bleeding color

Mexico did me in with it's colors.
Un-capturable by camera.
Nevertheless, I tried.

it takes a vendor

Every night at 7:30, whether we were at the villa, or walking up the hill, sitting by the pool, or traversing across town...we heard his call. For days, I thought it was two men: One would call out the first part

"ahYUP!"

quickly followed, overlapped even, with the low sound,

"eeeehhhhhhhhhhh"

and once again,

"ahYUP!"

and then,

"oooohhhhhhhhhhh"

It was fascinating. Strange. Eerie.
The way it came every night at the same time, the way it started above our house on the hill and made it's way down into the town. The way it bounced heavily off the sides of crowded buildings and kept us entranced. We couldn't see him when we heard him. And we couldn't find him when we ran out of the gate to catch him.
It was driving us crazy.
In a good way.
And I was determined to get to the bottom of it. I wasn't leaving Mexico until we found him.

I LOOOVE a vendor call. I think the first vendor that caught my eye was a heavy-set, sweaty guy in NYC who seemed to take up a street corner while sitting on a turned over box. He picked up and set down little wind-up mice and called out in this classic new york, nasally voice, "good for caaaats, good for caaaats". To this day, he's one of my favorite.

But this call, this vendor, wherever he was, whoever he was, would go down in my memory as one of the best for being one of the most unusual, one of the most mysterious. He wasn't calling out words, I still wasn't even clear it was just one man ...and I could NOT figure out what in the world he was selling. One night, RK decided to ask our night manager, Francisco, if he knew what it was. He described the call and Francisco smiled. Yes, he said, he knew what it was. But, as with any lack of language skills, we could only make out that it was some sort of corn thing and deduced that it was probably tamales. We worked out a plan to be home by 7:30 that night and we'd buy at least six to ten of them, eat a couple for dinner and freeze the others to enjoy throughout the week.

Laying by the pool that night, we heard the call! We threw on our clothes, raced out the gates, passed Francisco (smiling widely at us crazy Americans), and hoofed it down the street. There he was! Right at the street corner! We saw him do the call! We tried to act casual as we half sauntered, half ran up to him, but our excitement was overtaking us.

There was no clue as to what product he was hawking. A young guy, with a couple of coolers attached to a dolly. No pictures, or signs, or even anyone near him enjoying his wares. We went for it anyway,

Us: Cuatro, por favor.
Him: Cuatro?
Us: Si. Cuatro.
Him: Con queso?
Us: ummmm, si?

He whips open one of the coolers. Our eyes are wide, our mouths slightly open... what could possibly be in there?! What in the world was he going to add cheese to?!

He pulled out four cobs of corn, jabbed in a thick dowel of wood that had been fashioned into a small spear, pulled out a spatula covered in mayonnaise and slathered it all over each ear and then rolled them all in queso. I'm not sure he noticed our slumped shoulders and, luckily, he couldn't hear our hearts sink as we each took our two ears and walked away. But, by the time we got home, handed an ear to Francisco, and sunk our teeth into the rock-hard, freezing cold corn kernels, we were laughing our heads off. ALL the build-up, ALL the wonder, ALL the guessing, ...and here we were, holding the result of a week-long mystery and we couldn't even eat it!

Ah, well, we told each other....it'll make for a great story.

welcome, to bellas artes de mexico

hola, bellas artes!
what i wouldn't give to spend a year learning with you...in your very hallowed halls...

Bellas Artes: San Miguel's premier school for the arts offers classes in photography, sculpture, music, dance and painting.

Every classroom we looked into held another treasure. I wanted IN so badly!


Located in an old convent, the patio feels sacred and the classrooms downright holy. They were locked when we walked around, though there were a few artists inside, here and there, perfecting their craft.


Each room solidly dedicated to the one thing it proclaimed. None of this mixing and matching of instruments or art supplies. One thing at a time, it seemed to say. Do it right and do it well. A very good philosophy, I must say.

Strange but true,
and who are we to say?

Learn the Language

SMA the locals call it. After more than a week there, I want to be a local too! Maybe it's the constant cobblestone streets. Not just one or two left, even when the streets are "newly paved", they're a super bumpy cobblestone beauty. The smiles of everyone you pass on the street, the church bells ringing every hour or the common calls of this or that street vendor. Maybe it was the perfect weather. The sidewalks-for-one were a wonder I never grew tired of. I'm just fine with stepping into the street. Even if that street, any ONE of them, had nary a street sign or street light or even a lamp post. Many moons ago, the town of San Miguel d'Allende was declared a National Monument and, with that declaration, there can be no neon signs, no modern buildings, and apparently, no street lights or ugly signs. Day one, we noticed Starbucks somehow worked it's way into the town (how do they DO that?!)
I loved being able to go to the many markets on the way home: One for tortillas, one for veggies, and my favorite, one for pollo. It was a shop no bigger than a walk-in closet, with a glassed-in spit and a little man in a chair next to it. You couldn't get in the door so much as you stood in the doorway and ordered. It was all he sold. It was tres pesos (about .25, at this point) and he cut it up, wrapped it, threw in a little baggie of jalapenos and away we went. There was even a spot called chocolate y churros. We joked about meeting there all week, but never made it. There's just more to do in this little town than a week would allow. Especially if you know you also need to get in a little sleep and some poolside margaritas.

When we did go out, I clung to my few known Spanish words: Hola, Gracias, Buenos Dias, Buenos Tardes, Buenos Noches, Hasta Luego, Adios. I got the 'how are you?' and the 'my name is..., what's yours?' down pat, as well. But the one I relied on the most was "SI!" Which kept all transactions quite positive, if sometimes confusing.
If you opened your morning with a well-accented, "Good morning, how are you today?" it's inevitable that the person you're speaking to thinks you habla espanol and away they go! Pretty soon, you're so far behind in understanding, you just end the topic with a "SI!" and hope for the best.

(Fortuitously, while I was down there, I read David Sedaris' book When You Are Engulfed In Flames and,
in his hysterical piece "In The Waiting Room",
he really clarifies how one good, foreign word can lead you to amazing places unknown.)

Hang Ten

It's a boiling hot night and all I want to do is throw all the covers off my body and let the air breeze over me.
Except my feet. I cannot, for the life of me, leave my feet out.
I have a
Totally.
Irrational.
Fear.

It doesn't matter how steaming hot it is, my vulnerable little toes will get covered up. Otherwise, I lay there, imagining a monster peeking through the door, licking his lips, drool cascading to the ground, just waiting to leap for those exposed feet: A perfect hold point for a monster.

Mexico, boiling hot...and, for just a moment, in all this heat, I forget! I leave my ten little toes hanging over the edge of the bed. I feel a cool breeze between my toes and a...
What's That?!
Was that hot breath I felt?!
A Slither I heard?!

For under-the-bed monsters, there's no need to even see the object of their desire. They just get close enough to the edge, right underneath your mattress, throw a hairy arm straight up and BOOM! they've got you by the ankle now and will proceed to drag you to the depths of hell! (or, wherever it is monsters go...)

Finally, there are closet-monsters that peer out at their good luck from just behind the doors. I always make sure closets are closed all the way, for if even a crack is left open, they can see the glint of my tiny toenails. It's like a little pin light that leads their way.

So, my time in Mexico, with beautifully hot nights, the breeze blows in our open window, the bedroom door ajar for cross-current, the closet doors securely shut and me, in my itty-bitty nightie with as much skin exposed to the air as possible and my feet tightly wrapped in the blanket (feeling like i've put my soles to a hot iron), I'm safe, ever so safe, from what lurks.

holy smokes, Kate MccGwire...




And there's more where that came from. What an insane amount of detail and time and precision. The pigeon feathers come from pigeon wranglers around the UK (hence the stamped markings on the wings). I can't even imagine encountering that curious, beautiful beast in that enormous museum cabinet. The piece is called "Vex".

And then she went and made this one,
called "Rile".

travely

i'm feeling all travely now.

getting my travel on...

mexico, like a second honeymoon with RK.

france, like the good ole days, with my sister, my mom, and 12 strangers that will probably end up as life long friends.

new york, like a third honeymoon with RK, and none of this tourist shit, we're house swapping with friends and living like we're living there.

it's for almost six weeks straight. i bought a small suitcase. forcing myself to pack light. beautiful, but light. new clothes, new bags, new shoes. and, away we go....

i'm leaving on a jet plane (today). not sure when i'll be back again.


all images square america

grandma's bowl

{bon iver's skinny love -- to be opened & played in another tab, while reading}

i was standing doing the dishes tonight when this song came on. i don't know what it is about this song, but it makes me think of hanging out with my family or it makes me think of being young and hanging out with my family. there's something really youthful to it. and i've been thinking about youth, specifically the disappearance of it, a lot lately.

but as i'm standing there, doing the dishes, listening to this song, i realize i'm really a grown up now. i think of all the grown up things that take over my daily life. the grown up details, the good and the bad.
and i'm doing the dishes, doing grown up dishes. i'm washing a bowl. the type of bowl i'd always associated as a grown-up piece of dishware. it looks exactly like something my gramma carey had.

recently a really, really cool friend of mine and kaari's came back into our lives. i think it'd been about four years since we'd seen H. she'd been a good friend of my sister's for years. maybe even her first customer ever? and they'd hit it off and gotten together as friends since then. years later, when i met H for the first time, it felt like meeting family. when she met RK, she fell in love with the 'us' of us. so, her coming back into our lives this past year was like coming home again.

almost four years ago, she bought RK and i a wedding gift. this year, she sent it to us.
and this is the bowl of which i speak.
we'd had one like it when i was a kid. this grown-up bowl that reminded me of my gramma.
i remember it as one of the best bowls in our kitchenware repertoire. it was our popcorn bowl, mostly, but it had held other important food items over the years. here it was, my version of those days. it was in my hands, this gorgeous hand-made wood bowl.

and this song was playing and it,

it made me feel like the kind of grown-up i'd always wanted to be in my youth.

Introducing....the Neighborhood!

I felt like a roadie for a rock show. I was just there to lay down the action, stand back, and watch it come together.

Not one of these pictures does it justice.
Not even a lot of pictures do it justice.
The kids each dressed like a neighborhood worker.
We had a dentist,
an ambulance driver.
Soccer coach.
Artist.
Fireman.
Policeman.
Hairdresser.
Construction worker.
Theatre Ticket Taker.
Recycling guy.
And a neighborhood that had electricity.
With the long light days and kids' bedtimes being around 8 or so, the lighting of the Neighborhood could have been anticlimactic. But, not with this group. They'd worked too hard and were too excited to notice that these little lights they'd hooked up to batteries and on-the-count-of-three turned on were but mere specks in the whole hood.
On the last day of school, each had to decide who would take the neighborhood section home, only one partner could take the whole thing. Some of them had us cut it right down the middle. Others, knowing how their parents react to home-made projects of this size, let them go easily, with the idea they might visit it at their friend's house. All in all, no tears, no tantrums, just a separation that was as easy as the coming together of it all.

Kinda like the beginning and the ending of the school year.

perfection in plants

I'm leaving soon.
For the summer, really.

Well, for quite a few weeks, actually.

And, I think I'm going to really miss what our little plant friends decide to do while I'm gone.

Already one, given to us by an old neighbor, has decided, out of the blue, to create these perfect little tubes on the ends of her long branches.


I'm impressed. Well, more than impressed. I'm really blown away at what these creatures do when we're not paying attention. I nearly scared RK to death when I yelled out the other night, "OHMYGOSH! COME LOOK!"

Yeah, I was excited. We've had this little beauty for over a year and she's just slowly plotted along. This is her first blossom, if you will.


And just today I noticed there's something more....there are these little red bulbs coming out of the tubes...I can only imagine what they'll explode into!

Oh, please let it happen while I'm still here...

everything will be okay in the end




if it's not okay,
it's not the end.

i got this quote from a new friend. 

being a grown-up, a new friend is always a bonus. 

new friends can be hard to meet. 

new friends aren't just people you meet at a party, talk to for awhile and when you leave you say, 'nice to meet you' , knowing you prolly won't see them til the next gathering of this same group of people. 

no. 

new friends are the ones you meet, you get on like a house on fire and you actually make plans to see each other again. and then, you do it: you have lunch, you gab, you laugh so hard it hurts, and you talk about things you don't usually talk about with the general public.

and, sometimes, advice gotten from a new friend sits a whole new way in your brain.

you will too

The Starfish, by candlelight, inherits the earth.

--adam gopnik
the new yorker

remember the beautiful mind

We're still in this major overhaul of our apartment. It's been so strange to go through stuff, deciding to keep, toss, donate... at the same time, we're doing it in the digital recesses of our life, as well...and it keeps leading me back to all these photos from the last five years that are in deep storage here in the computer. I find my mind wandering to the same place...keep, toss, donate...

I came across one of my favorite photos-- apple photo booth, you brilliant little piece of technology -- probably about 4 years old.The thing that made it my favorite was the response I got from my friend. After I sent it to him, he wrote back,
'hey, good to hear from you. what's up with the "beautiful mind" area in the background?'

It was my studio.
Was.
I'm in a different place now.
I miss it, actually.


Photo No. 11, I guess I'll donate and keep. Settled.

Hey Cap'n!

In our class, we're big on treating people, animals and nature with respect. And, if you get caught mistreating someone or something, you can't cop out by saying, she (or he) made me do it! Doesn't work that way, we tell these little kids who are barely 7 years old. Nope, you gotta do what you know is best.

The phrase we use is this: You are the Captain of your own ship.

And they really took to it. Many a time I'd be walking past one of them and overhear them pleading with another child who'd done some sort of 'wrong',
but YOU are the captain of your OWN ship.

With school closing up shop for the summer, I knew I wanted to make them a little reminder of this past year together...




I was so happy with the way they came out.. (thanks to D, who gave me that ship image ages ago, it's inspired many a project; to RK for being a tech wiz), it felt truly satisfying doing some old school iron ons.

At the end of the day, they all put them on over their clothes and we took a bunch of photos together. I've never squeezed so many kids goodbye, so many times, in one day.

majesty in simplicity

image: oliva bee

We have one more week of school left. Some days, the kids' excitement is so palpable it could be Christmas. Other days, you'd think it was any other day of the week with all the work we have yet to do. With the same insanity that work is exuding, so goes my personal life. Our social calender, our commitments, our schedules are off the hook and we don't seem to be slowing down anytime soon.

When I saw this photo, it made me wish, for just a moment, to be a kid again. A warm evening, I'd walk out to the driveway to climb to the top of our old VW van and just watch the world go by....not a care in sight. Soon mom would call me in for dinner, or dad would ring the big dinner bell posted out on the front porch. I'd come to the table, along with my four other siblings, and we'd melt into the comfort of the known. We'd probably all have ice cream and slowly filter into our rooms. I'd crawl under the covers and read a book til I fell asleep.

Simple.

we must be willing
to get rid of the life we've planned,
so as to have the life
that is waiting for us.
--joseph campbell

Go see UP



and bring tissues.