maria

documents

I have a long list of things we have to get done if we ever get our hands on any significant amount of money that may be coming our way via dead relatives - and obviously it hasn't, but it might, still, happen -. One of the things on that list is a divorce.

"What?" I hear you asking, "But, given the situation and the circumstances, I thought... ". Yes. We all thought. We all thought it would be done immediately by my ex. Because why would he want to stay married? And you know, I don't know. I don't get it either. But there it is and there you have it, he hadn't. But he did. I signed the documents on Saturday. We still have to go in front of a judge and resist all temptation to fall back into each other's arms when he admonishes us about the importance of family, marriage, and the sanctity and whatnot of it. If he only knew.

The kids think it's awesome, though. Because they really just want everyone to move on, like they, apparently, have. Which is nice, you know? It doesn't really stop me from feeling a bit guilty - about, you know, failing to keep my shit together in the face of fantastically huge loneliness -, but it does make me feel like, hey, they'll be OK, maybe.

Will has been very cool about it, or so he seems. I think in the back of his mind he is worried that I will grow bitter about his situation. I don't know. I sort of always figured it didn't really matter, but now that this is happening - my divorce -, it's sort of been "there", like the beginning of a headache makes you realise that your head is there, just being there.

Although I still don't think it really matters. I'm actually quite happy to be granted "single" status again. You know, in about three months, given the judge admonishment scheduling, but, wow! I'll be single.

Just typing that I feel like an enormous weight has been lifted off my shoulders. This is going to be awesome.

Ithaca, or Ferris Bueller, you're my hero.

Hi. I know it's great and lovely with the handwriting but linkage needs to be done and it is overall clearer to just type, so let's move on.

It's been hectic, as I'm sure you've all read over at La casa de Will. Something I know he mentioned and I'm just throwing my - small - weight behind is Laguna Niguel, and their wonderful Auto Center. This repair shop was a true blessing.

Now. The trip. Will might say that neither of us had a bad feeling or premonitions. I have to confess to having had a nightmare about the truck, something going wrong with it. I dismissed it because I know I am usually very anxious about things and it is not uncommon for me to be incredibly fearful. If I started not doing things out of fear, I would never do anything! So we went. It was fun to get lost for a bit just to meet the fantastic people at Fat Chance and get to see this desk [Check out the gorgeous inlaid brass handles, the beautiful, flawless finish, it is absolutely perfect]. Jeff was very cool about the two sweaty tourists in his store and gave us directions. We got to the gallery with absolutely no problems after that. I loved the show, I fell in love with a painting - trust me, this image doesn't do it justice - and we got on the road, deciding to drive around for a bit.

To be perfectly honest, I expected it to have many more fake breasts, Los Angeles. But there you go. You get the feeling that everyone is busy, that everyone has a dream, that everyone is trying to get somewhere. At a point, while driving down Santa Monica Blvd., I saw an older blonde woman wearing lots of big chunky diamond(?) bracelets, red lipstick, unsmiling expression, and I got the feeling that it's hard to be happy in LA.

We started the drive back hoping to be able to stop in San Clemente before coming home to watch "So You Think You Can Dance?" (I am not even offering an explanation to this, if you read Will's blog, you know how involved we got with the thing and how much I hated the tractor - was he the best dancer? yes, was he the most talented one? you bet. You're missing the point [as I walk away sullenly]). It was not to be. A pit stop at a petrol station in Mission Viejo ended up being the last stop for the day, sot of.

The truck wouldn't start. I thought it had overheated because... I don't know. It made no sense that it would - at all -, but it was missing some coolant, so I just assumed. Me and a man named Mufasa. Or Mustafa. Or something. He seemed like he wanted to help and, stupidly, even though I found the man a bit frightening, I didn't want to seem racist. Which you would think I could, given that I am Mexican, so I shouldn't have any qualms about rejecting people of any race or colour on the basis that I don't fucking know them, but what can I say, I was stupid.

165 dollars later, a thermostat had been destroyed and a band that didn't need changing had been changed. This got us about 30 metres westward on the crown valley parkway. And then stuck in the middle of it. Will and Mustafa (Mufasa, whatever, you get who) and a man from AAA (who could help no further because we don't have a card and left us with a final warning "Be careful, he is not a good man" - Too late, man, but thanks -, before driving away) pushed the truck into what we would later find out to be Laguna Niguel.

At this point, I want to throw up I feel so sick at the thought of everything that is happening. We are stuck. WIth a strange man. In the middle of nowhere! My stomach contracts but there is nothing to actually throw up, so I end up just bent over, stomach hurting.

- at this point half of you have left me here, which is fair enough, this is a long post and I know from comments that make no sense that most people give up anyway, but kudos to you for sticking around, strange person still reading! -

Mufasa (or mustafa) won't just go away. He wants to help, he says. We have no more money, I tell him. He still won't go away. I turn to Will: "Save me". I shit you not, I said that. Save me. I know it sounds corny and ridiculous, but at that moment I really just needed him to get on the thing and move it forward.

And of course, OF COURSE HE DID. How much do I love this man? He and what'shisface pushed the truck into a parking lot for a mall that had, unbeknownst to us the best auto repair centre in the world, and then he told him - politely - to fuck off. I was progressing into the state of "complete fucking wreck" ("why are we even here? The show was not THAT good, we are going to die here! we are going to kill ourselves going down this hill, I could never be an illegal immigrant, I just don't get how they get through the desert, look at me nearly killing myself going down this stupid hill, I picked the wrong week to quit smoking, we are going to die here, this is going to be so expensive, I can just hear it on the news, Fox, almost certainly, "they were last seen walking down the railroad tracks..." , I just want to go home"), Will just fucking shone. ("We are going to be fine. We are together, we are happy, we are going to be fine"), he was hitting his stride as "the person who can get us through anything" ("It's going to be fine, we are going to be fine, we'll spend the night at a hotel, we will watch SYTYCD, we will get some rest, tomorrow the workshop will be open and this will get sorted out, don't worry, we are together, we are happy.").

We walked to the hotel, where we got a room (it was a great room, let me just say, very clean and spacious). I hardly slept.

Next day, Sergio at the auto center tells us he will get us back on the road today. The waiting room has internet service and Will can get his people drunk - avoiding a rebellion -, and we feel like we are back in contact with the world. Everything is going to be fine. Everything is going to be fine. Everything is going to be fine.

hope

There are things about Will that bemuse me. This apologising thing - yes, I understand, I do, in Mexico, we are taught to say please, excuse me, thank you, so on and so forth, it's a social lubricant, politeness, but apologising in your sleep is a whole other business - for starters. But I love all of them. I love him. I like that I know who he is, and that things may throw me, but they are looked at from a perspective of love, trust, and understanding.

And the hope. You know he is happy, you know he's creative, he can tell stories like no one else - except perhaps other members of his family, or that's what he says and I believe him -, and you know about the avocado pits. And the lemon seeds. And green stuff.

He's been trying to grow an avocado, he's been trying to grow a lemon tree. It hasn't quite worked out how he would want it to. But he continues trying. He has hope. I love him for that.

The kids have been here since Tuesday. No socks have been lost yet and all seems to be running smoothly. Of course, during this time, we've found out that Danny cannot dice a tomato to save her life - she's never had to - and that when the hem in her uniform goes, she tapes it - with masking tape, because apparently it lasts longer than most other kinds -. She was going to have the maid do it, but I've taught her how. She did half of it and gave up. Argh.

Oh, and this made me really sad today. If this is what's happening in America - the world? - then what can we expect in Mexico?

on apologising

Sometimes Will will apologise randomly. For. No. Reason. I love him and he apologises. I thought it was... odd, and yet... you know, him.

I was wrong. He wrote that and then Alan - who is lovely - commented. Immediately Will thought he'd said something wrong, which prompted an e-mail. Which prompted an e-mail back from Alan. Which... yeah. Crazy apologising loop ensues. It's a wonder they have time to do anything else.

Anyway, my guess is that, living in Mexico, Will doesn't get to do his daily share of apologising, so he will do so at random moments in the day.

He comes out of school and I am sat out in the truck reading. "I'm sorry - he will start - I was held up talking to... " It's 2:20 PM. He's on time.

He makes dinner and serves it in front of the TV and I get up to get drinks. "I'm sorry - he says - I was going to go get that... " His hands and forearms holding dishes.

We're in bed and he needs to turn over to be able to sleep "I'm sorry". He will even apologise in the middle of the night. I'm sure he's not even awake when he does that - He also says he loves me in his sleep. Which is adorable.

Yes, he apologises if I step on his feet. What is this apologising madness?

keep putting it off.

I keep putting this off. not because I don't want to sit here and tell you about whatever, but because I like to give will a chance to blog it himself before. He tells things so well! - Sometimes there's a feeling of redundancy to this two-blogger household, although I get that we have different styles, I wouldn't be with him if I hadn't loved the way he writes in the first place, so I wonder why I keep doing it if I prefer reading about it anyway, but here I am and I still do it. Go fig. - And so you know now about Santos winning the championship - Which is brilliant and it makes me miss my hometown dearly -, and you've heard about the man who was asked to move the trophy out of the sun and burned his hand when trying to - Silver trophy, one hour, 46 degrees Celsius in the shade. What was he thinking?

It'll be a cool story for him to tell, one day. Not yet, though.

This past week I also killed the television and an iron. The kiss of death. It had been a while. The Television happened to break down one hour before the first leg of the Santos - Cruz Azul finals. This made us have to go get a television one hour before the game started. We came back home after picking something we both liked enough and could afford, installed it quickly, found the second half of the match and I spent it agonising in front of the new TV.

- Just now I was looking for some links on the game and I spent entirely too much time on it.

This week was the week of phonecalls, too. I answered no e-mails, I talked to my parents, since we have a new phone plan that charges us the same whether I dial long distance or not. So long as it is within Mexico. It's brilliant and I'm very happy about it. It's a bit of a problem that it doesn't work the same for mobiles, but then again there are only a couple of people who don't have anything but a mobile and we'll just have to stick to e-mails.

I finally finished "The Woman Who Walked Into Doors." and it's heart-wrenching. I loved it, it's so good, but it's so hard to read! Afterwarsd I read JPod, which provided the much needed break I needed. Light, funny, great.

And that was my week. I have not killed any appliances this week, apparently. Unless that sound was your fridge going. Sorry!

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.

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!