If you're reading this from outside the San Diego/Baja Norte area you probably have in your mind that all of Baja is tropical - like Cabo, at the southernmost tip. But Cabo is 1,200 miles away from where we live, right up 30 miles from the US border. So, while I thought when I came here (two years ago) that I'd be missing seasons, that turns out to be wrong. We just had "winter" here, which was chilly (40s-50s). OK, I know that those of you from places where it gets REALLY cold are laughing yourselves silly at the thought of winter temps in that range, but for here, it's COLD. We had to bundle up to walk the dog, we had to put away our sandals and get out our sweaters, we had to light the (beautiful) fire some nights, and the bathroom floor was too cold to walk barefoot. The garden continued to bloom some, but most plants just slowed down. And it was rainy - very rainy this year. Big storms with lots of wild rain and wind in the night. I was very happy to be in our snug, cement villa. It started in December, lasted through January and February. Just when I was starting to think that I was getting pretty tired of "cold" - it ended.
Yes, just like that, on the first of March, Spring arrived in Baja Norte! The temperatures shifted to the high 60s. The sun shone more brightly and warmly. We suddenly seemed to have more hours of sunlight - now with US daylight savings time, it's light until 7pm! (We shift to US time because we like TV and all the programs we like are on the US schedule. Our families back home are all on US time. Mexico shifts an hour forward in April. So, it's pretty confusing here for a month in the spring and fall.) The garden has started to look lively. Flowers are still in bud, but they're getting ready to pop open with color. Birds have appeared from somewhere, with sweet and happy songs I don't remember from last year. They're hard to see - not colorful here, as I expected. Even the hummingbirds are a dull color. Did you know they don't "sing"? They make a little clicking sound that confused me at first, until I got close one day to make sure that sound was coming from that bird.
We see whales and dolphins almost every day. These whales are the last ones heading south to calve. The dolphins are following the fish, so they're always around, traveling north, traveling south, wherever the fish go. Sometimes the whales and dolphins get together to actually herd the schools of fish. You can see them, the whales moving slowly on the outside, the dolphins racing fast on their side, guiding the fish into smaller and smaller spaces, until they take turns going in to feed. The seagulls and pelicans wheel above, shreiking and dive in, with an almost soundless "plop". It's amazing.
We don't have the time to take the trip south to see the calving, but we've heard that in April we can drive about two hours south to a protected cove where the mothers bring their babies to shelter on the loooong trip north to Alaska. I REALLY want to see that! Sometimes, late at night, when I walk the dog along the cliff edge in the chilly dark, I look out at the vast Pacific shimmering quietly to the distant horizon, and imagine the huge whales out there, swimming through the night. Do they sleep, I wonder? Close their eyes? Make those lonely whale-sounds to each other as they travel? I know they're not cold, but the thought still makes me shiver.
Last night I slept with the door cracked open for a little air for the first time in months. It was deliciously cool and scented with ocean. Now I'm sitting in a short-sleeved shirt, no sweater, and sandals. OK, I'm a little cool, maybe rushing it a bit, but I have welcomed Spring whole heartedly, and I'm not going back!
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Friday, February 15, 2008
Well a happy Valentine's Day to all. Hope yours was fun and romantic. Mine was, well, typical for us. I did all the planning, and thought I did a pretty good job of it. I bought us tickets to the Cirque de Soleil production, Corteo up in San Diego. That would be the most fun thing we've done in over a year - but only if we could actually GET there to see it.
Getting Steve out the door is like getting a four-year-old - no make that four-year-old TWINS out the door. "Steve, are you taking your shower?" "Steve, are you dressed yet?" "Steve, it's almost time to go, have you walked the dog yet?" "Yeah, yeah, I'm gettin' there!" So, although I hoped to leave the house at noon, it was actually 12:45 when we walked out the door. We took the new Baja 2000 road to Otay Mesa, and saw the shortest line ever - we thought it would take only 20 minutes to cross (since I freakin' CANNOT GET a SENTRI pass from my government...) but our lane was sloooower than slow, so it took 45 minutes. We crossed about 2:15 and were supposed to be at the Del Mar fairgrounds at 3:00 for a 4:00 performance. There shoulda been plenty of time. OK, well, there shoulda been ENOUGH time.
So I said, I bet traffic will be bad as we get further north, so let's just head there directly. We can get a hot dog at the show. I mean, that was the smart thing to do. We were headed that way when I had to call our friend about meeting for dinner. When I got on the phone and was distracted for just the teeniest little minute, next thing I knew we had left the freeway, headed for a mall. 'Hey! Where are you going?" "We're gonna stop and get a bite." "No, we don't have time for that." "Sure we do, it will just take a minute." In Steve's world, which runs on Steve time, there is ALWAYS enough time to do everything you can think of, no matter what. That this bears no relation to reality does not bother him much. Bothers me plenty. I wish I had been driving.
We stopped at Taco Bell (because we apparently don't get enough Mexican food in Mexico), which was bad enough, but then he got the food to eat THERE. "Hey! We don't have time for this, don't you get it?" "Sure we do, it will just take a minute." Well, it took from 3:00 to 3:25. Now I'm totally pissed off, we get in the car and head north again. Shockingly (WHO could have predicted this, I wonder?) now there's a lot of traffic, 'cause it's rush hour on VALENTINE'S DAY and everyone left work early to get home to their sweetie. Again, WHO could have predicted that? Well, me for one.
Now I'm getting really anxious that we're gonna be late for the show, when Steve says, "Oh, shit, we're running out of gas! Just hit reserve! Unbelievable!" Sure enough, the reserve light is on, and damn if it isn't MY fault he didn't notice we're running out of gas. I'm exasperated, but I say, "I think the reserve tank will take us at least 30 miles. Let's just keep going north, we know there's a gas station up at our exit and we'll be close to the show." "NO! I don't trust this gas gauge. I'm getting off at the next exit, we'll get gas and only lose a few minutes." Now it's so late we don't HAVE a few minutes, but there's nothing I can do, I'm just along for the ride. I'm upset, but I'm trying really hard to keep quiet about it. You'd think Steve, WHOSE FAULT THIS ALL IS, would be grateful, at least just a little, but you'd be wrong. He's now screaming at me about how this is all MY fault for not getting him out the door earlier, so we'd have lots of time for screw-ups like this and why can't I learn how to deal with his time problems!!" We're driving around like morons because apparently we took the ONLY exit from the freeway that does not have a gas station anywhere around. We drive and drive in circles. Time passes. 3:45. 3:50. 3:55... now it's 4:00 and the show is starting and we're still looking for gas.
God knows he'd never ask, so I roll down my window and imploringly ask a woman in another car for help finding a station. "That way" she points. "Follow me!" Bless her forever. We would NEVER have found that station, we would have run out of gas at the side of the freakin' road and I would have committed murder. Did I mention it was raining? And cold. Really, really cold for San Diego.
We get gas, I walk the poor dog, who is traumatized by having to listen to Steve screaming and cursing and carrying on like a lunatic. He's a beast. (Steve, that is.)
We arrive at the show 20 minutes late. Steve snarls, "I'm dropping you off - I'm staying in the car with the dog!" I guess this was supposed to be a punishment to me? "FINE!" I say. "Fine. Just get me to the door and get lost."
So I missed the first 30 minutes of a 2-hour show. Sat happily in my 5th-row seat enjoying the show just fine by myself. After a while Steve came and sat next to me, looking sheepish, but not enough to suit me. He grins at me, takes my hand, which I try to pull away, kisses my hand repeatedly, whispers how sorry he is, what a jerk he is, how sorry he is, he's a moron.... I shrug and turn my attention back to the amazing show. LOVE any Cirque production. The flyers - they're the best part. How I'd love to fly. Makes me reconsider all my career choices....
During intermission Steve buys me pink champagne, kisses my hand some more, apologizes some more. He tells me he sat outside and watched all the other couples that arrived late - they walked separately, one of them looking totally pissed off. Just like us! What can I do, I'm kinda stuck with him and stuck ON him. We enjoy the rest of the show, and have a really nice Chinese dinner after, then make our way back to Mexico, too tired to do the horizonal tango, but happy to have seen the show.
This time last year I was flat on my back in a hospital bed recovering from a broken back. So I'm very grateful to be strong and mobile again. That could have ended very badly for me, but it didn't. Every Valentine's Day we've been together before that we went dancing. I miss dancing very much. There's not much of that where we are. I guess if we want it we'll have to set it up ourselves, but we're too busy writing our books just now.
This has been the story of Melinda and Steve's 2008 Valentine's Day - hope yours was a lot less dramatic!
Getting Steve out the door is like getting a four-year-old - no make that four-year-old TWINS out the door. "Steve, are you taking your shower?" "Steve, are you dressed yet?" "Steve, it's almost time to go, have you walked the dog yet?" "Yeah, yeah, I'm gettin' there!" So, although I hoped to leave the house at noon, it was actually 12:45 when we walked out the door. We took the new Baja 2000 road to Otay Mesa, and saw the shortest line ever - we thought it would take only 20 minutes to cross (since I freakin' CANNOT GET a SENTRI pass from my government...) but our lane was sloooower than slow, so it took 45 minutes. We crossed about 2:15 and were supposed to be at the Del Mar fairgrounds at 3:00 for a 4:00 performance. There shoulda been plenty of time. OK, well, there shoulda been ENOUGH time.
So I said, I bet traffic will be bad as we get further north, so let's just head there directly. We can get a hot dog at the show. I mean, that was the smart thing to do. We were headed that way when I had to call our friend about meeting for dinner. When I got on the phone and was distracted for just the teeniest little minute, next thing I knew we had left the freeway, headed for a mall. 'Hey! Where are you going?" "We're gonna stop and get a bite." "No, we don't have time for that." "Sure we do, it will just take a minute." In Steve's world, which runs on Steve time, there is ALWAYS enough time to do everything you can think of, no matter what. That this bears no relation to reality does not bother him much. Bothers me plenty. I wish I had been driving.
We stopped at Taco Bell (because we apparently don't get enough Mexican food in Mexico), which was bad enough, but then he got the food to eat THERE. "Hey! We don't have time for this, don't you get it?" "Sure we do, it will just take a minute." Well, it took from 3:00 to 3:25. Now I'm totally pissed off, we get in the car and head north again. Shockingly (WHO could have predicted this, I wonder?) now there's a lot of traffic, 'cause it's rush hour on VALENTINE'S DAY and everyone left work early to get home to their sweetie. Again, WHO could have predicted that? Well, me for one.
Now I'm getting really anxious that we're gonna be late for the show, when Steve says, "Oh, shit, we're running out of gas! Just hit reserve! Unbelievable!" Sure enough, the reserve light is on, and damn if it isn't MY fault he didn't notice we're running out of gas. I'm exasperated, but I say, "I think the reserve tank will take us at least 30 miles. Let's just keep going north, we know there's a gas station up at our exit and we'll be close to the show." "NO! I don't trust this gas gauge. I'm getting off at the next exit, we'll get gas and only lose a few minutes." Now it's so late we don't HAVE a few minutes, but there's nothing I can do, I'm just along for the ride. I'm upset, but I'm trying really hard to keep quiet about it. You'd think Steve, WHOSE FAULT THIS ALL IS, would be grateful, at least just a little, but you'd be wrong. He's now screaming at me about how this is all MY fault for not getting him out the door earlier, so we'd have lots of time for screw-ups like this and why can't I learn how to deal with his time problems!!" We're driving around like morons because apparently we took the ONLY exit from the freeway that does not have a gas station anywhere around. We drive and drive in circles. Time passes. 3:45. 3:50. 3:55... now it's 4:00 and the show is starting and we're still looking for gas.
God knows he'd never ask, so I roll down my window and imploringly ask a woman in another car for help finding a station. "That way" she points. "Follow me!" Bless her forever. We would NEVER have found that station, we would have run out of gas at the side of the freakin' road and I would have committed murder. Did I mention it was raining? And cold. Really, really cold for San Diego.
We get gas, I walk the poor dog, who is traumatized by having to listen to Steve screaming and cursing and carrying on like a lunatic. He's a beast. (Steve, that is.)
We arrive at the show 20 minutes late. Steve snarls, "I'm dropping you off - I'm staying in the car with the dog!" I guess this was supposed to be a punishment to me? "FINE!" I say. "Fine. Just get me to the door and get lost."
So I missed the first 30 minutes of a 2-hour show. Sat happily in my 5th-row seat enjoying the show just fine by myself. After a while Steve came and sat next to me, looking sheepish, but not enough to suit me. He grins at me, takes my hand, which I try to pull away, kisses my hand repeatedly, whispers how sorry he is, what a jerk he is, how sorry he is, he's a moron.... I shrug and turn my attention back to the amazing show. LOVE any Cirque production. The flyers - they're the best part. How I'd love to fly. Makes me reconsider all my career choices....
During intermission Steve buys me pink champagne, kisses my hand some more, apologizes some more. He tells me he sat outside and watched all the other couples that arrived late - they walked separately, one of them looking totally pissed off. Just like us! What can I do, I'm kinda stuck with him and stuck ON him. We enjoy the rest of the show, and have a really nice Chinese dinner after, then make our way back to Mexico, too tired to do the horizonal tango, but happy to have seen the show.
This time last year I was flat on my back in a hospital bed recovering from a broken back. So I'm very grateful to be strong and mobile again. That could have ended very badly for me, but it didn't. Every Valentine's Day we've been together before that we went dancing. I miss dancing very much. There's not much of that where we are. I guess if we want it we'll have to set it up ourselves, but we're too busy writing our books just now.
This has been the story of Melinda and Steve's 2008 Valentine's Day - hope yours was a lot less dramatic!
Sunday, October 28, 2007
Who I am
My parents were very interesting people. My dad's family, the Ridders and Naumanns, came to America in the 1840s, supposedly to escape being executed by the Kaiser for rebellious activities. My mom's family came from Spain to Puerto Rico, where her great grandfather was a naval captain in Ponce during the Spanish-American war. At the end of the war he had to decide whether to go home to Spain or stay and be an American. He chose America and named his first daughter America Anna. My mother's mother died in childbirth when mom was only 3 years old. She and her brothers were shipped off to New York to be raised by three maiden aunts.
Dad was a founder of the NY Ski Club, and mom, a barely 5'tall Puerto Rican, for reasons she never explained to us, joined the ski club. They met, fell in love, and married, then moved to Washington DC for his work.
My sister, brother and I were all born and raised in Washington. It was a great city in the 1950s and '60s. My parents were staunch Republicans, but were very opposed to the Democrats on the Hill who refused to allow Washingtonians to have home rule. They thought this was very wrong, and they resented not being able to vote!
I'm the product of wonderful Catholic schools, although I'm not a Catholic any more. I attended Blessed Sacrament Parochial School, Georgetown Visitation Preparatory School, and Georgetown University, class of 1968. My most famous classmate is Bill Clinton, who I met the first week of freshman year. This tall, skinny kid with the whiteboy Afro, stuck out his hand and said, "Hi! I'm Bill Clinton and I'm running for freshman class president!" We've been friends ever since.
After school I married a very nice man I'm now divorced from - we are great friends and parents, just not very good mates. We had two wonderful sons. One lives near his dad in VA, and one is traveling the world, currently in Ipanema Beach.
AFter being home with the kids for a while, I joined the staff of the National Gallery of Art, as an exhibition supervisor. This was a great job! I learned to love working with the public, especially when the public is behaving badly. Any moron can behave badly back, but it's a kind of game to return kindness and helpfulness to rudeness and aggression. My first day on the job, at the opening of Treasure Houses of Britain, the charming Prince and exquisite Princess of Wales walked up to me and began a conversation about tourism in Britain - as if my opinion mattered. It was a wonderful experience, and I knew I was gonna LOVE that job. I stayed at the Gallery from 1985-'87, leaving only because there was no large, special exhibition scheduled for several years, so I had nothing to do.
In 1992, my friend Bill, now Governor of Arkansas, announced he was running for president - an announcement all his friends had been expecting for 24 years. I worked hard as a volunteer in the campaign in Washington, and never imagined there would be a job for me if he won - but there was. The day after the 1993 inauguration I was called to the White House to head up the Visitors Office - more about that later. I'm the first and only person in history to hold that job for all eight years of an administration, and that was in the Clinton years, when the First Family actually WANTED the public to visit. We found a way to accommodate 1.5 million visitors a year - a great record. For eight years I was the White House "Egg Lady", coordinating the annual Easter Egg Roll, an event for 30,000 people on the South Lawn, the day after Easter. I worked on State Visits, Arrival Ceremonies for heads of state, Balls, receptions, and every other kind of event the White House hosts. It was not unusual to walk out of my office, across the House, and to the Oval Office for a few moments with the President. These were amazing times, and now I'm writing a book about it all.
In 2005 I happened to see a CBS television program about Baja California, Mexico. They interviewed lots of happy Americans who seemed to love living on the beach. They talked about how affordable it is. It's only 45 minutes from downtown San Diego, a great city. Two weeks later we were here, just "looking". But, to my own surprise, I bought a little house on the beach, went home, quite my job, put my house on the market and planned my move to Mexico.
I will write the blog about all these experiences, and hope you find it interesting. If you have questions about the move, or about living in Mexico, please post it, and I'll be happy to answer.
Dad was a founder of the NY Ski Club, and mom, a barely 5'tall Puerto Rican, for reasons she never explained to us, joined the ski club. They met, fell in love, and married, then moved to Washington DC for his work.
My sister, brother and I were all born and raised in Washington. It was a great city in the 1950s and '60s. My parents were staunch Republicans, but were very opposed to the Democrats on the Hill who refused to allow Washingtonians to have home rule. They thought this was very wrong, and they resented not being able to vote!
I'm the product of wonderful Catholic schools, although I'm not a Catholic any more. I attended Blessed Sacrament Parochial School, Georgetown Visitation Preparatory School, and Georgetown University, class of 1968. My most famous classmate is Bill Clinton, who I met the first week of freshman year. This tall, skinny kid with the whiteboy Afro, stuck out his hand and said, "Hi! I'm Bill Clinton and I'm running for freshman class president!" We've been friends ever since.
After school I married a very nice man I'm now divorced from - we are great friends and parents, just not very good mates. We had two wonderful sons. One lives near his dad in VA, and one is traveling the world, currently in Ipanema Beach.
AFter being home with the kids for a while, I joined the staff of the National Gallery of Art, as an exhibition supervisor. This was a great job! I learned to love working with the public, especially when the public is behaving badly. Any moron can behave badly back, but it's a kind of game to return kindness and helpfulness to rudeness and aggression. My first day on the job, at the opening of Treasure Houses of Britain, the charming Prince and exquisite Princess of Wales walked up to me and began a conversation about tourism in Britain - as if my opinion mattered. It was a wonderful experience, and I knew I was gonna LOVE that job. I stayed at the Gallery from 1985-'87, leaving only because there was no large, special exhibition scheduled for several years, so I had nothing to do.
In 1992, my friend Bill, now Governor of Arkansas, announced he was running for president - an announcement all his friends had been expecting for 24 years. I worked hard as a volunteer in the campaign in Washington, and never imagined there would be a job for me if he won - but there was. The day after the 1993 inauguration I was called to the White House to head up the Visitors Office - more about that later. I'm the first and only person in history to hold that job for all eight years of an administration, and that was in the Clinton years, when the First Family actually WANTED the public to visit. We found a way to accommodate 1.5 million visitors a year - a great record. For eight years I was the White House "Egg Lady", coordinating the annual Easter Egg Roll, an event for 30,000 people on the South Lawn, the day after Easter. I worked on State Visits, Arrival Ceremonies for heads of state, Balls, receptions, and every other kind of event the White House hosts. It was not unusual to walk out of my office, across the House, and to the Oval Office for a few moments with the President. These were amazing times, and now I'm writing a book about it all.
In 2005 I happened to see a CBS television program about Baja California, Mexico. They interviewed lots of happy Americans who seemed to love living on the beach. They talked about how affordable it is. It's only 45 minutes from downtown San Diego, a great city. Two weeks later we were here, just "looking". But, to my own surprise, I bought a little house on the beach, went home, quite my job, put my house on the market and planned my move to Mexico.
I will write the blog about all these experiences, and hope you find it interesting. If you have questions about the move, or about living in Mexico, please post it, and I'll be happy to answer.
Hello, and welcome to Boomer in Baja, the blog of Melinda Bates, transplanted East Coast girl now living in Baja California Norte, Mexico.
I'm a proud part of the first year of Baby Boomers, born in 1946. All my life, for reasons I don't completely understand, I have found myself on the leading edge of things. Deciding, for my own purposes, to do something, pursue something that interests me, and finding shortly after, that millions of people coming up behind me are interested in exactly the same things. So, when I quit my job, and sold my home of 30 years to move to a little house on the beach in Baja, I figured there will be a lot of my contemporaries following soon enough.
This blog (at least to start) is about my experiences with that move, the process of divesting oneself of a lifetime of acquisitions, moving to a place where I knew no one, adjusting to a new and very different country, gutting and rebuilding a house, in Mexico!, and settling in to a new life of writing.
This post is a brief introduction, a scout, so to speak, with many more to follow. I'll add photos of our new life, and political musings, and descriptions of life in Mexico. I look forward to hearing from new friends of all ages, and from all over. So, once again, welcome to Boomer in Baja!
I'm a proud part of the first year of Baby Boomers, born in 1946. All my life, for reasons I don't completely understand, I have found myself on the leading edge of things. Deciding, for my own purposes, to do something, pursue something that interests me, and finding shortly after, that millions of people coming up behind me are interested in exactly the same things. So, when I quit my job, and sold my home of 30 years to move to a little house on the beach in Baja, I figured there will be a lot of my contemporaries following soon enough.
This blog (at least to start) is about my experiences with that move, the process of divesting oneself of a lifetime of acquisitions, moving to a place where I knew no one, adjusting to a new and very different country, gutting and rebuilding a house, in Mexico!, and settling in to a new life of writing.
This post is a brief introduction, a scout, so to speak, with many more to follow. I'll add photos of our new life, and political musings, and descriptions of life in Mexico. I look forward to hearing from new friends of all ages, and from all over. So, once again, welcome to Boomer in Baja!
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