Pico de Orizaba

Pico de Orizaba
Taken from Huatusco, Veracruz, the closest town to Margarita's family's ranch.

Saturday, February 23, 2013

Some strange illness my way comes...

During my 43.8 year lifetime, I've contracted the Flu a handful of times...  I've proudly boasted of not remembering ever having a fever outside of a dirty I.V. needly inserted in my arm during my last hospital stint at Mount Sinai Medical Center in Manhattan, November 2001.  My sisters (especially Beth) experienced strep throat regularly.  ¿Yo? No...  I've had one cavity in my life.  I believe I've had a strange form of influenza occasionally since late adolescence.  For some reason I was sure it was influenza, although never diagnosed... An influenza that settled into the joints and muscles, didn't cause nausea or fevers, but a strange form of paralysis, semi-paralysis that lasted maximally 3 days, one time causing my being away from the lab where I worked testing sewer sludge at the age of 20.  I wanted to believe that I had been contaminated by the sludges or by the acids I used for attempting towards isolating the various chemical substances in those sludges possibly contaminating farmland or drinking water...  But, I "knew" it was the flu and not the job... I would experience this strange semi-paralysis, strange fatigue occasionally the rest of my life...

When we were selling gourmet cupcakes in Xalapa between 2003 and 2007, I believe I had damaged the nerves from my right shoulder to my right hand from repeatedly going from the hot of the oven while baking to the cold of the freezer, where we stored our finished cupcakes.  Later on I would realize that I may have damaged the nerves in my right should from carrying 120 pound sacks of sugar on my shoulder or 50 pound crates of bananas there...  I prided on being an ox or a mule, a beast of cargo...  I loved pushing my body to it's physical limits.  Today, for at least 6 years now, I can't put much weight on that shoulder, which is much weaker than it was...

I imagined that the hot to cold and over-use damage to my arm created Carpal Tunnel Syndrome, since I would experience the symptoms in my right hand after days of typing on the computer... Truthfully, until about 2 weeks ago, I didn't know there were other Tunnel syndromes in the arm and that Carpal Tunnel only relates towards the nerve canal that passes through the center of the wrist and only affects the hand and the thumb and first 2.5 fingers...  All would be basically fine, if the nerve-muscle issues I'm experiencing were relegated to the wrist and that part of the hand...  However...

The Tunnel Syndromes can be caused by pinched nerves... they can be caused by the inflamation of tendonitis, meaning that you can have the two and not just one or the other... You can have bursitis like pains in isolated regions of the shoulder.  You can have rotator cuff and pitcher's elbow or golfer's elbow like pain in your elbow...  Benign tumors can create Tunnel syndromes by putting too much pressure upon the nerves that go towards the hand or the fingers... However, one must be very careful assuming, without knowing exactly where is the tumor or the nerve that passes through that part of the arm.  I have a lipoma (I imagine it is a benign fatty tumor in the backside of my upper arm between my armpit and my elbow.  We've been aware of it for at least 8 years now.  It hasn't grow (as far as I can see) and occassionally is "tender"...  The few doctors who've been notified of this dismissed it as a ball of fat.  Then again, they don't know about Gardner's Syndrome and that it is not just a ball of fat...  Truthfully, I don't know if it is pressing upon one of the two main nerves in my arm and if that nerve passes through the carpal tunnel, which I believe not, since Carpal Tunnel Syndrome is related to the nerve that passes between the elbow and the wrist...

All sounds pretty innocuous, doesn't it?

But then things changed in November...  (and things changed in December... and things changed in January... And things have changed such that I'm "inspired" to write about this today, February 23, 2013...)

Thursday, February 14, 2013

A Valentine's Day Story/Conversation


she wrote:
big huge mama jumbo bag of snickers , bubble bath AND a masssage!!!... ill be seeing y'all LATER-maybe . HAPPY V DAY
And I said:  Don't drown yourself... Valentine's Day isn't worth it... just a scam to make some people feel worse! And if you don't drown yourself, don't subject yourself to prolonged torture with the scale the following days... And if you eat the jumbo bag of snickers, make sure that the masseuse stays away from your midsection or that could produce vomitting or diarea or flatulence, making this unfortunate Valentines Day that much less romantic! But, thinking about it... How can you eat a jumbo bag of snickers and lay in hot water?



and she said: damn!!!! now i may drown myself!!!! 

 How many have you eaten? Should someone call 911? 

 not YET!!!! (ok maybe4)

Enjoy your bath and massage. There are 364 much better days in the year than this one... No joke... I used to love snickers. But, here in Mexico they don't sell the jumbo-sized ones so enjoyable to sink your teeth into... and as for bubble baths... it's extremely rare to find an actual bathtub here...
... awwwww but the food more then makes up for it!!!! 

...we bought a box of Mrs. Fields chocolate chip cookies in Costco. That was today's V-Day celebration... After two cookies, I felt like vomitting! Where is Galinda the Good Witch of the West who can send me back to my adolescent days in New Jersey and the ability to down all that stuff without feeling anything?
...Truthfully, while driving to the park where we soak in the sun while exercising I mentioned to Margarita the different problem of V-Day for men and women in the U.S. using the example of Mars and Venus... The man must find someone to go out with that night (if he is single) and spend a lot of money on stupid stuff. And if he isn't single he must spend a lot of money on stupid stuff and try and appear as if this day was more special than all other days... A sign of the single woman's attractiveness is having a date on the 14th... However, there is the probability that she becomes inundated by invitations by morons and perverts and must have the strength to say no, risk being alone that evening... Margarita says that she (the woman) is probably better off not taking the risk with any jerk and asked why can't women ask men out on the 14th? My response is social norms... The last 14th I remember celebrating was in 1996 when my 3 year relationship with the woman from college with whom I moved to NYC was deteriorating. We had to meet for dinner after work, since it was the 14th... I rushed around the city and bought a box of chocolates at Godiva and gave it to her at the restaurant. When she saw the box she said, "Look Ross, if you didn't want to buy me something, you shouldn't have..." But if I didn't... Social pressures. You may ask, "what's so bad about Godiva Chocolates?" She knew that I prefer giving authentic gifts for weddings and other special occasions. Godiva is commercial and cliche like a dozen roses... However, I've never considered Valentines Day a special occasion, and less so when the ending of a relationship was long overdo... I believe the best reason for giving a person a gift is when you feel it within and not because someone or something said you should... 

amen to that!!!once you put it that way....but i woulda loved the godiva chocolates...!!!
Yes, I thought you would have V. But, truthfully, there is much better chocolate in this world... 

yes!!! but its the thought!!!!that was a horrible reply!!!!!!(from her) so why are you in mexico??? if i may ask...just curious .....are you running from the law???(bad attempt at humor)
Don't worry about the humor. I deserve it after how I began this conversation...We had a gourmet cupcake business in Xalapa Veracruz 4 years from 2003-2007. I tried creating the best quality chocolate cupcakes that the locals could afford... So, I bought 12 pound bars of the highest quality Mexican chocolate (Chocolate Turin named after the northern Italian town "Turin" where the modern chocolate process began), chopped it up and mixed it in the batter with Hershey's Cocoa... We had Chocolate-Coffee, Chocolate Coconut, Chocolate Peanut Butter, Black and white (chocolate/vanilla), Banana with Chocolate chips... All filled with and topped with cream cheese toppings mixed with cocoa or with coconut cream or with vanilla... You have no idea how much chocolate I ate over those 4 years! Fortunately 6 years have passed and I have recovered and can appreciate a good (yet small piece of chocolate)... Come to think of it, what the hell happened to that box of Godiva Chocolates?!!! Damn! 

 that sound AMAZING!!! what happenned??( after 2007??)

Truthfully, I think her reply was concise. And I appreciate that she knew me well enough to have understood that something was amiss when I brought the box of Godivas... However, it's a shame that two people who once were actually friends must end up hurting or being hurt... in order to do what's actually right for themself or the other... She ended up marrying 1.5 years after we separated and has two children and a brownstone in Park Slope Brooklyn... I think it all worked out for her.

 and you too i hope?!!!!!

What happened with the cupcake business? I gained at least 40 pounds and became ill, mainly from the incredible stress of trying to pull ourselves up from our bootstraps in Mexico (in a town far from having the culture or economy for our business). We had many clients. But we were selling very close to cost. I've always been a strange idealist. My ideals tend towards going against economic prosperity... One day a client passed by our cupcake tables and asked me why we didn't have a bakery or cafe or a coffee bar (since we were selling my father-in-law's organic coffee... And I began a 2 week interchange (call and response) with him (a retired man from the Olympic Peninsula)... After two weeks of responding to his questions he said, "I think you've answered all of my questions. You have a good point. The big fish will always swallow the little fish. But I can help you economically. Just give me the price... But tell me what you are going to do with the money."

For me? Imagine... I was looking for my wife ever since the age of 8... One of my ex-girlfriends from Brooklyn once called me "Serial Monogamist"... And I asked, "can you blame me for trying?" I believe she watched too much Sex and the City... It turns out that she ended up impregnating herself artificially and gave birth to a beautiful daughter after I left for Mexico... In as much as the relationships were important to me, I never met the person with whom I could create a wonderful life... I stress the second part of that statement, "WITH WHOM I COULD CREATE A WONDERFUL LIFE"... I remember living in Brooklyn after 9/11 and reading the editorials or whatever you call them in the New York Times written by women envious of all the sudden weddings after 9/11, saying "I used to be anti-committment, enjoying meeting different men from different occupations... not wanting to be burdened by having to be with someone specific. But, after 9/11 I feel so ALONE. Everyone has someone for support and I just have my dog..." (I added the dog part ;-o) Arms that don't truly belong entwined in an embrace, no matter the situation, shouldn't embrace... However, minds that don't allow one into the other, that don't truly wish for an attempt towards sharing, create miserable people in the end... It's very difficult to make an "ideal" match... And even if the match or pairing is close to ideal, it doesn't remove an incredible conflict/stress caused by attemption towards mixing two distinctly separate worlds. No matter what anyone says, each person is a unique universe with a lifetime of experience separate from that of the other... And in as close as we me come to another, we are always semi-light years away. I loved the Dar Williams line that says something to the tone, "I was born alone and I will die alone..." and something to the tone of trying to accept the differences and to appreciate the meetings... Somewhere we may meet someone who magically fits better with us than others... People call it chemistry. I may call it Astrology... I may call it destiny... Possibly our souls were always connected in some way or another... or time doesn't truly exist and everything is planned out for us in some strange way or another... and we meet people who help us grow/evolve, travel and learn... They may not be lovers. They may not be spouses... The relationships may not be explainable...

...And you can't expect the appearance of that person... or wait for them... they have no background or appearance... but you must expect you and await your appearance. Meaning that you must be honest and sincere with yourself. You must learn true respect for yourself and enjoyment with yourself. You must forgive yourself and have patience with you... And, possibly, just possibly, if you haven't met that person or those people, you will meet them or begin meeting them... It all begins with you... And then one day, close to the end of my 7 year cycle in New York City that began with the College love with whom I moved from Amherst, Mass. to her grandmothers coop in Astoria, Queens... I decided to sell all of my stuff and hopped on a Greyhound Bus from the Port Authority in Manhattan to Mexico City... I had $3,000USD, no working knowledge of Spanish. No illusions about Mexico, Mexican Culture, Politics or Mexican people... Not even prejudices... Just a strange sling-shot to another world... 3 weeks later I met Margarita. 5 months later we were married... To this date she doesn't speak English... But, for some strange reason I understood everything she told me... and miraculously, I made Spanish my first language... Now, how can one do that? You would understand only if you heard me speak English. Since I don't do it for even the equivalent of 1 of 365 days per year for 10 years now, I've lost much of my spoken English abilities... It's cool. Sometimes we die and are reborn... sometimes we leave and don't return. Each additional day here in Mexico is one day less probable that I will return to the U.S. Not that that makes me happy. Life here is very difficult and risky; why so many people "escape" to the U.S. I understand aspects of the arguments about closing the "doors" to immigrants. Every country has the right to determine how many people and who enters their countries for living permanently. However, the U.S. has ALWAYS been a country of immigrants or foreignors... It was built upon that premise or need or desire or strength... It would be a lie to say, "The U.S. for Americans"... Just look at our last names... look at the incredible mix of cultures that created so many new appearances, ideas, perspectives and flavors... Who didn't come from another place that wasn't exterminated by the newcomers...? The American Dream is for everyone who came from incredible limitations or nightmares. It's for their children and grandchildren... The founding forefathers were immigrants seeking new lives and better opportunities... mainly for "their" people... I live in Mexico. I understand why the people leave for the U.S., against all odds. I did the reverse. I'm here against all odds. Margarita is from the 2nd to lowest "class" in Mexico, just above indigenous, although her family isn't "indigenous" because somewhere in the past they rejected their roots to protect themselves against extreme classism and racism... Imagine... connecting with women of my class, region, educational level, social/cultural background, possibly religious background (since I don't believe in modern or organized religion), language etc., I found that we always had an incredible communication/language problem... There was just something we didn't understand or accept about the other or what came out of the other's mouth... We spoke clearly. But we didn't understand what the other person was saying and we ended up in incredible misunderstandings...

...When people learned that Margarita and I were married in 2003 and that she doesn't speak English, they asked, "how did you understand each other? Through signs?" They would ask Margarita that infront of me, as if I didn't exist. As if I didn't understand their foolish statements or energy... Most people believe that our language, our nationality, our religion, our skin-tone, our bone structure, our accents is our "race"... makes us different species, like dogs and cats...

...How did I end up in Mexico? I painted Margarita up to two years before ever thinking of setting foot in Mexico. When I began painting, I painted EVERY important woman who would enter my life before meeting her... 4 months before leaving for Mexico, I drew "The Woman in the Sky"... She's floating above the mountains, her hair becomes Pico de Orizaba, the 3rd tallest peak in North America (on the gulf coast of Veracruz). The woman's skirt becomes the gentle waves of the Gulf Coast... A Mexican man with a baseball cap turned backwards, like a hip-hop or rapper hoodie with sad eyes has his head in her lap... I knew he was me because that is how I wore my beloved baseball cap EVERY DAY... But, I didn't know that there were volcanoes in Mexico, nor did I know anything about Mexico, nor about Veracruz, nor about the gulf coast. Nor did I care... August 15th 2002 my last "American" girlfriend left our apartment in Brooklyn to return to Denver Colorado. 2 months later, exactly on October 15th, I met with Estrella the Puerto Rican "psychic" in Park Slope, Brooklyn. It was my second meeting with him in 2 years after being recommended by a Dominican collegue while working as a social worker in Foster Care services for the Salvation Army Social Services... The first meeting was interesting. The second one blew my mind... The first thing Estrella said while feeling (not reading) the tarot cards was, "Your girlfriend left you exactly 2 months ago..." "She was much more attractive than you..." (she was a dancer [ballet/modern] and the daughter of a Czech-American and an African-American; beautiful bone/muscle structure, incredible hair/curls)... He said, "you will leave the U.S. in less than 4 months... to Europe"... I said he was crazy. I wasn't going anywhere outside the U.S.; actually a friend of mine had just invited me to move in with him in Portland, Oregan. I told James that I would, but when my lease was up along with my 7 years at the end of January... Truthfully, I didn't have the money for travelling and thank god James had a place for me and had invited me and hopefully I would find work there... Estrella said, "Fine, as you wish, you aren't going to Europe or leave the country." But you can't stay here. When you reach your final destination you will meet your last girlfriend. It's not a perfect relationship. But it's a good one... I see a lot of trees where you are going and a large body of water, like a lake... But, you will not find her here... In fact, you will not have another sexual relationship with a woman as long as you remain in New York City... You won't have a sexual relationship with another woman until you end up where you are going... As it turns out... I sensed nothing with women between August 2002 and January 2003. And, for the first time in my life since high school (since before my first sexual relationship that lasted 4 years), I started truly appreciating time spent with men and I developed some really wonderful relationships (or I realized that the friendships I had with certain male friends the five years between breaking up with the college love and leaving for Mexico were really important for me)... But, just as I realized that, something told me I must leave for Mexico on December 5th, 2002... And I left my best friends behind and I don't believe I'll see them again. And here in Mexico it is incredibly difficult to create friendships... There is too much mistrust and interpersonal conflict and a word that doesn't translate well into English (Invidia)... People don't have conversation for the enjoyment of conversing and sharing with others... People don't appreciate others here... But I met Margarita. I didn't spend my life looking for my best friends... I spent my life looking for the woman I would walk with alongside... Do you remember the "Dark Crystal"? I was looking for her... I always believed that we were equal... That in some way or another we completed each other... I know, that may sound naive or loopy... I'm prone to self-criticism and don't like living in fantasies or being idealist... I don't believe in fairy tales... However, something within said that the best things I would do in life would be accomplished alongside another... I'm egoistic in many forms. However, I don't believe we get there alone... Granted, maybe it's just that I don't get there alone and, maybe others do. But, what happened with those anti-commitment women after 9/11?

...The dancer girlfriend was born exactly 7 years, 7 days and 7 minutes after me... I was head over heals in-love with her... But I knew that we couldn't continue... and I pushed her away... So I asked Estrella, what is the significance of 3, 7s? His response was that 7 is a cosmic number... and the combination of 3 7s is divine, since it is a trinity of a cosmic #. 7 isn't about luck... It's something about cosmic force... When I told him that the ex-girlfriend was born 3 7s after me, he yelled, "LOOK, IT'S OVER! IT'S WATER UNDER THE BRIDGE! SHE'S GONE! FORGET ABOUT HER!... And if she looks for you, it won't be for 3+ years later. She lost her prince and you are about to find your princess. When a woman loses her prince, she doesn't find another. But a prince will always find his princess. She has serious problems; AND IT IS NOT YOUR FAULT. LET HER GO!" 

It turns out, I spent my last week in the U.S.in New York (after selling my stuff, leaving my apartment near Kings Highway and spending some time with my mother and her husband in New Jersey before they left for France) with one of my bestfriends and his wife. Actually, it turns out that he met Margarita while helping a Shamanism friend in Veracruz that past December... The day I left on the Greyhound, Michael's wife offered me a gift for leaving. She showed me a bunch of hand sculpted stone pendents of indiginous friends she and Michael met during their 2 year travel from Mexico to Argentina, just before I met them on East Houston towards the end of the summer of 1997. She asked me to choose one. The only one that reached out to me was a fish. I said to M'nique, "But why the fish? I don't have any Pisces in my astrological chart..." A few weeks into our relationship I took the fish pendent/necklace off my neck and said to Margarita in my less than a month of Spanish, "The fish has finally found it's home..." and placed it around her neck. Margarita was born on March 7th, 1975... she was the magical 3-7 I was looking for... When you look over your history, you may realize that so many coincidences actually disprove that concept, as Carl Jung explains in his book about Syncronicity...

... I believe this is a fitting story for Valentines Day, don't you? But people always ask me why I left for Mexico. Usually I tell them it is a very long and complex story. I wrote a blog trying to explain it... and then I got fed up and basically dropped the writing... But, truthfully, I believe there is something else happening in our lives if we seek that something else and we don't imprison ourselves in other people's styles and expectations. I don't believe our souls have a nationality or a religion or an economic level or a social class or a status or a sexuality or a gender. But I do believe that our souls are much more than our bodies and are eternal. The question is "how do we connect with our souls?" and "is our material being truly more valuable than our spiritual being, although it is much easier to see and feel our material being?" Why soulmate if the meeting wasn't being our physical capacities for truly connecting? (I don't understand this sentence or how it ended up as it is; truthfully I don't understand it.  But, I remember when I wrote it and I'm not capable of rewriting it, nor am I willing to remove it at the moment). In Spanish, soulmate is "Alma Gemela"... Meaning "Soul Twin"... It's a nice idea or fantasy; "Soul Twin" or your duplicate somewhere out there... That was a song in some Disney Animated movie, wasn't it? "Somewhere, Out There, beyond the... blah, blah, blah, I will find you... Somewhere... Out There..."  However, how can your twin look totally different and be of a different sex or gender? Afterall, it is a constant war of the sexes, isn't it? It's just a war because those waging it don't truly want peace or to understand the other side's complaint... Or is it possible that the material/socio-political (and unresolvable) historical issue of embedded sexism (perpetuated by both the fathers and the mothers) or inherent disrespect/lack of consideration and lack of understanding that we are the same with slightly different procreative purposes/roles AND THE TRUTH that both men and women come into this world via a WOMAN making it IMPOSSIBLE that the man is more valuable... The embedded artificial creation of the man's socio-politically and biologically superiority over the woman creates an almost impossibility of there being true harmony within heterosexual relationships. More than 6 thousound years of male created/dominated/oriented societies, religions, socio-political and educational systems, theologies and philosophies constructed to prove and/or perpetuate Male physical, intellectual and spiritual dominance over the woman makes it a bit difficult for there to be true harmony within a heterosexual relationship... We are taught to listen to and communicate towards, relate towards the other sex in a way that is subconsciously socially acceptable, although it maintains a "battle of the sexes"... Some women say "I like it this way! I like being a woman. I like being treated as a woman!" Why wouldn't she? It's how we were taught is acceptable... I truly believe that NO ONE likes being unacceptable, different, outcast, in conflict with the norms... But that doesn't make it correct... None of this removes the issue of the conflict. But, maybe it isn't about any of this... Maybe the true conflict is because we haven't connected with who we truly grow with... Maybe some or many of us aren't meant to connect that way... Or maybe because we are so out of touch with ourselves, so distracted, so dishonest with ourselves or others... maybe we can't connect well with THAT person because we don't connect well with ourselves... We aren't truly comfortable with ourselves, in the skin we choose and not the skin that is truly ours... How many people lie to themselves? and to others in order to be accepted... by their family... by their peers... Maybe you don't truly like or enjoy or appreciate what you think you do... because you don't want to be different... Sounds lie a sermon... It's kind of funny. Your Snickers and Bubblebath got me inspired and on a role and I'm sure I'm the only one smiling at this moment (with my eyes)... But why you? It seems that you were the one I caught alone on V-Day drowning yourself metaphorically and unnecessarily in a Jumbo bag of Snickers... hoping that the hot water, bubbles and a massage would remove the tension of not sharing this foolish and horribly manipulative day... Granted, the bubble bath could have been a seductive setting for that sexy hunk of a man about to give you a nice massage blah blah blah... But, if that were the case, you wouldn't have a Jumbo bag of snickers alongside the computer and you wouldn't have been sharing that with "us" on the computer... I'm not making fun of you... It's truthfully a strange embrace. I think you can laugh at yourself... But I wouldn't be surprised if you remove me from your friend's list. As I said, there are 364 much more important days in the year preceeding and superceeding February 14th... Truthfully, I'm not to blame for this. However, it's a wonderful opportunity. Don't you think?