for years. I searched nooks and crannies. I turned the bag upside down and shook it violently. I heard a wee small voice say, “Sorry, he doesn’t work here anymore.” I was devastated. I needed him. Self-pity had pulled me out of some rough spots in my past. Into, out of, who can say? 

            The following day, as we snaked our way around more mountains, I grieved the loss of everything in my recent life, including Self-pity. Lupe said, “You are awfully quiet. What’s wrong?”

            “Nothing,” I lied.

            “Come on.” (He said this with a ‘you-can’t-fool-me’ lilt.) “You have a little bit of attitude.” (How dare he say something like that? He doesn’t know me well enough.) 

“I’m feeling disconnected from everything and everyone I ever knew.” Then I pulled out my fake-positive smile mask and continued, “But I’ll be okay. Tomorrow I will feel differently.” 

            “I feel the same way,” Lupe said. “My friends told me, ‘Straight roads, easy drive, lots of beautiful towns where you will want to stop and stay.” (Later those words became our touchstone joke of the week.) 

            But the jokey part didn’t happen right away. First I grew fangs and claws. First I had to glare at Lupe and compare his disconnect to my disconnect. Mine was much bigger, more crushing and dramatic. Just ask me. How dare he think our situations anything near similar.

            About then is when I realized I had lost my sense of humor. Misplacing my humor is more devastating than losing my money and underwear in Los Vegas. I had slipped into black-and-white (no rainbow hues), either/or (no alternatives), all good/all bad (no everyday in-between) judgmental thinking. I hate myself when I do that. But not until I had hated my friend for just a few kilometers. 

            To add insult to injury, he began talking about my Roshanna Van in an intimate way. “She likes me,” he said. “She is like the kiss of a butterfly. (Now he’s a poet?) I think maybe she likes me better than she likes you,” he teased. One thing I really like about Lupe is his dry wit, his wry way of thinking. Normally, I like his quirky humor which compliments mine. 

            But when my own humor hides behind a wall, I detest being teased. “I have a twenty year relationship with my sweet Roshanna Van. She’s not going to let the first pretty face that comes along turn her head. She and I are buddies.” I slammed a metaphorical door. 

            Oops. I heard myself. Heard all my icky fears and ugly attitudes. I cried, apologized, laughed. That was the turning point of the trip. 

            Two days of mountains, two days of desert, and a final day’s drive along highway with glimpses of spectacular beaches and we entered Cabo San Lucas, my sense of humor restored, mostly restored. 

            Still, my friend said, “I see your face. I hear your voice. I know you try but you are not really happy. Let’s go on to Mazatlan and get you settled. 

            We took the ferry from La Paz, an eighteen hour trip across the beautiful Gulf of California. I am so glad I didn’t have to drive Roshanna Van down the steep ramps into the lowest of five levels of vehicle decks in the hold. 

            Today I am in Mazatlan. I have an apartment, a nest from which to search for a house. Once more, I feel centered, connected. Today I’m going to Cerritos for fried fish freshly flopped out of the Ocean, grilled over open flames, under cobbled together make-shift shelters on the beach. Home again.

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

November 21, 2013

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________