MEXICO VACATIONS OFT GANG AGLAY---

Dios mio!
Expectations!
I know better.  I know better.  I know better.

I had two daughters with a one year old girl and a six year old boy and my dearest friend come to spend a week with me to celebrate my upcoming birthday.

I pictured sitting at night with wine on the roof top garden sharing women's wisdom.  I pictured kids playing quietly under a mesquite tree on a blanket.  I pictured quiet board games.  Ambling shopping.  Long relieving talks with each of my women individually.  Happily complaining, soothing, laughing.
And craziest of all, I pictured our last night in a courtyard of ours that has a tall rock garden with cactus.  I would place a hundred candles in all the nooks and crannies.  Our Mexican neighbors would come.  We would have an ice cream bar.  My daughter would sing.  So would our two Mexican friends.  We would remember the moment as sterling, fanciful, perfect.

The van that broke down on the way to the airport with a new driver should have been an indicator to me of things to come.  Start with new places to sleep for over stimulated kids.  Add four women all wanting both time together and time individually.  Bug bites.  One large (very) scorpion.  Yes Montezuma's revenge all around.  Me too and I live here. One trip to the doctor. One day with no electricity or water. Credit cards not working. Logistics galore even after much planning. Such work to get to a place to relax that you didn't want it when you got there.  I could go on. 

And still lovely things and moments happened.  Almost none planned.
We fell into them.  Stumbled.  There was a moment in the shade with cross-cultural babies and mamas.  There was a caught moment of coffee and conversation on the roof top.  There was a good long belly laugh led by my six year old grandson--up after bedtime all of us in the darkened kitchen so the baby could sleep.  Pure curing impossible to stop giggles.  We somehow managed a lovely Mexican breakfast out on the main square with kids in tow and picture perfectly happy.  We all took turns babysitting while the others went out to play.  A night out for dinner with slurred Margarita laughter  as wide awake kids waited for functional moms.

Are we tired?  Yes.
Did we relax much? No.
Were we glad to be together? Yes.
Did we have exhausted stressful moments of managing crisis?  Yes.
Did we have magic moments? Yes.
Were any of them planned?  Mostly no.

Expectations.
I know better.  I know better. I know better.
Nothing gold can stay, but gold can come from out nowhere as well.

THE ULTIMATE PRIORITY

Visiting grandchildren trump blog!!
HASTA LA PROXIMA SEMANA!!

LOVABLE LEARNER MAKES EVERYONE A TEACHER

I have had two visitors here in Mexico during the last two weeks.
(Yes, we are all still speaking.) One was my sister-in-law and one a work colleague and friend.

They shared something in common.
Neither spoke Spanish.  And, when they tried, it was often wrong and impossible to understand.  But they plunged right in.  And asked not to be helped.

Frankly it was hard to watch. And I stepped in too often, not because they needed it but because I couldn't stand it anymore.  BUT.  BUT.
The reaction to their earnest bungling was so heartening.  Everyone became their teacher and proud to do it.

Taxi drivers were the most demanding.  They made my guests repeat and repeat and repeat a phrase until they got it right.  No mollycoddling at all.
Stern, I tell you, stern.  Waiters were the most patient.  They didn't help or correct but waited for "una cervesa" to come out right.  

There was not a single person that my sister-in-law and friend spoke to (take that word lightly) that didn't summarize the interaction by saying "buena persona".
The good natured willingness to learn created great good-will all around.
My sister-in-law would shake hands with both hands.  My friend would give a touch or a punch and laugh.  That was the real communication.  But what I saw was the quintessential phrase in action--"When the learner is ready the teacher appears."  

Just think of all the teachers available to us that we don't bring forth because we need to be more lovable learners.

NOTHING SAYS I LOVE YOU LIKE A MILK-BONE BISCUIT!!

What?  
I was all set to write about something else when I saw this ad about love and dog food.

How many words can we ruin in one language?
God--gone, ruined
Diversity--ruined
Amazing--ruined

Ruined-- meaning it now has no meaning.  Trivialized.  Made not specific.
Used without thought.  Sloppy talk.  

I'm sure you know many others. (please send)
But I too have been numbed out about the use of the word "love".
I mean, Valentine's day sort of clobbers the love word.

But who knows why, today, on my way to write you, this ad for dog food and love got to me.

Yes, we do mistake food for love.  Look how fat we are becoming.
And cars and hand bags and shoes and social connections.
These are not love people.

I'll tell you what says love to me:
Kindness
Tolerance
Compassion
Engagement
Active care for the common good
Listening to words that are hard to hear
Openness to being part of the problem
Seeing me for who I am
Enjoying being together

Please add to this list but do not think dog biscuits mean love even for your dog.  Poor baby culture-- maybe we are going to the dogs.  

WHAT TO DO WITH A PERFECT MOMENT?

I am in a perfect moment right now.
And just starting to ruin it.
Well, maybe not.

It is one of my dappled sunlight moments.  Seems that dappled light is just right for perfect moments. Looking out over the field and mountains below my writing spot on the balcony.  White butterflies flit by. Mexico is good. I went to the local chapel this morning and saw everyone from my Mexican community.  Talked to kids in the US.  All goes well.  My sister-in-law is visiting. We cook and chat about family memories.  We plan to go into town to the main square and then to dinner at a restaurant that looks over the maximum amount of church steeples and domes.  Leaves sparkle, birds sing, no family drama intervenes.  Everything hangs fire.  (That's a great phrase--use it)  I am poised in what everyone works hard to get to----the here and now.  I am content.

Here's the tricky part.  I begin to get exhilarated about being content.
Which makes me want to share the perfect moment.  Which also kills the perfect moment. Get it? So I write to you.  The moment dissipates a little.

Then the phone rings.  Gone.  Done.  Bye-bye perfect moment.

What to do with a perfect moment?
Let it be.  Kill desire to share it.
Don't answer the phone.
Do not move.
Do not take a "selfie" of the perfect moment.
Let it sink in--absorb it.
Don't talk about it.

See what I mean.  Just starting to ruin it. Can I bring it back?