It’s spring time in the central Mexican mountains, and the land feels sleepy. Like it’s waiting for the rain and conserving its energy. Hot and dry, it bakes in the sun, and even so, there are plants and trees that push sprouting fruit and flowers, at this hardest time of the year.
The light here in the dry season is sharp and unfiltered, the kind that makes shadows hard-edged and colors flat. It’s beautiful and relentless at the same time.
Everything is waiting for the same thing. The cracked earth, the dusty roads, the trees holding their breath. In a few weeks the rains will come and everything will change.
In the morning here, just after sunrise, before the heat settles in, the spring swallows start. They come and do these acrobatics over the property; banking and diving and wheeling around like they’re showing off. It looks like pure joy. And I stand there watching them like I have nowhere else to be.
Which, actually, I don’t.
My favorite thing is to watch my garden grow. And it’s come a long way already. There’s something deeply satisfying about watching a piece of land wake up and turn green.
Right now it’s mainly this big raised bed, which was just sun bleached earth and weeds until recently when I started seedlings in the house and then transplanted out here. Every day there is beautiful growth including this volunteer which is starting to look like a cala lily. I’m excited about tomatoes but I’ve heard over and over that you can’t grow tomatoes here without a green house or a high tunnel or something like that. I’m thinking that’s because when the rain starts in June it just floods the plants and leads to fungus and waterlogged roots. Right now they are doing great! But I might need to figure out some kind of shelter before June.
I also have runner beans, some herbs, these are bush beans, sunflowers, and zucchini. In the future I’d like to build a big raised bed garden out in the field. And maybe a couple more fruit trees. Avocado, fig, apple? I’m still just discovering and researching what grows well here at about 7000 feet with a pronounced rainy season. A bigger garden means more water usage of course, which is easy in the summer, but costly in the spring.
I am very content to go slow with all my plans. Now that the casita is finished and my friends are living there, that’s done. But I have some big expenses coming up. The fence needs to be repaired, the wood is rotting in many places, and I need to buy a riding mower before too long. So I’ll do these things and then see if I have any money left for the pleasures of a bigger garden.
My new neighbors are doing amazing things with the casita garden and it’s looking beautiful! They finished clearing the overgrowth and made some plantings; vegetables and flowers. I’m so grateful to have them here! They say they really enjoy it. Looks so different from when I first moved in.
The rhythm of the day is shaped by the heat right now. By 10am the sun is hot! So we stay pretty much in the shade or in the house. This is boring for the dogs but the adobe bricks this house is made of really keep the house relatively cool. Viggo especially needs to be protected from the heat. I’ve never had a dog with such dense fur. Sometimes I give him a wipe-down to clean him up a little and cool him off, and it’s hard to even get down to the scalp level. Plus with all his black fur he gets overheated very fast.
If I’m staying home I work on the computer, read, cook, clean. I love being home for the day with the dogs and just doing my things. We wait for the evening when it starts to cool off. It’s so beautiful here. I have a daily ritual to go out to where the bamboo grove was cut down and pull all the new little shoots. It’s so relaxing and I just listen to the sparrows and finches sing their songs, the breeze picks up, and I love it! The dogs investigate things, lounge in the shade, and keep their eyes out for any intruder, like a squirrel or rabbit.
I have mixed feelings about the bamboo. I do like to go out everyday and pick it, and I would miss it if it was gone. But obviously I don’t want it spreading all over the yard. The first time I walked this property there were little bushes of it trying to grow all over the place. Can’t have that. Bamboo does not accept defeat easily!
By the way, I want to thank those that took the time to write comments on my last video. So sweet and supportive! Thank you. I realize that it may look, from my videos, that I’m solitary all the time. I assure you I’m not. I go out with friends usually a couple of times a week, and I have friends and neighbors over at my house regularly. It makes me happy to have a balanced life and I do. That’s one of the best things about settling down in one place; I’ve had the chance to make good friends here. I feel very fortunate to be able to spend time alone as well as with others I care about.
We just passed Semana Santa here, Holy Week. And I want to show you some of what that looked like here, because it’s not something I can really describe in words.
Living here has shown me layers of the beautiful Mexican culture I didn’t know existed before now.
Semana Santa is one of the biggest holidays of the year. The fireworks are serious and not just in town. I’m not talking about backyard sparklers really; but the kind that shake the walls. And Olive always disappears. Under the bed, under the sink, wherever she can wedge her body into the smallest sheltered space. She’s very afraid of loud noises like cohetes and thunder.
I’ve tried everything: Sitting with her, holding her, treats, a thundercoat, everything. Her body doesn’t care. The fear is already running the show before I can even say a word.
Olive came to me from a rescue in Northern California. In a wire pen, open to the wind and weather, with a traumatic past, nobody knew the full story. What I do know is that somewhere in her early life, loud noises meant danger. Maybe shouting Or something worse. Her brain learned a lesson and it has never unlearned it.
It doesn’t matter that she has been safe for years now. It doesn’t matter that no harm has come to her here, on this finca, in this life with me. Her nervous system doesn’t accept the proof. The past still holds the microphone. So to speak.
And I recognized that in myself.
I had been in operating rooms for nearly thirty years. The sounds of that world: monitors alarming, overhead pages, the urgency of a surgeon’s voice, my body learned to respond to all of it instantly. That hypervigilance wasn’t a flaw, it helped keep people alive. And I was good at it.
And then I moved to Mexico. And I was happy and peaceful. Exploring new towns, watching fireflies and hummingbirds, letting mornings be slow for the first time in so many years.
But underneath all of that, I was still tense and bracing. I found myself still scanning the horizon for the next thing to manage or the next danger, despite the evidence of my everyday life. My body didn’t know the difference between a real threat and an old habit of fear.
I’d see no danger. And still feel the old pulse pounding in my chest. The shallow breathing and tense muscles. With an anxious mind.
Olive taught me what that is. It’s not weakness and it’s not a failure. It’s hardwiring. You can be completely safe and still feel under siege. You can be free and still act like you’re in a cage. The nervous system doesn’t update automatically just because the circumstances have changed.
What changes it is time. And noticing, and deciding, slowly, to trust the quiet and the peace.
Viggo has always known how to do this. He approaches almost every person, every dog, every new situation with a wagging tail. He leans in with trust. It almost never occurs to him that things might go badly. But then, he’s never had anything bad happen to him. During Semana Santa, while Olive was shaking under the bed, Viggo was at the window. Curious with his tail wagging.
Olive was the part of me that waited for the worst. Viggo was the part that assumed the best.
Both of them made it through. And so did I.
Olive is getting better slowly. As time goes on her fear is less and less.
That feels like wonderful progress.
Despite the current heat, and occasional loud noises, since we’ve settled in here I’ve never seen both of them so happy.
They run around the property looking for rabbits and lizards. They nap in the sun when it’s cool, and in the house when it’s hot. Viggo loves when I have company and is friendly toward most people and dogs. Olive is still more reserved and nervous about new people, and is a great protector and watch dog.
As for me; I’ve never been happier. I moved to Mexico two years ago not entirely sure I was doing the right thing. I was afraid. I’m still sometimes afraid.
But I came out from under the bed.
