Overload—Where’s the Off Switch?

Overload—Where’s the Off Switch?

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            It’s my own fault, of course. I’ve hit the wall. Can’t go any further. A day of rest would do wonders. Two days might put me back to myself.

            If I’m not myself, who am I? I feel like a brainless blob. A wart on a toad. A knot on a log.

            For one thing, Jim and Crin and I have been having too much fun. Since both of them are here for only a few weeks, we try to cram the time with explorations and adventures, fun along with our designated projects. 

            Jim alternated building a fountain, think babbling brook running over rocks, against a hillside for Bonnie with getting my therapy tub up and running. We had to wait for a heating element to arrive from the States. The element arrived four days early rather than my guess of three weeks late. I lost the bet.

            Got the hot-tub working. Hooray! I had an afternoon soak as well as an evening soak. Ah, wonderful world.  

Jim came over late in the evening, climbed in the water, hit the button to turn on the light and the whole caboodle up and died.  Back to square one. Jim, however, left Monday, without time to figure out where the short originated.

            This was harder on Jim than on me. Man-ego stuff, you know. I can wait. He had an expensive five minute soak. I had at least an hour. I’m neither comparing nor complaining. Jim took drawings, pictures, schematics back with him and is determined to return in the fall with parts plus knowledge of the inner workings of hydro-tubs.

            Crin brought small quilting projects with her for us to sew together. We set up our machines in Crin’s casita and enjoyed hours stitching, talking and working with beautiful colors complimented by coffee and pastries. We didn’t finish our quilts so put aside the project for fall when she returns. She left this morning.  

            In the last several days we seem to have gone into social panic. We’ve been to Tonola, made a day trip to Tequila where we were fortunate to see the dancers fly from the pole set up in the plaza, twice. We’ve been to San Marcos, to Ahualulco, to Oconahua to see the dig at the ruins there, to the Mirador which is an incredible lookout on the mountain above our town, complete with a beautiful shrine, to Guamuchil, a nearby waterpark.

Every trip requires a meal, of course. And to this largess, we’ve added several trips into Etzatlan specifically to eat in places special to us.

As if enough isn’t happening, I decided to re-varnish my twenty boxes which stack into shelves for books and art objects, a never-ending project. Each box is made of heavy local pine from our region.

One good clean deserves another. All the books must be wiped down and the art objects and keepsakes washed. Have you any notion how filthy simple woven baskets can get? Windows behind the shelves must be cleaned; let’s do it while the shelves are down. Oh, and the cupboard between the two sets of boxes; ten stack on each side. Clean and re-arrange all the contents. Of course, this leads me to deep clean of the rest of the house, why not?

I’d be fine with all the activity, love it, in fact, if I hadn’t done some sort of twisty-hurty to my hip. Felt like it slid out of the socket and back in again. I know that’s not possible. But I felt huge pain. And Fear. Yes, with capital “F”.

Did I stop activity for a few days to heal? Of course not. It’s not my way. Push on, woman, there is too much to do. Too much I want to do. Ha—there’s the kicker. Want.

Pain is a marvelous teacher. It pays no attention to my whining. In my life, because of past physical damage, pain tends to partner with fear. Together, they slammed on the brakes. I’m not at a stop—yet. But I’m moving in slow motion, searching the mental/physical/emotional “wall” for that elusive off switch.

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

June 28, 2018

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Just Blindly Bumping Along

Just Blindly Bumping Along

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            Went to the artisans’ tianguis (street fair) in Tonala and got me a man. Yep, brought home a genuine Mexican man.

            Next I wrote to my women friends and you should have heard the response. Oh, my. I had immediate replies expressing everything from shock and outright horror to reluctant caution. They should know me better by now.

            Not to worry. I’d had my mind on this man from the first time I saw him, three years ago. (Him, or a counterpart.) I even had my picture taken with him a few months ago. I finally asked him to introduce himself. Homer is the new love of my life.

            Almost all of my friends, here and up North, are couples. Only three of us here on the Rancho are singles. Crin is a recent widow and she’d love to find the right man. Jim has been on his own for a number of years and has his eye on a certain woman.

Me, I’m done trying. At least, I could say that prior to meeting Homer. You just never know what life has in store.

            I want to share a quote from Kent Haruf’s Our Souls At Night. Louis and Addie, from a small town on the Colorado plains, older people like me, both widowed, are talking about their former spouses. Louis said that he might have been the wrong man for his wife. She always seemed disappointed with her life.

            Addie said, “Who does ever get what they want? It doesn’t ever seem to happen to many of us at all. It’s always two people bumping against each other blindly, acting out of old ideas and dreams and mistaken understanding.”

            That says it better than I ever could. Of course, I’d love to have a partner, somebody with whom to share my dreams, fears, hopes, along with the mundane everyday stuff. Life just hasn’t quite worked out for me in that way. I’ve learned to find contentment where I am and how I am.

            Now I’ve got Homer. He’s not Hollywood Handsome by any means. He’s awfully bony. I prefer a man with substance. But he is quite debonair and a natty dresser. Who could not love a man who wears spats? He is a good head taller than me. I like that. So, I’ll bump along with Homer for now.

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

June 21, 2018

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I Love A Rainy Night

        I Love A Rainy Night

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            By the time I got from beneath my covered patio to my front door, a few steps, I was drenched and dripping rain. Already the floor filled with standing water, a shallow lake, half-way across the room. Not even a minute had passed.

            The sky opened. No warning. Oh, sure, I’d heard a few rumblings from the mountains on the other side of town. Nothing serious. No gentle drops to precede the deluge. Suddenly, the wind whipped in circles and buckets of water fell, whipped in all directions, finally settling into a horizontal push from the east.

            The storm raged only long enough for me to shed my wet clothing for dry, towel my hair, wipe down cabinets, sop up the wet floors with bath towels, maybe half an hour.

            Later in the night, I heard soft rainfall out my bedroom window, gentle, light.

            Rainy season announced itself a mere week ago, following a month of intense searing heat.  The middle-of-the-night storm woke me with a lightning strike that lifted me off my bed, heart pounding, adrenaline coursing through my body. The special effects were more than worthy of Hollywood’s best. 

            And we’ve had rain every night since. I love it.  Like in the song lyrics, it makes me feel good. And the average daily temperatures plunged from fry-eggs-on-concrete down to pleasurable.

            Our hot season is over and done. Back to perpetual spring until next May.

            There is no set schedule to the storms. This morning I have laundry on the line, wafting in the gentle breeze. I’m eyeing the lowering sky apprehensively, knowing if rain falls now, well, the clothing will be wet again, a rainwater rinse.

            Generally, the rains are an evening event. Clouds roll in from both east and west around 4:00. It might rain early. It might rain late.

            Last Saturday night, while apprehensively scanning the dark sky, Jim, Crinny and I went to the Plaza in the evening, after sunset. The Plaza is always crowded Saturday nights, more so this night. We had just missed a political rally, with party supporters attired in orange shirts.

We knew we might get wet. But we were on a mission. Jim had discovered that one of the food stands served crepes. He’d promised us a treat and he didn’t disappoint.

I had strawberries and kiwi in my crepe, topped with vanilla ice cream. We all chose different variations, fruits, toppings of caramel and chocolate. We argued, “My crepe is better than your crepe.” Practicing heroic restraint, we managed to resist licking our plates, just barely.

We made it home, dry and satisfied. I woke in the night to a steady hard rain pounding my roof. I woke in the morning to a sunny day with a song in my heart, with a smile on my face.

I do love a rainy night, and who cannot love the sunny days? The green is greener. All colors are more intense. If I’ve nothing else to do, I can watch grass grow. My elephant ear plants, normally huge, doubled in size this week. Weeds grow apace. The cicadas have stopped their noise-makers. 

What’s not to love?

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

June 14, 2018

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As the Worm Turns

               As the Worm Turns

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            Paradise. Yes, I live in a garden of Paradise. I suppose there is a snake in every garden. My snake is gray. Pure deep gray with diamond shaped markings like fish scales. I’m told he is harmless. Every woman since Eve has heard those words whispered in her ears.

            I can live with my gray snake. What can I do? He slithers whither he wills. My hope is that he eats rats.

Week before last, a rat infested my bodega. Until the evidence appears, One doesn’t know a rodent has set up housekeeping in one’s space. Rat is a sloppy housekeeper. He didn’t properly apply for housing, didn’t pay rent, and ignored my demands that he vacate the premises.

It took Leo and me four days of concerted effort to get him gone, put new screens on the windows, which had become the point of entry, thoroughly clean the bodega, all the storage shelves and everything in storage. Good riddance, Rat.

This morning while weeding, we discovered that one-third of my Amaryllis crop (I have at least 400 plants) have been invaded by a particular fly that chooses bulbs in which to lay her eggs. One does not discover the damage at the beginning point, however. Who pays attention to varieties of flies? What we found were hundreds of maggoty larvae in each sopping, mushy, rotten bulb.  Off with their heads, so to speak. An entire section of garden laid bare.

I love my Amaryllis. They bloom from the first of January through May. It doesn’t get much better than that, a constant color parade.

A quick trip to David’s Centro Vivero and $500.00 (pesos) of poison later, maybe we can save the rest of the bulbs.

My garden is full of metaphorical snakes, in addition to my all too real gray serpent.

The rabbits, they look like cottontails to me, which used to keep to the back yard, now venture onto my front patio. There is one particular cheeky, chippy squirrel which is the bane of my life. She ventures up to my screen door and thumbs her nose. She’s naught but a rat with long hair.

I call this the Year of the Lizard. Never have I seen so many and of such variety. Iguanas, too, a lot of them.

Ants of every variety. Some eat roots. Some eat leaves. Some bite humans with fire. Some, Leo tells me, are harmless. Their large black bodies form a parade across the patio from time to time. Leo says they are moving from place to place, bundles on their back. How does Leo know?

Except for my large and gray snake, none of these creatures eat one another. All are vegan.

Still, I live in my garden of Paradise. I share my bounty of beauty, flowers, leaves and roots, each according to his appetite, with the creatures around me. I have no choice.

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

June 7, 2018

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A Pig In a Poke

                        A Pig In a Poke 

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            We didn’t exactly buy it sight unseen. Well, I suppose I did. My half. Unseen.

            Last winter Jim, a neighbor here on the rancho, and I began hankering (that word generally precedes a pig in a poke) after a hot tub for pain therapy. We agreed that if we found what we wanted, we’d share the cost, share the use.

We made two dread trips into Guadalajara only to find them outrageously expensive. Searches on such sites as craigslist: Mexico, for a second-hand tub yielded no results.

            Jim returned to Missouri in March. “I’ll look around here. If I find one and we agree, I’ll buy it and bring it down in my pickup.”

            He searched in his area. Checked out a couple. I nixed one. Another we agreed was too expensive. Our criteria; almost free.

            “There’s one in St. Louis. It’s old, like us. The owner wants $500.00. I’ll go check it out when I go up to see Mom.”

            Later, “He’s dismantled it. I won’t be able to see if it works or not. He’s firm on the price. Are you willing to risk your $250.00? It’s old . . . “

            “Like us. You said, already. I’ve spent $250.00 foolishly uncounted times, so I’m willing to risk.”

            A week later my therapy tub rolled in atop Jim’s pickup bed. It’s old. The tub, not the truck.

            A week after arrival, Jim had the electrical line routed from the box on opposite side of my house (of course) around to where the tub sits. Jim is meticulous. He spent hours staring at the innards. From my own experience, I know this to be one way to figure out how things go together.

            Meanwhile, I had my hands full rearranging and creating new garden areas for the flowers which the hot tub displaced.  

            The heating element isn’t working. A post is corroded, completely gone. But we can get a replacement.

An O-ring is broken. We can’t find one in town. I shudder to think of an hour and a half drive to the Big City for a thin circle of rubber that costs pennies. Not that we know where to find one. But, we’ll do what we must. We cannot fill the tub and check the pump, circulating lines and other mechanical parts without that particular O-ring.

            Me, I’m happily painting the skirt. I love Mexico for Mexico’s love of color. I’m transforming boring brown wood into a landscape of turquoise, ochre and aqua: water, earth and sky.

            Today I’m optimistic that we (Jim) will get our therapy tub running soon. We alternate feeling discouraged, grinding our teeth over money spent, another $300.00, shared cost. We are in a country where, instead of saying, ‘It’s broken, throw it away, buy a new one’, people say, ‘It can be fixed’. We like that philosophy.

            Friends like to chide us for wanting hot water soaks since May is the hottest month of our year with temperatures in the high 90’s every day.

But I know from experience, years of nightly soaks, that hot water eases muscle pains, whether the weather is stifling or freezing. 

Believe me, dripping sweat ain’t the same thing.

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

May 31, 2018

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Looking for Wormy Apples

            Looking for Wormy Apples

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Have you ever woken up with a sense of impending doom—for no apparent reason? That’s my story today. Could be I’m asking for trouble. Could be the shadows I sense hovering around the edges of my life are tricks of light. Could be I’m just an old woman with old woman worries. 

I cannot put my finger on a thing that is wrong. So why this niggling anxiety?

My awareness seems heightened. I strongly sense the incredible beauty which surrounds me.  I am in awe of the idyllic life I live.

But, if you were raised like I was raised, when the apple is ripe, you begin to look for the worm. Old habits die hard. I thought I’d erased this one, but, apparently not.

My life is filled with amazement. The other day, driving back from lunch in San Marcos, we slowed down behind a walking haystack. We could see the outline of shoulders and a wide-brimmed straw hat hovering inside the stack. Beneath the load of loose grass hay, the sun glinted on the horseshoes as the mule lifted his hind feet. Amazing, yes?

Later in the evening, I heard cattle lowing and men shouting familiar words in a different language. Cowboys, the same in this culture as in ours, same western-style shirts and jeans, swinging lariats, sitting astride saddled horses, hustled the mixed breed herd, mostly Brahmas, down the highway. When I hear the familiar sounds, I go to the edge of my yard and watch this scene that I never tire of seeing.

Yesterday four of us went to lunch and spent several hours strolling the grounds at Hacienda El Carmen, a restored, centuries-old Spanish hacienda turned resort, not far from Etzatlan.

The grass-laden mule, the cattle drive, lunch at the Hacienda, all are gifts with a nostalgic flavor of the past. I’ve no desire to live in yesteryear. Change, whether I like it or don’t, is inevitable.  These experiences, these gifts, I see as my tree of beautiful ripe apples. And I pluck one or more daily.

I’m not looking for perfection. My back yard is a mess. Leo has just finished building another flower bed along my south wall. In the morning I’ll help him maneuver my displaced flower pots onto the new gravel deck out by the back-yard wrought-iron gate. My yard will be bordered with wrap-around flowers. No, this is not a worm. This is another tasty apple on my tree.

My patio is a mess of a different flavor. My new-to-me, but ancient in years, hot-tub is scattered in pieces, a puzzle to be put together. The aqua shell, the cover, the motor-heater-blower innards, the wooden base surround, will clutter my life for several more days before Jim magically (to my mind it is magic) assembles the parts into a workable, usable unit. Today Jim is running electric wiring to that side of my casita. I have confidence that this is not a gigantic worm littering my patio. Just an unripe apple.

I try to give my apprehensive feelings scant attention. I get this way from time to time. It’s just a feeling. It will pass. A bite to eat, a few chapters in my book, a good night’s sleep and I’ll feel differently in the morning.

To the best of my ability, I’ll not borrow trouble. Who cares if there is a worm in the occasional apple? Better a worm than half a worm.

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

May 24, 2018

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