If I Were A Car

 

If I Were A Car

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 If I were a car, I’d choose to be a 1945 Pontiac sedan, green. Why a Pontiac. Because the first family car I remember was a Pontiac, an older model than a ’45, pretty sure. I don’t remember my Dad ever buying a new car, but when he worked for Ford Motor in Louisville, he might have. Memory is a funny, fluid thing.

Somewhere in a box I have a photo of me as a little girl standing in front of our Pontiac, gray, holding my Dad’s hand. Since I’m not a car and this is my imagination, I can choose the year of my birth and the model and color I want.

In my real life, I like going to classic car shows, to ooh and aah over restored beauties. However, neither the real me nor the ’45 Pontiac sedan me, have been restored. I’ve always been a “what you see is what you get” kind of gal.

I’m amazed, daily, that I’m still running. Running, not as in marathon but running as in the motor still turns over. Not every part is original. I’ve been sanded down, hammered out and Bondo-ed in patches.  I’m rusty, faded and jaded. The thingy that registers milage quit working a long time ago. Every day that I back out of my garage is a gift.

This morning I cruised my back yard garden to check out my fruit trees. The first papaya from one of my new trees fell into my hand with only a little tug to help falling. If I left it another day, the birds would find it and begin boring holes into its flesh. I don’t mind sharing with birds, but not my first fruit.

My mangos are not ripe yet but the larger ones are beginning to glow, from green to yellow. I’ll have a fine crop of key limes. The limes go into a couple months of sleepy time once a year and bear fruit in profusion the rest of the year. I have learned to use a lot of limes.

The Black-bellied Whistling Ducks have been flying regularly through my yard, taking R & R breaks on the boughs of my Jacaranda. Across the lane is a variety of a Pine tree, very tall, very sappy. My tracking ability is not great but the ducks might be nesting in the Pine.

Yesterday I saw the strangest sight. One of the ducks, just hanging out on a branch of my Jacaranda, lifted his leg at a 90-degree angle, straight out perpendicular to his body, not to the front nor to the back, but straight out sideways. I’ve not seen any kind of critter be able to do that trick.

I learned something new the other day. Cane harvest is over as of last week. The cane trucks, over-loaded, every one, no longer rip up and down the highway to the factory in Tala. Yet I saw a truck loaded like a mobile haystack with cane stalks. So, I asked, what and why.

Those canes destined  back to the field for a new planting. The stalks are laid down in furrows, lengthwise, covered, and from the nodules, new plants spring out of the ground. I’ve lived here all this time and didn’t know that because I never asked.

I’m feeling like it’s time to refuel so I guess I’m not ready for the Final Junkyard today. I just made the best yoghurt, and, with fresh strawberries, that should keep me going.

Wait. Food will wait. I hear somebody moving cows out on the highway. I like to go out and watch them, nostalgia on the hoof. Toot. Toot.

Sondra Ashton

Looking out my back door

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We Come Borrowed

 

        We Come Borrowed

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If I were to find myself in front of the Great Judgement Seat, in which I don’t believe, I’m pretty sure the first question (Picture black robe, powdered wig, furrowed brow, huge eyebrows, glaring eyes.) she would ask, would be, “What did you do to enjoy yourself today?”

I have an answer. “I rode my tricycle. Wah-hoo!”

My morning starts early with a chorus of birdsong, which pretty much goes on all day, with the accompaniment of roosters, peacocks and a donkey, except for that strange moment of silence as the sun peeks over the horizon. Once birdsong resumes, I’m out of bed, dressed and out the door for a trike ride with my dog Lola running alongside.  

I’m old. My trike is a simple, one-speed, three-wheeled joy machine. If, after sixty years of not riding, I were to try to ride a bicycle, I’d be a danger to myself and a danger to you. Once I find my center of balance on my trike, it balances me.

This makes me feel happy. Actually, I’ve a better word. I feel joy, deep inside, simply from riding my tricycle up and down and around our lanes, Lola trotting alongside or racing to explore scents along the edges, breeze fluttering my hair, birds swooping around me.

“Venimos prestados”, “we come borrowed”, a Spanish phrase I recently heard, or as I prefer, “our lives are lent to us”. My friend Bob often said, “We are here to experience, to experience, all that life gives us.” I like that.

So, why worry so much. We all worry. I worry too, always about something over which I have no power, but I’ll worry it to a frazzle until I can come to acceptance.

A friend told me about a fundraising event held in her town last week. The weather was windy, stormy, nasty. There was a flurry of complaint in social media, the chief question (complaint) to the organizers being, “Why did you pick such a horrible time to hold this event?”

Really? Think about that question a minute. If that makes sense to you, I’m sorry. But, what do I know? That may be your pleasure and not for me to judge.

Now that my Jacaranda tree in the northwest corner of my yard is full and leafy again, I’ve moved my chairs from beneath the mango tree, back to the Jacaranda tree for my afternoon sit-and-read. The mango is still shady but as the fruit grows big, I grow uncomfortable, picturing a full, pointy fruit, falling on my head. See, I worry.

I experience my full share of fear and disgust and apprehension and all the so-called negativities. I experience them just as fully as the joys. Then I let them go or put them on the back shelf in a closet of my mind, if they need to be dealt with later.

The experiences I choose to give most attention are the joys, hedonist that I’ve learned to be. I’ve had a lot of years and experience in which to learn which is what and how.

This afternoon, I’ll lounge beneath the shady Jacaranda. I’ll read a little, swat mosquitoes, pick ants off my legs, watch the mangos and the papayas begin to glow with color, ripening before my eyes. I’ll try again to track that bird I hear but never see. More pleasure.

I’ll bookend my day with swallows. We’ve always had swallows when the mosquito season comes in its fullness. This year I see swallows in great numbers. I love to go out in the evenings and simply watch them, fifty or sixty or seventy swallows swooping and arcing overhead, flying along criss-cross lanes invisible to me, their pleasure giving me pleasure.

Maybe it’s kind of like riding tricycles through the sky lanes. It’s hard to be bad, mad, or sad when one is experiencing pleasure. But, what do I know!

Sondra Ashton

Looking out my back door

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Air, Water, Earth and Fire

 

Air, Water, Earth and Fire

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Now and then it behooves us to think about the Elements. Usually when we hit a crisis.

For the past several days our air quality has been extremely poor. Our neighboring city of Magdalena, 26.4 kilometers by highway, about a half-hour drive on a winding highway, is beset round and about with wildfires. The mountains of Magdalena are famous for quality opals. Fire opals?

This morning I woke up knowing that there had been no progress in controlling the fires. How did I know. My breathing when I awoke was quick and shallow, unusual enough for me to be immediately aware.

I wrote to my friend Carol around the corner, “Move over. I’m coming to share oxygen.” I was not gasping but gasping was not far away. The morning smelled heavy with burn.

When I went to bed last night, the last thing I did was watch the light against the heavy smoke clouds. The morning colors shone gorgeous but tragic.

I decided that my morning trike ride was not a great idea but went out and waylaid my neighbor Josue, on his way to work, knowing he would have news of the fire. He told me that the Army helicopters were out with their giant buckets, aiding firefighters from all around the area, but that the fire was nowhere near being controlled.

I’m aware that you, having had years of experience with smoke while Montana and Alberta burned, know exactly what I am describing. Granted, the Smoke I’m smoking is on a smaller scale. However, there is no school. Everybody has been alerted to stay indoors if possible.

When Leo came to water my plants, he assured me that the town of Magdalena was safe. So far, the fires were just beyond town, to the northeast, in forest and brushy country. Oh, for rain, any rain. Rain down the flames. Rain up the aquifers.

Dry, we cry, dry. Our city of Etzatlan has begun water restrictions. Yesterday we got no water. Today we had water in the morning hours. People in some sections of town, especially higher up the mountain, have not had city water for weeks.

I figured it might be a good day to mop and shared my muddy mop water with two papaya trees. Waste nary a drop.

We don’t drink city water, heavy and often stinky with minerals. We buy purified water for drinking and cooking. Our water is from aquifers fed by mountain streams. The mountain streams have been affected by centuries of mining.

Etzatlan is older than Guadalajara. When the Spanish came through Jalisco, they immediately discovered that “there’s gold in them thar hills”. That was in the early 1500s. I’ve been told Guadalajara was built as a waystation for shipping our gold back to Spain.

The gold and silver mines operated until the 1930s or ‘50s or 70s, depending on who tells the story. Three or four years ago, somebody reopened the mines with Big-Gulp Machines. Most of you know that mining and water don’t play nicely.

We are fortunate to have some water, most days. At times, given ancient infrastructure, water simply doesn’t flow. Last year the City instituted every-other-day restrictions for several months. One learns to live with that and be grateful. This week the city began restrictions again.

Rain, please. The earth is parched by drought and afternoon temperatures which hit the high 90s. Rain might be a month away for us. Magdalena, in a rainier pathway, gets a lot of rain in comparison to us. I don’t begrudge them a drop. There is hope. There is always hope.

Sondra Ashton  

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Recipe for Those Puffy-Fluffy Things

 

Recipe for Those Puffy-Fluffy Things

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 I’m a decently good cook using simple, good ingredients. I am not a gourmet cook. I leave that to Kathy, an honor she deserves. I like to have guests to share meals. I’m past cooking for large groups. I’ll leave that to Nancie; that’s her forte. Some things I won’t attempt, much as I love them. Lani makes the most delicious chicken livers, which I savor.

A long, long time ago I learned to leave specialties to special people. Rose made raised doughnuts that floated off the plate. I watched her make them, took notes, followed precise instructions. I failed.

 Back then we had an old shepherd heeler, Mike. I tossed my final batch of failures out in the yard for Mike. Poor Mike. He tried. Tears ran down his face as he looked at me as if to say, “Doorstops?”

I make excellent cake donuts of all sorts. I’ve never tried raised doughnuts again in all these years. I love baking bread of all kinds. Anything yeasty, bready, biscuity, sconish, I’m all over it.

All that is background. John and Carol are leaving for Duluth soon, so I invited them over for breakfast. Whatever possessed me to offer a menu from which to choose, I don’t know. ”I’ll make pancakes with fresh strawberries and cream, or scones with jam, or beignets. You choose.” I’ll make café de olla. I’ve aced café de olla.

Carol phoned me, “Let’s have scones. Oh, wait, wait. John is waving his arms in the background. He asked if you would make those puffy-fluffy things that you sent over a few weeks ago.”

“Beignets?” “Yeah, whatever they are.” Beignets are small bites of fried dough.

I began making beignets when a friend brought me a box of mix from the Café du Monde in New Orleans. I might have gotten the recipe from the back of the box. I don’t recall.

While we stuffed our faces that morning, Carol looked at John and said, “Why don’t you make these?” John is the chief cook at their house. So, John, here you go.

Dissolve 1 packet yeast in a cup and a half warm water. Stir in 1 cup evaporated milk, 1 t vanilla, 2/3 cup sugar, 2 eggs, room temperature,  and 1 t salt. Add 4 cups flour and beat with spoon until smooth. Mix in 5 T shortening, and 3 more cups flour. This will make a sticky dough. Cover and refrigerate at least 2 hours. Overnight is better.

Roll a portion of dough on floured surface to ¼ inch thick. I know. Believe me, ¼ inch. Cut into small squares.

Up here at high altitude, I heat oil to 380 degrees. At sea level, 360. So adjust as needed.

Fry in small batches until browned and puffed, drain on paper towels. Shake powdered sugar over hot beignets and serve immediately with your best coffee.

Call them what you want, these puffy-fluffy things are addictive. Make sure you invite friends to share.

Like Rose’s doughnuts, these little morsels float off the plate, into your mouth. The difference between beignets and doughnuts: Doughnuts are dense all the way through. Beignets are air with a skin of fried dough.

If you want Rose’s doughnut recipe, let me know. Good luck.

Sondra Ashton

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We Don’t Have Robins Here

 

               We Don’t Have Robins Here

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We don’t have Robins here. We do have a similar bird, similar in coloring, larger, a Rufous-collared Thrush. Unlike the Robin, herald of spring, the Rufous-collared Thrush is here year-‘round.  He’s a tyrant of the Lantana bushes with their multi-colored flowers and seeds like blackberries. He’s a bit of a bully, plowing out his territory with swagger.

Ah, Spring. While up North it is snowing one day and melting into the 70s the next day, here in Etzatlan, we have entered our hottest two months, roughly mid-April through mid-June, when the thermometer shoots daily into the 90s. I’ve been here ten years and cannot get used to it. Eagerly, like a little girl waiting for Christmas, I latch onto any sign, however folklore-laden, of the coming rainy season and relief.

I’ve seen a pair of Black-bellied Whistling Ducks. The Rainbirds have hung their purse-like nest onto a seemingly fragile branch of the Jacaranda tree. The doves of all varieties are shamelessly cuddling and nesting. Every evening the Swallows swoop through the skies, dive-gulping mosquitoes. Those horrid, irritating, little black flies are everywhere, most especially seeking out eyes, noses and mouths, mine and yours and all the animals.

We don’t have Crows here but we have their cousins, the Tenates. Same thing, Crow cousin, pushy, likes glitter and bling. No Jays but we have a most delightful Black-throated and White-throated Magpie Jays, large  birds, beautiful, with long blue tails, twice as long as their bodies, also a Spring bird.

Last week I had a Real Scare. I awoke to Silence.  We don’t do Silence here. We do cheeps and chirps and whistles and screeches and screams. That’s just the birds. Everyone must raise their voice to greet the morning, including the neighborhood Roosters, cackling chickens, the Donkey across the Arroyo and the pair of Peacocks down the way.

Even the air was still, stolid. Leaves might have been painted on the trees, not a wiggle. Even the overloaded cane trucks did not lumber past on the highway, on the way to the processing plant in Tala.

Trying to ignore the Silence, I got dressed and went out for my morning walk with Lola. Lola followed me to the gate and refused to go further. In her scruffy dog-language, she said, “No way. Too scary.”

I love my early morning walk with Lola. I count on the antics of the birds. Every day the same, every day different, every day a delight. The Morning of Silence, I saw nary a bird. Back home I sat with morning coffee in hand and scanned my back yard. No birds in sight.

Silence. No birds, no roosters, no donkey, no peacocks. My uneasiness lasted until late morning when the Mourning Doves bravely came out of hiding, followed by the little Quail Doves and the ever-present sparrows and those tiny little gray fluttery birds with the soft “cheep-cheep-cheep”. It was afternoon before I saw any Tanagers or the more colorful birds.

I suppose I’ll never solve the mystery of the Morning of Silence. I feel relieved to wake to morning racket. You might ask me if I feel the same way once the Cicadas come out.

Meanwhile, it is spring. All the birds are singing, especially the ones that sing a song that sounds like “shooba-dooba-dooba-doo”. Flowers are blooming. Jasmine fills the air. Trees drop pollen in a haze of yellow dust. The neighbor’s lawn mower is growling through grass. I sneeze heartily. A slight breeze of undulating hips dances the top tree leaves. Joy is in the air. What’s not to love!

Sondra Ashton

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Living the Unscheduled Life

 

Living the Unscheduled Life

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“Sondrita, how’s your wonderful retired life?” That’s a regular question from our rancho-helper-with-garden-and-more. It is a good reminder that life is full of wonderfulness.

I like the wonder of my life, as in “I wonder what today might bring me.” Not all gifts from Day come gift-wrapped with ribbons but all gifts bring an element of wonder.

Take yesterday, for example. I’d invited two neighboring women over for breakfast, loosely scheduled, of pancakes with strawberries and whipped cream, scrambled eggs, and I do make the best egg scrambles.

While we are poised to dig into a breakfast of decadence unlimited, three men in a red pickup truck show up to build my new ramp for my tricycle. Unscheduled, sort of, maybe, scheduled. This means sand, gravel and cement, dust and noise. Kathy and Janet jumped up and closed windows to keep out dust. I took the pancakes off the griddle. We dug in.

It all worked out, no bumps, no grief, no problems. In fact, the three-red-truck men ate the rest of the pancakes. I am constitutionally incapable of not making too many.

The ramp is to enable me to get my new tricycle out of and back into my yard more easily. ‘Nuff said.

 The day proceeded as days will. Kathy threw out a fishing line. “Want to take a drive?” I took the hook. Kathy and I have a 25-years or more history of road trips, short and long. No specific idea of destination, just go. Left, right, turn around and head north toward Magdalena. I suggested we head down to the balneario, the turnoff shortly before you come to Tequila, an extremely beautiful, deep canyon.

Then we spotted a sign pointed toward San Martin. What? Where is San Martin? Obviously it is this side of the same canyon, so, why not? We followed the road around and about and I do mean around and about. Kathy pulled off to the side several times for us to feast our eyes.

At the very bottom of the deep and steep canyon sits San Martin. Our friend Julie lives in La Masata, a mountain town with narrow streets all carved into steep hillsides. San Martin makes La Masata look flat. There were more vehicles, mostly pickup trucks, on blocks, than vehicles still road worthy. We saw a dam across a river, young people out on motorcycles of all kinds, an elderly Vietnamese pot-bellied pig, in other words, a regular small village. We stopped at a small tienda de aborrotes for a drink and road snack.

Kathy asked about a street to the river. A lovely woman grabbed her and took her to the street and pointed here and there, arms waving. The young woman at the till pointed her phone at me with this message, “The road is ugly.” I nodded that I understood and made motions to let her know we would not try to find the Rio this trip. The word “feo” in Spanish means much more than “not pretty”.

In no time at all the streets spit us back out onto the road home, satisfied with our small adventure.

Take today, for example. Today Kathy takes the autobus to Mazatlan, five days on the beach, then flies back to Victoria until her return in October. I decided to ride along, delaying goodbye and depression, normal-reaction depression.

Kathy is, by far, the most super-organized person I know. We got to the bus depot in Zapopan. Leo drove. He got out and put her suitcases on the sidewalk, turned to hug Kathy goodbye.

Kathy has this strange look on her face. Disbelief and consternation, mixed with remorse and seasoned with a touch of self-recrimination. She’d left her wallet with Mexican ID and credit cards in her casa. What’s to do but laugh a little, reload the baggage, change her ticket and drive home. Definitely unscheduled.

I chose to skip the second run. What will I do with the rest of my day. I’m sure the day will unfold as days do. That is enough for me to know.

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Fire on the Mountain

 

               Fire on the Mountain

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 Kathy arranged for the six of us women to go to the Laguna Colorado for my birthday dinner. Four of us piled into Kathy’s car. John agreed to bring the other two and drop them off. We arrived at our favorite little restaurant under the large palapa by the water. The owner treats us like family and the food is good, the laguna full of all manner of water birds. What’s not to like!

Kathy, being the youngest, popped out of her car and immediately announced, “Smoke”.

By the time the rest of us groaned ourselves upright on the ground, the smoke had become visible flames. Within ten seconds the wind-whipped flames rolled over the top of the mountain and began the rapid descent down toward the restaurant—and us.

Another half-minute and we were zooming up the dirt road back to the highway, a cloud of dust in our wake. On the way we met John. “Fire. Turn around. Follow us.” We met two water trucks and approximately forty volunteer firefighters on the way to tackle the blaze.

By the time we got to the highway we had decided by committee consensus to turn left, to La Canada. (Cahn-yah-dah)

The food was excellent, the company, superb, the stories, mostly true, the laughter, real. Our energy had ramped up to the top of our scale by the drama of the fire.

It was my best birthday. All the women agreed that I didn’t look a day over 81. Four of us are in our 80s so they had to say that. (One of them whispered, “That changes tomorrow!”) We don’t exchange gifts, yet I came away with an extendable back-scratcher.

When we were ready to go home, rather than split up, rather than call John to come get passengers, Crin and Janet figured out how to cram us all into Kathy’s car.

Kathy is the get-away driver. I always sit in front, not because I am the birthday girl, but because I get car sick and threaten to throw up on everyone. Crin is small, so she tucked into the back seat between Lani and Carol. Janet, who is younger and more flexible, fit herself into the back luggage area, legs extended, “The best seat in the car,” she declared.

On our way back we could see the smoke still rolling black clouds into the sky from the fire. We are concerned about the restaurants along the lake, but more worried about the small scattering of homes. Fire doesn’t care.

However, our energy levels and camaraderie had not dissipated one whit. Four of us are in our 80s. We all have scars. Conversation in the back somehow centered around scars that look like zippers, should I get a tattoo to cover it, you must have shaved your legs this morning, (?) good grief, you could grow a kiwi vine up that one, show and tell, swinging legs, that trouble walking, through the air like acrobats, women comparing bruises and dents and purple veins, all with much teasing and hoots of laughter. Kathy and I wanted to climb over into the back seat and join the fun.

We are ladies in our 80s.

We are girls.

“Girls just wanna have fun.”

Sondra Ashton

Looking out my back door

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