Sunday, January 9, 2010 — On my countdown

I have happily made the decision to travel to Mexico but now I find myself just two and a half days from departure. In the past Skip would accompany me for three wonderful weeks prior to the workshop retreats in El Tuito. We would spend several days in Puerto Vallarta, usually staying at Playa Los Arcos, a comfortable ocean front hotel with several inviting pools. From there we would go to Yelapa to stay at Hotel Lagunita on the beach. That was the most relaxing place to spend a week, eating fish tacos, walking across the river and visiting the village, usually after a walk to the hillside waterfall for breakfast. l can't think of a better place to swim, eat, read, sleep, hike up the river, generally do whatever seemed right for the moment. There is always something new to explore, or not. The pool at Lagunita sits above the rocky shore at the end of the beach in such a way that you can look from its rim, down to the breakers and eager swimmers in the surf. The pool is placed in a crevasse and many of the rocks are left in place to swim around or sit on for a moment's rest. It used to boast a carved iguana from which the circulating water spewed. At some point the iguana malfunctioned and seems never to have returned. So now the water comes very honestly from a simple pipe.

There were times when the boat ride back to Puerto Vallarta was more than exciting. Several years ago we witnessed a wind tunnel off in the distance and the boat had to land while the sea rose and fell four to eight feet as people debarked. Very exciting and a little scary.

For some years we moved on after Yelapa to the town of El Tuito where the Larochettes live and work for half the year. We rented a wonderful adobe house in a bird sanctuary for about a week and then Skip headed back to Vallarta to fly home to San Francisco. He had been in Mexico for three weeks and he came happily back to his house and its canine inhabitants. And now I'm realizing all the things he came home to besides his beloved dogs and their hikes to the Noyo river just down the hill.

As I struggle to get all the chores done before I go, I realize my leaving for this yearly trip is very different. Before, I knew Skip was returning shortly and would take care of all the little forgotten items, the maintenance issues for house and vehicles, the writing of the February bills and all the other things I'm now trying to deal with because I won't return for six weeks. I finally decided to send double payments or extra amounts with the January bills so that I wouldn't come home to a pile of penalties and reprimands. How do other people deal with being away when the bills come? I wrote little explanatory notes to the credit card companies, hoping they will follow my instructions. I've been writing ATT notes on the bills for two months asking them to discontinue our phone service at Marina Bay because we all have cell phones and I figured this would be one way to cut expenses. They still continue service and still continue the bills. So we shall see if they accept my earnest pleas for understanding while I'm gone.

This year's workshop/retreats will feature a teaching visit by Sarah Swett. We're all really looking forward to working with her. As soon as the workshops end, eight of us will travel by bus to Mexico City and then to Oaxaca. Should be a great trip as long as I manage to break away from Fort Bragg. Every force for preventing my departure seems to be at work these last few days. You can only be at one meeting at a given time. So wish me luck and hope that I will get myself to simply walk out the door, ready or not. If you're interested, I'll enter the blogosphere several times a week while away and will let you know how it's going south of the border. Check out the view from Jean Pierre and Yael's studio window shown above. I keep telling myself that I'm about to return to that wondrous world of bird calls, tapestry talk, dogs and roosters cheering us on during the night, meals on the front porch and evening conversations. Exploring weaving ways and ideas will be the norm of the day and I will somehow manage to get myself down to that airport.