Dining in the Exclusive Restaurant

 

                                    Dining in the Exclusive Restaurant 

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Some days when I look out my door, there just doesn’t seem to be much happening.

I remember wishing, when my children were young, just wishing for one boring day. Just one day of absolute boredom, please, Dear God.

That wish-prayer was never answered. I’m the kind of person who simply does not get bored.

However, back in the day, I also remember when good friends sat me down and suggested that I was a bit of an adrenalin junkie, just a tad addicted to drama. I listened. It’s hard to ignore when four friends surround you, tell you what they observe, and don’t leave you an escape hatch.

With my friends’ help, with hard work and a good counselor, I’ve pretty much overcome that compulsion.

But boredom? I don’t get it. I mean, I’m just not subject to boredom.

However, to tell you about what’s happening in my life right now, know that what I say could bore you to tears if not leave you in Zombieland.

I stand in my door and look out. Yep, not much going on. Oh, the gardenia I planted for Kristen when she died is in full glory of white flowers, scent to fill the entire garden. And the Kiskadees are having feast day in the Lantana bushes. But those are just everyday type things. You’ve already heard me blather on about such.

I’m surrounded with beauty. Some days clouds scuttle overhead and obscure the sun. Some days the sun is ever-shining.

My son-in-law has Covid, first time. My oldest granddaughter has the plague, second time. Her baby boy is sick and the girls will follow, all in a row. But none of us want to hear that. We are tired of it. The phrase “sick and tired” never had more heart-rending meaning.

So what’s going on in my world is mostly house-wifery sort of things. Cooking and cleaning and sewing and gardening. These things don’t bore me but I could bore you if I went into detail.

My secret weapon is that I’ve learned to enjoy these mundane tasks. Uh. Except for swabbing the toilet. No enjoyment. But it beats the outhouse.

After two weeks of self-imposed jail behind the brick walls and wrought iron gates of my casita, I’m happy to report that Josue and his family are all testing negative again. Life is back to normal for them and for me.

Lola The Dog and I have resumed our daily walks along the lanes. This morning the thick fog muted our world, damp and silent. We returned with wet hair.

I talk with my neighbors for short stints of time, over the gates or on the patios, those four neighbors who are here. Everybody else has skedaddled, either north to home or over to a coastal beach.  

I like to think of each day as a restaurant experience. A really posh, high class restaurant. So exclusive, there is no menu. I walk in, sit down, and wait for the feast of the day.

Maybe yesterday I was served lobster, drenched in butter, so sweet and tender. I say, “Thank you!”

Perhaps today I am served lumpy oatmeal. I ask for brown sugar. “Today there is no sugar.” Oh. I’ve learned to eat my oatmeal, smile weakly, and say, “Thank you.” Sometimes I mean it.

Tomorrow I might find a tiny green worm slithering along a lettuce leaf in my salad.

This actually happened to my son, Ben. We were dining in the poshest restaurant on Bainbridge Island which is a very posh island in Puget Sound.

“Mom, there is a worm in my salad.” We all laughed. “Mom, I’m serious. Look.” There really was a worm in his salad. He picked the worm out, gave it to the waiter, who rushed back with a fresh salad. That experience put the rest of us off the salad.

But, hey, tomorrow our Waiter in this Restaurant of Life, just might serve up a thick, juicy, tender slab of beef. Just say, “Thank you.”  No matter what I’m served, I do my best to make it a feast. Some days that works a charm!

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

January 27, 2022

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The World Turned Downside Upside

 

The World Turned Downside Upside 

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I’m not saying winter is over and done. I’m not that presumptuous.

However, it surely does feel like spring has bumped winter off the edge.

Why, when we’ve only sailed through mid-January, am I waking up to mornings fifteen and twenty degrees warmer than at Christmas?

Why are some of the Jacaranda trees beginning to flower? Those trees bloom in April and May   through June. Purple flowers pop out like moles in a newly laid lawn. This tree, then that tree, then the one over yonder. But never in January. Any leaflets still clinging are falling fast.

Why is my Avocado tree, the newly planted Haas, in full flower?

Why is my Mango tree strutting in all itsl blooming glory? I tried to tell it, “Not now, you silly fool. Frost may still attack.” I swear, the Mango tree yawned and another cluster of flowers fanned out.  

I’ve lived in this lush garden country long enough to know to plant my garden buckets in February. I’m harvesting lettuce, zucchini and, of course, the perpetual tomatoes daily. Would anybody like some fresh tomatoes? We’ve planted a third of my buckets and are readying the soil for the remainder. 

And the flowers? Flowers are always. I mean, they do rest. They alternate blooming and resting all year long.

Did you know that the mother-in-law’s tongue plant sends up a tall spike with a cluster of flowers at the end? Did you know that all the houseplants that we Montanans struggle to keep alive and green, in moderate pots on a coffee table, down here in this garden, grow hugely, in the open, often planted by birds and flower unashamedly?

I have to hack back my herbs frequently, with gusto, and throw away the cuttings. I had to quit drying them. After using only fresh plants these several years, the dried herbs remind me of floor sweepings, just as tasty.

Are you bragging or complaining, you might ask. I’m not sure. I’m still learning this country and the country keeps changing. I’ll answer your question when I know the answer. Meanwhile, can you see me looking baffled and shrugging my shoulders?

Know what scares me though? Remember how when I first moved here, there were a dozen or so potted plants around the house? I began visiting Vivero Centro with great frequency, returning home with more pots and more plants. One day I counted and I had well over one hundred different plants in lovely clay pots. I think I was the vivero’s best customer. I had to make myself stop cold turkey, you know, white knuckle it.

It’s like a disease, right? When I began my bucket garden, it was with the thought of growing lettuce and tomatoes, maybe peppers and zucchini. Four buckets, or, maybe six, or even eight.

And just like the clay pots, buckets seemed to breed and proliferate. Next thing you know, I couldn’t remember what I’d planted in this or that bucket? Beets? Carrots? I had to wait for the little bitty shoots to give me a clue. Oh, yes, that which looks like grass. It’s baby spinach. Ah, isn’t it cute? See, what I mean?

Then I bought three baby baths for those plants that didn’t like hanging over the edge of a tall bucket. They wanted to sprawl horizontally, so what was I to do?

Then I bought a few medium trash cans and some oil barrels cut in half, for those which want just a bit more depth.

And just like that, my bucket garden grew out of hand. I’ll try to keep it tamed this year. Otherwise, I might as well plow up the rest of the yard and have a real garden.

A real garden is a lot of work. Real gardens are sweat and heartache. Buckets are fun. I don’t want a working garden. I want fun.

Is winter really over? The next few days will tell that story. Nothing in my garden seems to be behaving. 

What’s that you ask? How many buckets and designated vegetable containers do I have? I don’t know. I’m afraid to count them.

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

January 20, 2022

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On the Merry-go-round

 

On the Merry-go-round 

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Here we go again, ‘round and ‘round the merry-go-round, twirling so fast we dare not jump off.

Leo was just here with the daily death report from town.

Last night the Governor of Jalisco spoke to the people. He basically locked us down again. Don’t go anywhere. Don’t congregate in bunches. Wear masks. No travel unless absolutely necessary.

Now that the holidays have passed, tourists and Mexican-Americans here to visit family have gone back home, the latest Covid variant is on the rampage. Leo said, once again, the streets are empty, stores locked, and people who are out are masked.

Heck ‘n’ dang, when I walk my Lola The Dog in the morning, I mask up, knowing I’ll not likely see a soul on my stroll. Does that make me feel righteous? No. I’ve simply developed the habit. I grab a mask automatically when I leave the house. Do you have any idea how long it took to get that habit?

It’s not an imposition. Took me longer to automatically buckle my seat belt. There is another sure way to die if you are of a mind. And if you don’t die, you can have the gift of long term pain and/or disabilities. I’m living proof of the seat belt law gone unfastened.

Last week we oldies in Etzatlan finally got to line up for our booster shots. I was beginning to despair that we’d ever get the booster. The nurse, as I was getting my paperwork stamped upon leaving the courtyard of the hospital, told me I was lucky to get there the first day. The government was not able to send enough vaccine.

That’s the difference between here and there. We have people who cannot get vaccinated simply for lack of supplies. How would you feel standing in line, to be told, sorry, we just plunged the last shot?

Sure, some people are superstitious. But too many people have died in our little community for the majority to ignore the gift of vaccine.

The morning I was in town for my booster, the blocked off street quickly filled with we elders and with great numbers of young people. It was also the week for those ages fifteen through nineteen to get their first shots. A lot of youngsters accompanied their grandparents, helping them in line before stepping across the way for their own jabs. It was heartening to watch those dynamics.

Personally, too many people whom I know have died, both here and in the States. Yesterday I got word of another friend who died two days ago. Covid with pneumonia.

We rode the school bus together for all those school years. He was younger than me but was one of those rare persons who saw no barriers. He would sit with anyone, with everyone, and talk and laugh and just be the friendly person whom he was.

For some reason, word of his death took me out at my emotional knees. Why him, I’ve no idea. I’d only seen him once since I graduated High School. In 1974 I was working in Salt Lake City, walking through one of the big malls, and heard my name. I turned to look and was so surprised to see it really was someone I knew. We talked a while but I never saw him again.

One of my other friends said to me, “Now that you are boosted, you can go anywhere and do anything.”

I had no words to reply. She may be invincible but I am not.

I don’t want to get sick, even a milder breakthrough case. But more than that, I don’t want you to get sick.

I’ve lived a long and interesting and full life. I’ll go when I go. Please, please, stay well for me. I need you. Even if I haven’t spoken with you since 1974.

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

January 13, 2022\

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To Dream the Impossumable Dream

 

            To Dream the Impossumable Dream 

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To jump start a new year and top off my week, we had a puzzling close encounter of the impossumable kind. Lola The Dog chased down an adult opossum. It might have dropped out of the avocado tree. Lola was beside herself with dog joy.

Lola has a good measure of hunter in her parentage. She’s brought me birds and lizards of various shades. But this is a biggie.

She proudly deposited her gift at my feet, tail wagging like ‘copter blades. Good dog. There it lay, dead. I’d never seen an adult ‘possum up close. The strong jaws! The teeth! “Shark” came to mind.

I gingerly picked it up the hairy package with the naked tail and plunked it in the tall blue garbage can and banged down the lid, just in case. 

Later, I heard scrabbling sounds from over that way. Lifted the lid. The dead ‘possum had moved. The beast had been playing possum.

What was I to do? One of the men would surely be by later to help so I turned my attention elsewhere.

I like working jigsaw puzzles. Back in early autumn I ordered four new jigsaw puzzles from the Ordering Place, you know, the one we all use, name starts with “A”. I worked a puzzle Christmas week. Decided New Year’s week to tackle another. Puzzling is not an Olympic Sport to me. I come and go at it in small doses.

However the second puzzle I selected, a rainy day scene in a Parisian flower market, is gray. It’s all gray. Shades and variations of gray. Gray. Rain. Fog. Stone buildings. Eiffel Tower a shadow in the distance. Gray. With soggy flowers huddled in one corner.

Reluctantly, I have to give up my bragging rights about my amazing ability to work puzzles according to gradations of color. I’m good. I like to start with the sky because it is easiest. The corner with the cluster of flowers in pots? Not so easy. But fun. Generally.

When I’m laying out the thousand bits of cardboard, if two are still attached to one another, I separate them. (I don’t cheat at solitaire either.) I want to drag out the fun, milk every drop of satisfaction from arranging tiny chunks of cardboard into a painting.

So I figure maybe a gray puzzle is a good thing, despite the hit to my pride. I mean, that’s what I figured until I spent a day putting together a mere sixteen pieces. If I ever finish, I may take oil paints and give the hazy foggy gray sky some color. That’s where I started, the sky.

And the pieces seem to have only about six shapes. All of them. That means that pieces that seem to fit beautifully, and they do, they fit, are not meant to be locked together.

After tearing hanks of my own hair out in frustration, I went outside and picked tomatoes.

That’s another puzzlement. My bucket garden, the one I figured I put to rest until spring, meaning February. I’ve accepted that I’ll have perpetual tomatoes. I’m not complaining. But I admit I am puzzled.

And puzzled not just by tomatoes. I ate a lot of green beans last summer. They are easy growers. I cleverly moved the buckets next to my clothesline posts so I no longer had to tie the creepers to bamboo sticks. After a while, tired of green beans, I let the beans go brown and harvested dry beans for seed. One day a whole new bean shoot climbed up the pole and suddenly I’m eating green beans again, simply because they are there. Well, what would you do?

And what is this nonsense with the zucchini? In October, in hopes of one more crop, especially since invasive bugs took out my last crop, I planted four seeds. Nothing happened. Nothing happened. Suddenly, after two months of lying dormant, poor timing if you ask me, four zucchini plants shot up. Will they? Won’t they? It’s a puzzle. 

Yes, the puzzle. I mathematically deduced that I may finish that hazy and most irritating jigsaw puzzle February 23 at my present number of pieces per day. February, in time to replant my buckets, except for the tomatoes and green beans, which are perpetual.

I may give the rainy-scene puzzle to Lola The Dog to chew on.

My puzzling garden has convinced me that life wants to live.

Ah, yes, life. Fortunately, Leo showed up, took my not-so-dead ‘possum out to a distant corn field and watched it scramble away through the weeds.

Like I said, life wants to live, even when it seems impossumable.

Sondra Ashton

HDN: Looking out my back door

January 6, 2022

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