New England Hearts

The sun sinks quickly, this time of year in New Hampshire. What a sunny day brings of warmth, even this late into the Autumn, crashes quickly, into a frosty night.

The branches are pretty much bare now. We've had one dusting of snow, before Halloween, and it did that last year as well, only more fell then. It fell, when the leaves were still on the trees and bent many trees for a long time. They seemed to have recovered over the Summer.

The trees are ready for the snows, when they start. I just can't really get over the idea that Winter, is not like it was last year here, and bit of snow all Winter. What I hear is normal, is significant snow, with a snow that constantly blankets the landscape in white crystalline layers, for the season. I really is magical.

The snow I so longed for as a child, in a place that it only rained, is here. And when it comes, I have no idea what to do with it. I don't know how to play in the snow. I could sled, but what does that do to an artificial knee, when you crash? My knee doc would not be pleased. But my PC doc, would be pleased I'm out exercising. So I think it is worth the risk. If you don't move, you will "rust". So repairs or not, I'm not going to rust.

I am beginning to believe the New England could be home for a long time. If lonliness was not a factor, I'd be more comfortable. The culture here is cool and hard to get to know, but the great part of that, is once you are a freind, you are really and truely a friend. That is lovely. These cool hearts run deep.

How does a year go by so fast? One way is to be ill. I caught Entamoeba histolytica, in Mexico. Usually is gives you dysentery. I did not have that. Just a run-down feeling, and then atrial-fibrillation in my heart. I had to have a cardiac ablation.

As soon as that was done, I felt "creepy-crawlies" in my esophagus. After complaining to my doctor several times, she did an ovo-parasite test, and there the little buggers were! Treatment consisted of 12 days of Flagyl, immediately followed by 20 days of Yodoxin. Very expensive stuff.

I got better, immediately, but it has taken a full year to feel like normal. The amoeba, lasts, in the soil and on things for weeks. There is no telling where it came from other than it is common in Mexico, and half the people may have it, but are immune, since they grew up with it. Not me, I'm vulnerable to odd things like that.

I am happy to be back in the USA, however, I miss very much, the liveliness and the color of Mexico. I do like the quiet here, in the US. People don't blast their stereos over everybody else, expecting them to cope.

I am a very sensitive person, to environment. Noise, is stress, for me. But when I'm playing my guitars, well, I'm up the for noise, then.

This last winter, was my first in New Hampshire. It is very cold here in the winter. I experienced my first deep snow. It was amazing! Snow piles along every single road. Many roads in town, were not plowed a lot, so they became one-laners. There is absolutely no parking on the street in the winter, because you will get your car plowed under, or smashed by the plow.

Digging out your car, just to go the the store, became "normal". You just plan to take an extra 10 minutes, to get your car clear. And staying warm is not so big a problem, if you are shoveling powder snow. The wet snow, if too heavy for me. I just push it aside, like a mini-plow.

I didn't play out in it this year. I had to get a new polyethylene insert in my knee, as I wore the second one out withing 2 years. Maybe this time it will last.

The best news , is that I am playing music with other's now. I go to a cafe 20 miles away and play with friends, every week. I love it. Now it looks as though we may be branching off into a group of our own, from some of the friends I met. I am so excited, and writing songs like mad now.

I'll include one here and there, as they get a formal copyright done.

So long for now, CCS

Lots of changes

On new years day, 2009, I left my house-mate and moved back to Bucerias. It was cooler there, than before, but still warm.
I had a lot of physical pain, and went to a doctor. He put me on prednisone, and thyroid medicine, and then I had a recurrence of atrial fibrillation.
After several weeks of this recurring, I had to go to a Centro de Salud, and they sent me to a hospital in San Francisco, Nayarit. I was there, in the ER, on a gurney for 3 days. My heart stopped once, and I called family in the US, and they got me a plane ticket and I went to Arizona.
After several more months of Atrial fibrillation, I had a surgery to stop the problem. The surgery was successful, and I had no arrhythmias for 3 months.
I was very weak after the surgery, from complications, and went to New Hampshire to stay with my daughter. I continue to improve in some ways and get worse in others.
I have started a new practice of meditation. I meditate for about 40 minutes. I am also researching how I can live on a small income.
I found out last month, I had been divorced for 3 weeks, without my ex telling me he had filed the papers we had signed in the summer. Very disgusting behavior. Now I have to go take care of some things in Oregon, and meet my 3 new granddaughters. But I also have to come back to NH. It is going to be a long, and cold trip. Let's hope for good weather.

They tell me this is the sunny time of year here. "Six months of not a cloud in the sky." Well it has been not true this year!

A week an a half ago, the clouds came in the afternoon. They have been doing that lately. Then is got windy, and rained. Then about 10 p.m. we had very hard wind, lightning, and rain. My power went out.

As I tried to peer through my screens, it was just too dark to see, until a streak of lightnening lit things up. To my amazement, the palms looked just like they do on TV when they show hurricanes in the southeastern US. The tops wer absolutly bent over into a tight bundle.

I live upstairs, on the side away from the beach. But my door opens to a breeze-way (a well-named hall) where the rain had flooded the floors and left a puddle outside my room. Things were banging loudly, so I went back in, afraid something would fly through the hall and hit me. My fears were well founded come morning.

Though there were no objects in my hall, other than water, there were trees down, walls and fences down, and power lines as well. Roof ceramic tiles--very heavy had come down in places. Palapas, the palm frond rooofs on some places, were torn up or fallen down.

The open market tents had damages to clean up and roofs to replace.

Many saws buzzed on the street, as clean-up crews cut down broken branches, freed trees from lines, and cut down broken, torn up trees, such as the beautiful orange Obaliscos, many badly damaged in the storm.

I never heard a word on the street before the storm that one was coming. Some later said they heard a bit on the radio. Mostly we were all surprised, as storms don't usually come inside Bandaras Bay, and rip things apart. The last hurricane was (I think) 2002, in Puerto Vallarta, where the Malacón, the grand walkway along the sea wall was torn up badly. This was much smaller, but very intense. the worst must have lasted no more than an hour.

After the storm, I slept the best sleep I had had in 10 years. Being weather sensitive sometimes has its advantages.

Courage Come Slowly

Courage Come Slowly
I titled this site "courage come slowly" because that is how it seems to come. Slowly. Not by leaps and bounds of new courage to do or to be, but by little realizations of "oh, I did that, and maybe that does work". "Oh, I think I CAN live with this, or that", or tolerate a fear long enough for it not to be a fear anymore. Solo life is a scary thing to me. In this precess of coming to another country, I am finding that solo does not mean alone. Solo is my state of living without a partner, but alone, I am not. I make friends all the time, and the ones I made last week are better friends this week, and on and on we go, ever growing closer.

I have so many more strengths than I did a year ago. I panic less, I tolerate more, and I begin to recover from a long and painful marriage. Now, everyday has happiness in it. I have peace. I am hungry to learn new things, and have more strength to do so. I am less afraid of the world. I am becoming "me". My physical health is improving, too.

New opportunities are on the horizon, and I hope to be completely on my feet within the next 2 years. I feel appreciated here. Why I don't feel appreciated in the U.S., may have something to do with the way a lot of people view art and artist in the U.S. Art is is widely valued in the U.S. as a precious gift. Is seems to be looked at with an aw, but also the attitude of "not ever going to make you money". The same attitude my family expressed when I was a child. The implied message being that if you didn't make money, you were worthless as a person. How many artists have received the question, "So when are you going to get a real job?" ---too many.

How is it that we say so little encouragement to artists in the U.S., and then pay billions of dollars for the products of creative people? Every movie, TV advertisement, magazine, photo, print, and sign, are the works of creatives. Did you know that every item you see in a film, was placed there with intent? Every jar, can, spoon in a kitchen, every shirt, every stain on every shirt, every fluff of soap bubbles, etc, were placed there by artists of costume and set design.

Watch the film, The Bucket List, again. When the character sits in the soap bubbles and talks, the scene flips from one character to the other. Watch the scene carefully, for the position of the soap bubbles on his chest. If you observe your own bubble bath, you will see that the bubbles tend to minimize with time, and slip down the body. But somehow his bubbles get more fluffy, and slipped UP his body, in a scene that seems to take seconds. This just made me roar with laughter at how I was "into" the film, and then realized that is is still a work of art, not a real thing happening. It is a "story" that is in motion. It is lovely and sweet, and and creative, and it is art--and we paid millions of dollars to view it.

Adobe Dwellings and Making Tortillas

The joys of adobe. Or maybe I should say the joys of mold. On the left, the lean-to on the back of this building, is my apartment. Notice how the wall is open near the roof. This is necessary. There is no heat here, and if I want heat in the kitchen, I need a chiminea. Which I cannot yet afford--I would have to pay for the chiminea and someone to move it here as well.

There is an electric heater in the bedroom, but when the electricity is out, there is no heat. Br-r-r-r! As a consequence. There is a problem with things molding. Mold grows anywhere there is not good air circulation. Behind furniture, in the bathroom, under things not used.... It is very frustrating. I don't want' mold on my canvases, so I have to move them around a lot, and keep checking to make sure nothing sits or gets accidentally pushed against a wall.

Tortillas:

I can tell when someone is making tortillas. The smoke eases out from under the edges of the roof, and as I go by I can hear the poo-pop-pop of someone's hands on the dough.

A neighbor showed me how to make tortillas. REAL tortillas. She cooks in a kitchen like this mine, open on the top, with open cupboard spaces below the counter (la barra). The tortillas are cooked on a piece of steel, like the lid of a 55 gallon drum, over a wood fire. The metal for this is called a "comál¨. The smoke travels out, through the openings above the adobe walls , below the roof. The comál is a great pan for dry frying. I have one, but my indoor stove is a two-burner hot stove. My comál is too big to work well. I have yet to try it outside.

The woman making tortillas, worked with gentle, focused efficiency. She would dip her hand in a little water, then take a small ball of freshly ground corn (there is a man in town who's business is grinding corn for tortillas), pass it between her hands, with a "pop-pop-pop" firmly patting, between her palms. It made a perfectly smooth flattened ball.

Then, she would open up the press. It is heavy wood, about 10" across. She showed me how the plastic bag she had sliced opened was positioned in the press. A light-weight bag--not too stiff. She placed the ball on the bottom, closed the top, and flipped the lever, and pressed firmly on the handle that crossed over. When she opened it up, there was a perfectly round tortilla.

What surprised me, we her next step. She picked up the tortilla, plastic and all, and set it against the top part of the press. She flipped open the plastic and replaced it, then picked it all up, and flipped it over in her hand, lifting the plastic off the other side, then flopped the tortilla right down on the comál. Looked easy enough, I thought. We didnt' speak each other's language. Just cooking. Then she motioned for me to try the same.

I picked up a little ball of dough, and patted out a tortilla, then put it in the plastic in the press, and closed the lid. So far, so good. Then I opened it, and tried to flip the plastic up as she had done. My tortilla stuck to the plastic a bit. Then I tried to pick it up and remove the plastic from the other side. It stuck, too. Then, I tried to flip it out on the hot comál. Ouch! My tortilla landed crumpled in a combo-pile of flat and rumpled dough.

She helped smooth out my tortilla. Then when it was time to flip them. Her tortillas were constantly moving before me. Toss down, after a few seconds move to the side a bit. Then after a few more, flip over. Then after a few more, flip over again. When it all puffs up, pull it off and put under a towel to keep warm. Incredible! Increible!

My poor tortilla didn't turn too well when it was done. I went back to my new comál in my own apartment and proceeded to make more ugly tortillas. I must say, they are getting better. I had to make Guatamala style tortillas for many days (a thicker, small style) before I could even consider a nice thin tortilla. Still working on good tortillas. This is one of those kitchen skills that take a while to master.

I felt 9 years old all over again, learning to cook. My kitchen skills are strong, for American and European food. I can cook some Asian, too. But not so with traditional Mexican cooking, on traditional materials. Starting life over, right?

Ripe oranges, A lttle painting, My neighbor´s house.

These oranges are ripe off the tree. They were delicious! Some others, left a bit longer, turned no more than yellow, and became dry an flavorless.

An 8x10 panel painting. It now lives in Canada with my friend Audrey. I have work in 3 nations now. I guess that makes me an international artist(?)

My neighbor's house on the right. He bought this house for his young family and is restoring it. A safety team worked for days removing bees from it. Across the street is the open door of the ¨Tienda¨ where I buy small groceries. It is our version of 7-Eleven, and works very well. No ATM inside this one. No cameras, either.