Life in Paradise?
Recently in an email, Sharon wrote, “So how does it feel to have your house in paradise”. She was referring to our bungalow here in Tenacatita. Also recently, a friend Sylvia published a piece in her blog (http://admiralfox.blogspot.com) titled Country Living is Not for Wimps. Sharon’s statement and Sylvia’s blog got me thinking about what paradise is and if I really live in paradise, as Sharon alluded. I’ll begin by describing my version of paradise, how it looks and feels to me. My paradise has lots of open spaces with nature dominating; forests and meadows everywhere; beautiful beaches and rivers abound; wild animals roam freely, and the sky is filled with colorful singing birds. Rain falls from a beautiful cloud-filled sky, which has a daytime bright sun and a nighttime moon and stars. So far it sounds like earth, but here is where I diverge from reality, because in my paradise nature is benevolent and there never are wild storms, droughts, or biting, stinging creatures.
On a more personal level, my paradise includes my lover, and together we explore the depths and heights of our relationship. We have True Love since we practice the four elements of love: loving-kindness, compassion, joy, and freedom*. My family and friends are close by and we visit often, love among us brings us comfort and we find joy in each other’s company; and conversation among is of high priority because it helps us gain understanding. My Lover, my family and my friends bring me peace and love.
That is a simple version of my paradise. Now to the question, “Do I live in paradise?” Obviously, from my description of paradise, it is clear I do not. Sure I have a house on the beach in a beautiful setting; a very tropical, beautiful place. However, I have unbearable heat and humidity; the storms and rains come as they please and at whatever intensity suit them. Here on this beautiful beach nature does not feel benevolent, rather there is a toughness and rawness to her. If you make a mistake in this paradise you may be swept away by an ocean undercurrent, heat exhaustion is very real possibility, maybe a scorpion bite awaits; or at the least mosquitoes will bite you, repeatedly. Certainly during the winter months Tenacatita feels more like a tropical paradise because up north it is raining, snowing and freezing cold; but even then, as Sylvia states “. . . it sure comes with a creepy, crawly, stingy, windy reminder that there is probably no such thing as paradise”.
Again at a personal level, I could not call this paradise. I am happy here, it is peaceful and I have nature close by and all around; there is a consistency and simplicity to life, punctuated by the ocean waves and tides, and the sunrise and sunset, which set my daily rhythms; everyday is the same, but new and different at the same time, there is always something new to learn. But I am alone here and loneliness is my constant companion; no lover, no family, and few friends. Conversations in English are far and few between and my Spanish conversations are generally no more than a few paragraphs in length and even then there may not be total comprehension. A couple of Mexican guys do come and visit and spend an hour or so with me in Spanish conversation, and I’m glad of this; and, let’s not forget I have three dogs that are real companions and sticky by me no matter what, even after three injections.
I am realistic, and I know, as do most adults, that there is no paradise here on earth; we humans, or at least most of us are not capable of finding paradise here on earth. There is too much hurt, anguish and pain in all our lives for us to ever feel like we live in paradise, regardless of our surroundings. After all, paradise is more than a place that provides comfort and beauty. It is much more! It is having paradise within us; love and peace must flourish within us to live in paradise. There is a saying, ‘that wherever you go there you are’, so our hurt and pain comes with us wherever we go.
I guess my response to Sharon’s question, would be . . . No this place is not paradise. It is only a place, special in its own magical ways, as are so many places all over the world. No, cariño, I’m not in paradise.
*From the book, True Love A Practice for Awakening the Heart, by Thich Nhat Hanh
Friday, August 22, 2008
Thursday, August 21, 2008
Internet Problems Continue
Sorry, but I could not get a single photo to upload. Again here in Miguel Hidalgo the internet is slow, slow, slow.
Betty is Sick Betty has always been skinny, but when I returned after being away for a week, I realized she was very skinny. Since she is still a puppy, about 9 months, she has always been full of energy and loved to chase crabs, lizards and birds off the beach. Now she watches the lizards run by and her head can hardly get keep up with them, and when we go for a beach walk she now is always way behind and we catch up with her on our way back. So today I took her to the vets in Miguel Hidelgo and got her some medication. The medication consisted of two pills given to her in the morning with her food; no problem for me, easy to do. The remainder of the medication was in a vial which had to be injected into the inside of her leg muscle for three days running. Man, this is a beach dogs not accustomed to getting injections; and, I'm not experienced at giving injections to a beach dog. The first morning I decided I needed help so I loaded Betty into the cab of the pickup and we drove to the vets where he very easily gave her the shot. The second and third mornings I nervously and awkwardly gave Betty the injections. Now we wait. Summer Vacation Ends Sunday, August 18, was the end of summer vacation for students here in Mexico and they are back to school, parents are back to work, and what a difference this has made here in Tenacatita. The beach and restaurants are empty, there is very little vehicle traffic, and the place is quieter, not that it is ever noisy. Tenacatita will stay this empty with only the locals here until November when the Americano and Canadiense snowbirds come down for the winter months.
American Stork Across the road from Casa Liria is a mangrove swamp and immediately adjacent to the road is a shallow marsh. There are always birds feeding in the marsh or perched in the surrounding trees. The other day, I observed a dozen or more Wood Storks along with groups of Snowy and Great Egrets feeding in the marsh. As you can see in the picture, these large wading birds are mostly white, but what you can't see is their black under-tail and outer wing feathers. The Wood Stork with its large wingspan of 5.5 feet is impressive in flight with their black and white contrasting colors. They also have long black legs ideally suited for wading, with featherless dark gray scaly heads and necks. Storks have extremely large beaks which they use for probing in mud and muck for food, such as crustaceans, snakes, lizards, amphibians and other small creatures. They build nests of stick platforms high in trees and generally nest in large groups of hundreds of pairs. The Wood Stork gets part of its name from inhabiting freshwater, brackish, and salt marshes that often are wooded, as is the marsh across the road from me. If you read my last species account of the Black Vulture, you will remember that the Wood Stork and the Black Vulture are closely related. They also have the noises they make in common which are grunts, croaks and hisses. 
Monday, August 18, 2008
Internet Access a Challenge
For me, accessing the internet is a big chore. I drove to the internet site 2-times before I found it open. I drive to the internet site in Miguel Hidalgo, a 15 minute drive, becasue it is open most of the time and they have good computers, and they have the fastest intenest around. Also, I can use my laptop. That's not to say it is very fast, becasue it is not. The internet service in Melaque is much faster, but it is a much longer ride there just to use the internet. One day here in Miguel Hidalgo the machines were on fire and I was able to go through all my emails, respond to them, post my blogs and upload pictures. It was a magical day. Today, unfortunately, it is the opposite, when i could only open a couple of my emails, and I could not respond to a single one. As for the blog, as you can tell I was able to post, but I could not get a single picture to upload.
Betty hiding during thunder storm!The storm
A large, intense storm rolled over this afternoon. It came from the south, the direction from which our storms come. It was quiet, no distant rumbling to warn me, I heard only the sound of the surf on the beach. I was absorbed in my work, mindless of the approaching storm from the south. Suddenly I notice it is dark. I raise my head look around, turn south to see a sky-full of clouds; black, dense, ominous clouds quietly and quickly rolling in from behind the sea rocks. Before I could move there came a bright flash and loud boom that startled me into a run, and instantly I am inside the screened-room. The storm comes alive, throwing down lightning bolts all around me. I see a strike in the ocean close to shore and right in front of me; the lightning sizzles and crackles as it splits a path through the atmosphere, and instantly, the thunder boom comes which explodes and rolls loudly through the sky. The intensity of the sounds shakes the house violently and everything inside rattles. I want to run and hide, but I am thrilled by the incredible display of nature; the raw power of the lightning shooting all around me. The lightning and thunder comes frequently, is close and all around. I know the risk sitting here in this open room, and every time there is a strike and boom close by my body tenses, I feel my chest and throat tighten, and I have a strong desire to run inside. Yet, I sit frozen in place and watch and listen with my entire being.
Jiggle Key to the Rescue
Are any of you familiar with what a jiggle key is? I first learned about jiggle keys during a 30-day stint on a grand jury in Portland, Oregon. Jiggle keys are used by car thieves to break into cars. A jiggle key is any old key of the same make as the car you want to break into. Often the key is slightly filed down to round-off the edges, so it more easily fits into the lock and gives you some room to "jiggle" the key. Old Nissans and Toyotas were the easiest to break into with a jiggle key (I learned this on the grand jury not during my youth in NY). Anyway, during my stay in Vallarta I meet Joe Santana for a morning walk around the soccer field; well, I don't know what I was thinking, but I set the truck keys in the ashtray and thought to myself, 'they will be safe here'; jumped out and locked the door! Once I realized what I had done, I mumbled a few words under my breath, but decided to walk off the frustration with Joe. After the walk Joe and I walked to a breakfast place and passed two locksmith shops within a block of each other. Wow! So after breakfast we drive in Joe's truck to the locksmith, pick him up and take him to my truck. The locksmith comes with a helper and a large bag full of tools, enough to take off my door, which I hope he doesn't have to do. We get to my truck and the locksmith gets out and walks to my locked pickup; he reaches in his pocket pulls out a bunch of old keys, picks one out and sticks it in the lock and jiggles it a few times and unlocks the door. It took less than 1-minute and cost $200 pesos! Expensive, but the cost of a good maestro is priceless.
David and Lindi, our first renters!
This past week, we rented Casa Liria to friends of my daughters, Dave and Lindi. They got married on a Saturday and the following Sunday afternoon they landed in Puerto Vallarta for a 6-day honeymoon. They were a sweet, young couple and I wish them all the luck in the world in their marriage and future endeavors; and thanks for staying in our bungalow! I drove to PV and meet them at the airport and took them to get their rental car and shopping at Wal-Mart. I then guided them out of town, because it can be confusing, and sent them on their way to Tenacatita. They arrived rather late, 1100-1130 pm, because they spent some time lost in Tenacatita. They asked for Mario's house, but I don't think anyone was able to help them. They finally looked carefully at the map I had given them and they found their way, which was a short 2-minute drive from Tenacatita. Casa Liria is easy to find during the day, but at night is hard to spot even though it is right off the road.
Baby Crabs
Today I was amazed by one of God's creatures, the land crab, I wrote about them in an earlier blog. I am still being amazed by these small, alien-looking creatures. While cleaning up some sacks of trash that were sitting in the screened room, I noticed a lot of tiny spider looking creatures all over the garbage bags and on the wall. I thought this odd; spiders don't typically hang around in large groups unless it is a hatch when a web can be filled with hundreds of baby spiders. This was not the case here, there was no web. I got my reading glasses so I could get a better view and realized they were not spiders at all, but baby crabs. They were no larger than a pinhead, but I could see their tiny beady eyes and miniature claws, and they scurried around sideways, like crabs do.
Beach Bum (part 3)
Living here on the beach I get to feel and experience the continuity of life that I feel when I spend time outdoors. I do spend lots of time outdoors here in Tenacatita with the vast, never-ending ocean and the beach that stretches forever. Behind me is the dense mangrove swamp with the river that feeds it, and a panoramic sky filled with fast moving clouds is the umbrella for all this splendor. There are times when I experience the 'eternal moment', and all seems right and perfect. Here on the beach, I sit still long enough to allow my mind to think thoughts of love, life and death; about the continuity of nature and life. I experience the knowledge that today and tomorrow and the days after that, that the wind will continue to blow, the storms will come with rain, lightning, and thunder; the waves will crash on the beach, wash the sands away and re-deposit them somewhere new and in a different configuration; and all the earth's creatures will continue to march forward in our individual, species specific dance.
Dump Dogs
The other day I went to the dump and while unloading the truck a female with two pups walked up and laid down right under the truck. The dump is on a south facing hillside and there is little to no shade on the road and the female dog was panting heavily with the squealing, hungry pups at her heels. I found a container and emptied my drinking water into it for them; all three drank thirstily. The female dog looked pretty hungry and I figured she would get food from the garbage all around, but as soon as I drove off dozens of Black Vultures flew over to the garbage I dumped, so there was no way the dog was going to out-compete all those large scavengers. Mexico is a tough place for dogs!
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
Blog Changes name!
I feel silly, but the url, or web page address, I used had a grammatical error. Since Casa is a femine word in Spanish, the following word also has to be feminine; thus, Liro had to change to Liria. Goes to show my limited Spanish, eventhough this was an easy one to spot. I was speaking to a Mexican man and he repeated the name of the house correctly Casa Liria, then it clicked that my blog name was incorrect. Therefore, I made a change so the new address, which is now: http://www.casaliria.blogspot.com/ I hope you can find me again!
The Shoreline In an earlier blog I wrote about the beach re-healing after a large storm. I described how the beach was pounded by giant waves that came in with the storm and how these waves flattened and widened the beach. Over the following weeks the beach was slowly re-shaped by the waves to it's 'regular' shape a contoured beach with a steep drop-off. Not long after the first storm, we were hit by another large storm, which repeated the process. Now that I have spent some time here I have seen the beach change and re-change; I watch the beach sands get washed out by giant waves; and then they are re-deposited by smaller waves. I realize that the beach is in a dynamic stability, with a wide range of variability, which simply means, the beach is in constant change and the change is very great. The shore never looks the same, the dunes come and go, washed away here by waves, and deposited somewhere else by other same waves; change from one day to the next.
Rent Casa Liria Azul Bungalow Features Bedroom: AC, Over-head Fan, King Bed, Closet, Dresser, French Doors with Ocean View. Kitchen: Gas Stove, Refrigerator, Toaster, Blender, Water Dispenser, and Cooking Utensils. Eating Area: Table, Chairs, Over-head Fan. Bathrooms/Showers: Inside and Outside Bathroom, Outside Shower, includes bath towels. Water: 1200 Gallon in Ground Tank; Solar Hot Water (water is hot day, night, and on cloudy days). Drinking Water: Purchased at Local Store in 5 Gallon Containers Outdoor Room: Screening Keeps Bugs Out, But Allows You To Sit Outdoors and Enjoy the Views. Security: All Doors Lock Securely, Outside Lights and Motion Sensor Light in Parking Area. Tenacatita Beach: Fantastic Swimming Beach with Many Mexican Restaurants Only 5-Minute Walk. Additional Items: Places to Go: La Manzanilla, Melaque, Barra de Navidad, and Manzanillo, are Short Drives Golf:
TV/DVD with movies in Bedroom (no TV reception), Cell Phone Reception.
Isla Navidad, a 27-hole championship golf course rated Mexico's 5th-finest golf course. The course displays wide, emerald-colored fairways, long ocean frontage, including 8-holes that play along crashing surf. Enjoy a meal and a drink at the beautiful Spanish-style clubhouse; (45 min – 1-hour drive). For additional information and to reserve play: www.islanavidad.com.
for additional information: www.golfinmexico.net.
Where do I get my wash water? Water for washing, agua para lavar, is obtained from a local water supplier in Rebalisto. It costs $1 to fill a 125 gallon tinaco, or plastic water container that I empty into our large underground water tank, which stores about 1200 gallons. I can also have the water suppliers deliver a 250 gallon tank of water for $10, which I prefer to not do. The water is pumped up from a well that I think is about 40-50 feet deep which fills a 2" black pvc pipe hanging from a tree; I backup the truck and locate the hose right over the tank and fill it up; it only takes a few minutes. If you drill to deep then you hit saltwater and contaminate the well. The water supplier is a well known and respected family of Rebalisto, la familia Martinez; the patriarch, Martín has several sons, Fernando, Davíd, Jorge, and a couple of others whose names I can't remember; his wife and daughters I have yet to meet. Last February I attended the marriage of his older daughter. It was an evening wedding in a beautiful setting of colored lights hanging from palapas over nicely tables covered with colorful tablecloths and set with flowers and a bottle of tequila; beer was served by waiters dressed in white uniforms, so you never had an empty glass. Live Mexican music reverberated loudly through the air with many of the partiers singing along with the band. Dinner was Birria, goat meat, which is very tasty the way it's prepared in Mexico. It was a joyous occasion, especially for the Martinez family, whom appeared very pleased in front of their guests; and, they must have been happy their oldest daughter fell in love and got married. Love that pickup 
Sharon and I drove an old pickup down here, a 1990 Nissan. As basic a truck as you can get with no power steering, the AC doesn't work, and everything is manual. Here it gets more looks than Sharon did, and she got many because of being tall and blonde, and attractive. But the pickup is admired by every Mexican guy that gets to look at. It's not uncommon for these guys to walk around the truck, running their hand along the fenders, almost as in a caress, while asking me about it; invariably, they ask if I want to sell it. It reminds me of someone checking out a horse before they buy it. Right now I have at least 3-buyers that want it when I return to the US.
.JPG)
