My joy-inducing book collection. After the painters got done, shortly before Christmas, I expected that putting the books back on the shelves would be a mindless task but then, as I slowed down to dust off each one— and briefly think back why I had bought it and kept it—it became an unexpected exercise in introspection. …
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Gears of Mexican justice grind on. Very slowly.
As we head for the Christmas holidays, when the Mexican government practically goes into hibernation until the Feast of the Three Kings on January 6, we paid a visit to our lawyer to discuss the status of the litigation over the piece of land someone is trying to steal from us.It was mostly good news, …
Continue reading Gears of Mexican justice grind on. Very slowly.
Putting wonder and wandering back in retirement
When we first moved to Mexico some 13 years ago (!) Stew and I used to be far more adventurous. On weekends, or even weekdays, we used to leave town and point our car to wherever, in search of whatever. Sometimes there were quaint towns, tumbledown churches, markets selling weird stuff, stunning landscapes or, sometimes, …
Continue reading Putting wonder and wandering back in retirement
It's 11 a.m. Do you know where your car went?
Crime in Mexico is a topic expats would rather not talk about, particularly when visiting the U.S."Aren't you afraid to live in Mexico?" we're asked frequently, and annoyingly. Perhaps it's a matter of pride, of not wanting to admit that yes, we're often afraid, or worse, that we sometimes wonder if moving down here was …
Continue reading It's 11 a.m. Do you know where your car went?
Looking for Pancho Villa
My feelings are torn regarding the "caravan" of Honduran immigrants seeking asylum in the U.S. I see them begging at busy intersections in San Miguel and can't help remembering when I arrived from Cuba alone, when I was fourteen years old, with a nickel in my pocket and my head crammed with fears and dreams …
A round of applause for El Señor Arreglalotodo
Stew and I recently adopted the routine of doing a brief expression of gratitude before meals. Nothing deeply religious but just an improvised reminder of what is going right in our lives, so the occasional potholes in the road don't rattle us so much.Topping my gratitude list, of course, is my husband Stew, along with …
Continue reading A round of applause for El Señor Arreglalotodo
How environmental fervor led to a bum idea
Of all the hare-brained ecological ideas I've had since we bought our ranch—all in the spirit of "Let's Give Mother Nature a Hand"—the one I conjured up last week has to be one of the dumbest.Think Eddie Albert and Eva Gabor in "Green Acres."For several weeks Félix had been grousing, politely but insistently, about the …
When death came marching in last week
This past week, appropriately enough when Mexicans celebrated the Day of the Dead, we witnessed four different facets of death and the reactions it elicited from different people.The massacre at a Pittsburgh synagogue, ironically named The Tree of Life, was a horror that left decent people speechless. It's precisely on those occasions when the president …
Legends of the Mexican fall
Expats here sometimes muse nostalgically about the "changing of the seasons" back home, particularly autumn, when the leaves flip from green to shades of ocher almost overnight. In spring, nature then awakens and the landscape reverses to bright green; crocuses and other small harbinger bulbs peek tentatively out of the muddy ground and everyone goes …
Buying a new pickup the Mexican way
Our trusty 2000 Nissan Frontier 4x4 pick-up, which has served us well and saved our butts on several occasions—most recently facilitating our escape, literally, across an adjoining neighbor's ranch when a too-enterprising land developer blocked the entrance to ours for several days—is near the end of its useful life, at least for us.In rural Mexico, …
El Rancho Santa Clara 