The Unclothing of My Self

This blog was inspired for the most part by my R.V.C.C. James Tegeder.  In May, when we were still working in the fair of San Marcos in Aguascalientes, various Facebook friends with whom I went to grade school asked me why I didn't return to the U.S. with Margarita if Mexico was as dangerous as I was expressing at the time.  Some of those friends with such big hearts such as Sabrena and David actually began asking around about how to help Margarita enter the U.S. with me.  For Some reason James was looking for things I had published on the internet and discovered a blog I created in Xalapa in 2005 called Pinche Gringo in Xalapa that contains a wonderful interview with me connected with my gourmet cupcakes. For some reason or another I didn't work more on that blog and I had totally forgotten about it when James wrote me.  Now, James was connected with me on Facebook, so he could have asked me if I had anything else published on the internet.  I don't understand why he was looking up my name.  But that's besides the point.  During one of my responses to one of the questions on Facebook about why I don't return to the U.S. James interjected with the statement that he had found my blog and suggested that I write my memoirs titled Pinche Gringo!  Why Don't You Just Return Home?  Well, I knew that we would have 3 months down time and I had the money for finally buying my first computer.  So, I figured Why not?  I had entered into one of my eloquent and productive writing periods, so I figured that it could be a very interesting endeavor.  I had been planning this for years.  What better time than now? 

So...

When we arrived at my inlaws ranch in Veracruz, I began deliberating on the theme and the title of the blog.  For years friends with whom I reconnected on the internet after so many years away from New Jersey asked me, "How and why did you end up in Mexico?  What is life like?"  However, now there was the 3rd question added about why I don't flee this horrible violence with Margarita...  So I decided to answer those questions and I found myself in a horrible bind;  that bind was the true truth.  Why "true" truth?  Because there are what we call truths, but are a bit superficial or just on the surface. As you read through the blog you will find a lot of different motivators for my leaving.  You will also see contradictions, such as a clear rencor towards my family and the fact that I am still in contact with that family, that some of those stories and photographs are connected with visits by my mother and her husband Bruce.  I think if you look deep into yourself and into life in general you will see a lot of mixed messages, without anyone else existing.  You see conflicting needs.  Maybe that's to say that you aren't actually contradicting yourself.  But back to the true truth.  True truth is what profoundly moves you; what profoundly affects you, below your reasoning, below your fantasies, below your reactions, below your socio-political views, below your egoistic need to protect yourself and your image.  In order for you to reach that profound truth, you must uncloth yourself, remove all of those layers protecting you from your inner fears, your vulnerabilities.  And that's what I'm doing.

I'm a very intelligent person.  I am a multi-talented person.  I am a very thoughtful person.  I am a very creative person...  However I am so much more that I truthfully wouldn't want to show if I wasn't writing this blog.  Why not withold in the blog if I will withold within other relationships?  Because I am trying to answer the questions of why and why not?  And I don't believe in lying.  Witholding is not lying.  It's just not offering what is not asked for.  The problem with that is that it's safe.  As long as I remain silent, I protect myself from the risk of rejection and failure, meaning that I restrict my growth.  

When I realized the true answers to those questions I entered into a crisis of putting things into perspective; that First, I removed my whole family from my list of friends on Facebook because none of them, with the exception of my mother (a contradiction?) was truly interested in my life here.  I realized that I couldn't return to the U.S. for the same reason I left there.  I believed that those friends who didn't truly see me as a friend would reject me, if not gossip about me.  Granted, I also understood that I am here in Mexico 8.5 years without having seen anyone here other than my mother and Bruce 4 times and Scott and his wife Laura once in 2004.  I re