maria

new books!

New to me, at least. We went to the Feria Del Libro last Saturday and will bought me - or, actually, he gave me money which I used to pay, so, technically, he bought, but he couldn't have picked because we were here in Mexico and the books are in Spanish, although he did buy "Toda Mafalda", which I grew up with, love, and blame for a lot of my views of the world, it is brilliantly funny, sad, and insightful - a few books. I got a Saramago book, "Las Pequeñas Memorias", which had no blurb in the back but for a phrase "Dejate llevar por el niño que fuiste", which means "Let yourself be led by the child you used to be". So I bought it.

- In Mexico, books are sold sealed in a plastic encasing, which I think is ridiculous and also must have lots to do with the fact that no one reads. I have not been able to find statistical reports on the internet about how much people read in this country compared to other countries, but believe me, it's not a lot. This is why I have to guide my purchasing of one book or the other by the blurbs in the back or by previous knowledge of the author. In Saramago's case, both. -

I also bought, after much agonising, because I don't know the author, but it just called out to me, "La Virgen De Los Sicarios" by Fernando Vallejo. And three books by Paco Ignacio Taibo II "La Lejania Del Tesoro", "La Bicicleta De Leonardo" (which I am re-reading), and "Regreso A La Misma Ciudad Y Bajo La Lluvia/Amorosos Fantasmas". I really wanted to get "Para Parar Las Aguas Del Olvido" by Paco Ignacio Taibo (who is Paco Ignacio Taibo II's father and an excellent writer, IMHO), which I read when I was about 18 and really want to re-read and own (It's all about the objects for me), but no luck. I don't know what it is about that book, I can never find it.

I have seen a thousand fractures

I still embrace joy, hope, and love. It's not about having been, having done, or even having your heart broken. Do I see things differently? How could I not? But I know. I know how lucky I am. I have been enough places to know that what we have, who we are together, doesn't come along every day.

Friends separate, divorce, or stay. Friends marry, move in, or run. I don't know which of these things is the most hopeful. Because we all do things out of hope, even when it feels we are doing them out of hopelessness. It's amazing how much you hope for without realising, without being willing to accept it, even. You build your barriers against it, carefully, not leaving any gaps, because without hope there might not be heartbreak. And still, it breaks through, before you realise, before you know, there it is, hope, a tiny green shoot in the cracks.

Yes, we have all broken stuff, we have all had stuff broken for us. Still. Hope. There will be so much joy and happiness to come, there will be so much! If anyone knows this, I know this.

Best wishes, Croila. All our love.

from 2 to three

I am picking up an ID from the postal office today, from 2 to 3. It's mine, it has my picture on it, it's just got my original last name on it. I was adopted when I was older and I need to certify that, yes, my father was my father.

It's simpler than it sounds. Or maybe it sounds simple and it isn't. I don't know. It's taking a long time, I can tell you that. I still need to pick up a couple of other ID's. Driver's license and whatnot. Very exciting. I have to get it done quickly because they need all these documents back in my hometown.

The ex-lover from hell came to Tijuana again. Fortunately, he did not drink. I told him some fairly honest things because it wouldn't be like me not to. He needs to get a girlfriend, he needs to go to therapy, he needs to sort out his life. It's not so much that I care, but the fact that obviously he has a problem. And it bubbles up when he drinks. And obviously he drinks that much because he has a problem. Or maybe he has never been able to handle his drink which is probably why he never drank while we were in University. Anyway, the thing didn't go as badly as it could have and it definitely went better than we expected.

All in all, life is good. I like how it's going, anyway. Unless we have to go to Torreon in the summer, which I hope not, but it's been talked about, otherwise, perfect.

no time, no time, no time

I want to post, clearly, but there's so much going on!! I'm trying to get a fake ID - to get into a bar, obviously -, and we don't know just how successful I'll be until Thursday, the ex-lover from hell is back for another visit. We're all going to TGIF tonight and he's promised to stick to lemonade - I think it says something about you when your friends, or people, ask you to not drink alcohol and you don't even flinch. I just don't know what it says. It's a lot, though -, we got the phone bill for last month and it isn't as much as we thought it was going to be, and I have to do something about my hair now, now, now!

I promise I will post more on some or all of these subjects soon and we can maybe get into why I get so jealous of every person on earth, on account of them being alive, breathing, and making will smile.

Or not.

books

I was able to read pretty much fluently by the time I was three. I can't recall if I could do it in both English and Spanish, but I don't think so. In any case, I could read. I was blessed to have a psychologist for a mother, who ran a battery of psychological tests before I knew enough to be able to cheat on them, and I was immediately discovered to have a mild form of dyslexia - and just recently, dyscalculia, apparently. Which is a bit absurd if you consider that I read lots and became an engineer, but there are reasons to this -. The early discovery allowed my mother to work on it with me so that by the time I got to school - when I was 5 - I was already good enough on my own to overcome difficulties.

This meant that I had to know how to read by the time I got to school. My mother was 19 and had bags of time, I was less than a year old and couldn't run away. So I learnt how to read. I was also fortunate enough that my grandparents owned a bookstore. I would spend the afternoons with them from the age of 4 on. It was fantastic to have so many books at my disposal. My grandparents took great care in not letting me reach books that they felt would corrupt me - which didn't limit me a whole lot because they are very good about knowledge and culture, it mostly just weeded out books that were, really, bad books. Books that if I read now, I would think they were bad anyway -, or perhaps, after this small explanation, books that they felt would corrupt my taste in good books. I would not know what a good book was.

I think that because I was the first grandchild and my mother's first kid, everyone just turned me into their little experiment, now that I look at it. Anyway. I was going somewhere. Where was I?

Right, books. Reading. I was taught all these things before I went to school. And so I love books. It didn't work that way for my friends, it didn't work that way for most Mexicans. Because that is not really how it works in Mexico. I was so very lucky. Had I not had enough tools to deal with the dyslexia by the time I got to school, I would have been categorised as "thick" - the official term - and put in a corner to play with crayons.

Cut to my life now. I live with a man who loves me and loves books - he has also become a man of Action, but how long that lasts remains to be seen! -. He loves books that, before he got here, I would have not even seen. I would not have registered. I have read different things, I have learnt different things. It has all - I feel - been good for me. I am so very lucky.

He is also a teacher. A teacher that knows "his stuff" enough to be able to actually help his students. I am so incredibly proud of the fact that we're together, I am terribly proud of the man he is [as if I had anything to do with it]. During his birthday, his students threw him a surprise party, and I'll be damned if I wasn't elated that they could see just how fucking lucky they are to have such a good teacher.

I'm having a hard time finding a phrase that sums it all up. The joy he's brought to my life, to my children's lives, to the kids at school, to the parents at school. I don't know. It's just so much.

Thank you.

-And I didn't end up where I was going, about books and stuff, but you can see how it doesn't matter now. -

today

I've spent half the day with Danny - she's still here - and we have managed to pack the morning with good mother-daughter moments. Which is nice. In the morning we spoke about the social whathaveyou's at school, we listened to a Gaiman Story, we watched "When A Stranger Calls" - the 1979 version -, finding it mostly funny. I was scared by it when I saw it first (but I was 10 or something. That's my excuse). We watched "Annie Hall" - or part of it, because then we had to go get will from school.

We were parked outside the school, waiting for will and complaining about the weather, when I remembered it's friday. It's friday, which means a certain co-worker of will's will probably ask us for a lift. I groaned.

Danny: What?

Me: It's friday.

D.: So?

Me: The fat man will ask for a lift, probably.

D.: So?

Me: Well, he's just one of those people I find irritating for free.

D.: How do you mean?

Me: Well, I didn't always find him irritating. I did at first, and I said to will, "I hate your friend", and so but he knows and he would sort of tell me he is nice and whatnot, so I made an effort, and I managed to like him for about a day, but then he just fell back to irritating.

D.: But how is he irritating? What does he say?

Me: I don't know, have you ever met a person that just, whatever they say, you just want to slap them? Just for being alive.

D.: Yes.

[pause where I wonder if I sometimes am one of those people she just wants to slap for saying stuff like "it's so hot today!"]

Me: Like, who?

D.: Everyone.

God, I love her so much.

Yesterday

We drove across the border yesterday. We wanted to sort of get a head start on his birthday because his birthday gets a head start on us, starting at 4 in the afternoon the day previous - I asked will to ask his mum the exact time he was born but she doesn't remember, so we can't be accurate about the celebration, something that we take advantage of to spread it out -. And so there we were, queueing to get his permit to cross the border, at 4 in the afternoon, when his birthday officially started.

Now, when I say we wanted to get a head start on his birthday, I have to say that this was not entirely conscious. We were going to pay the credit card bill. That's why we were queueing to go across the border for. But once we were across, I had to buy his present - because I'm a terrible girlfriend and I really cannot pick something that is on the one hand so commonplace and still so personal to him - and I'm not even telling you what it is -. Suffice it to say that we had to go to several stores to find the thing. Which is strange because, like I said, very commonplace. But, whatever. We went to dinner - where we discussed why we do get along and what kind of compromises he has to make so that we do (I don't really compromise that much, to be honest, I mean, there's stuff, yeah, but it so... meh, that it's not even worth mentioning) -. As we were leaving the place, we asked the young hostess at the place - lovely girl - where this mall that we got lost looking for was. And she told us - she even wrote it down, I think I love her -. As we were leaving, a k.d. lang song comes on and I remember that the last time we were there, I couldn't remember k.d. lang's name, and we got the waitress that was serving us involved in the conversation, and she remembered.

It was our hostess. Our hostess was the waitress back then. And she remembered the name of k.d. lang, and sheryl crow. And now she's given us directions to a mall.

She is the internet. She is the internet goddess. That's how the internet works.

We went to the mall. We found the book store. I found a book. The Poetry of Pablo Neruda. I have a deep love for poetry that I'm afraid doesn't get taken out for a walk very often. I don't know why. I picked it up and immediately ran into something I knew. Eventually, though, I ran into a poem I used to know (in spanish) by heart. It's a lovely translation and I am going to share it with you.

XX

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.

Write, for example, "The night is starry
and the stars are blue and shiver in the distance."

The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

Through nights like this one I held her in my arms.
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.

She loved me, sometimes I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her, to feel that I have lost her.

To hear the immense night, still more immense without her.
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.

What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
The night is starry and she is not with me.

This is all. In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.
My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

My sight tries to find her as though to bring her closer.
My heart looks for her and she is not with me.

The same night whitening the same trees.
We, of that time, are no longer the same.

I no longer love her, that's certain, but how I loved her.
My voice tried to find the wind to touch her hearing.

Another's. She will be another's. As she was before my kisses.
Her voice, her bright body. Her infinite eyes.

I no longer love her, that's certain, but maybe I love her.
Love is so short, forgetting is so long.

Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms
my soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer
and these the last verses that I write for her.

I learned this by heart when I was about 18 or 19. There was this girl who liked to hear me tell it to her. I kept trying to remember it last night - because obviously, I knew it in spanish -, but I couldn't get past "... y tiritan, azules, los astros a lo lejos." Not that it makes a difference either way, but I think I should learn it again. For me, just.

My whole family, I think, loves poetry. Except maybe my uncle Alex. But "he didn't need that shit to get laid." And in the end, for my uncles, it might have been as crass as all that. I don't know. Somehow, having written that, I don't think so. It wasn't.

  I like how it makes me feel. I like the fact that it's so primal that we can all relate to it. I like to think that we could all like poetry, but some people just need more time. And desire. You have to have desire.

Are you still longing,
seeking what is beautiful,
what is decent and true?
Here in my hand, this flower,
my love, is shockingly red.

    -Yosano Akiko.

birthdays

His birthday is tomorrow. There's been some expenses that have been unavoidable and so it's not going to be  huge or anything, but I am hoping I can buy him something today. I realise that to him it's not a big deal, but it so is a big deal. It's his birthday!

phonecalls

Some weekends are just a car crash, aren't they? I've no idea what happened this weekend, but I know that it was mother's day. The kids brought presents and the sweetest cards ever. Or maybe not ever, but it just kills me that they still manage to love me even though I'm crazy. Which Danny mentions, sweetly, signing off "I love you, you weirdo", which would only work for us, really.

I had to call my mother and my grandmother, and my mother called back at some point on Sunday, also - mother's day is the 10th in Mexico, no matter what day of the week it falls on -. I now know way too much about every relative I'd ever forgotten I had - thanks to my grandma - and way too much about what's going on with my grandpa and his care - thanks to my mum. On the one hand, I am the only one who's ever been separated/divorced in my family, according to my grandma, who didn't say that because she doesn't know that I am, she just said that now everyone is married and happy. Except for the underage kids in the family, who will undoubtedly marry and stay married forever because that is their destiny.

It's always hard to speak to my grandmother and hear her speak lovingly of my ex (or soon to be ex-husband, anyway). On the one hand, I can see why she likes him and support my mother's decision not to tell her because, seriously, what is the point? She's only going to worry. On the other hand, Will is wonderful and I wish she knew that. I wish she knew how much better I am doing now that I don't want to kill myself.

But if she didn't know how badly we were doing - no one did - then there is no point. Or at least my mother doesn't think there is. As my whole family lives very far away, I can see how she would think so. I still don't like to have to listen to how lucky I am to have married a man who very nearly ruined my life. I can say he didn't because my life is great now, but I'd rather not have people telling me how fucking wonderful he is, thankyouverymuch.

Meh.

Will called his mother, which always makes me very happy. They spoke about this. I love, love, love her because of how happy her voice sounds on the phone when she realises who it is on the phone. Love her. It fills me with tenderness. I don't know what it is. I like that he calls her - and I know he didn't particularly used to, which makes me ache for her, I swear, so I am happier still that he does it now. Mums are important, even if one hates them. I know I am lying to my mother now - about the whole inheritance thing - and, even just lying by omission, I feel bad about it. Yes, she's a nutter, a druggie, and an alcoholic, but god dammit, she is still my mother. I can say horrible things about her, but you can't. Just like I can talk trash about Mexico but will gladly defend him from "masiosares*". Same thing with my mum. She's mine. I don't like her most of the time, some days I wish she was dead, but, god dammit, I love her. I can only hope that my kids love me even though I am a weirdo.

*In the Mexican national anthem, there is a phrase that reads "Mas si osare un extraño enemigo profanar con sus plantas tu suelo..." which translates roughly to "If a strange enemy dared to desecrate your soil with the soles of his feet..." and then it goes on to speak of the fact that the country has a soldier in every son - albeit a poorly trained one. Anyway, a cousin of mine - tiny devil of a thing -, asks me one day who Masiosare is. You know, the strange enemy. Because "Masiosare, un extraño enemigo". So. Who is he?
Obviously, we started insulting each other with that word. Masiosare. "Eres un masiosare." You know, to substitute for any other word you could think. Pendejo, mostly. But there you go.

linking

After a lot of fretting, and a couple of conversations Will had with a certain parent - it's funny now! - things have sort of evolved. It turns out that this man is very cool and has decided - after having given it a lot of thought way before this started, it seems - to start a blog. Except he started two. One in Spanish - which I am sure at the very least Gabo will appreciate, I thought it was very funny, and he offers some curious insights and a surprising amount of candidness that is terribly endearing -: Con aspecto Sinaloense, and one in English, which, even though his intentions were to write simple translations to the posts he thought he would originally write in Spanish, has taken on a life of its own and - as he's only just started - I am sure will offer a view of a man's life in Mexico which is devoid of the violence and drug dealing that is perceived to go on around these parts. Or it might just be to late for that: Being from Sinaloa in TJ (Mexico). Please go say hello!