Second item of business is a laundromat. Which here, of course, normally means dropping off your clothes at a tiny storefront to be washed, dried, and carefully folded. But today it means asking literally 9 people for directions, having a man call down from a balcony, "It's in here!" and finally scooting between the tables of a small taqueria and up a narrow flight of stairs into someone's living room, where a kind woman tells me to please come back tomorrow after 6.
The very steep streets of the city center would be seen as one-lane in the U.S., but here they accomodate two directions of traffic with pedestrians on both sides -- no sidewalks -- with only a couple inches to spare. Just as I'm wondering how the V.W. Bug taxis pull it off, down one of the narrowest comes a hearse, almost scraping stucco walls, followed by six men walking with a casket on their shoulders, and about a hundred people dressed in black. All traffic calmly stops as they cross the sunny plaza without a sound and enter the church.
Finally, I'm admiring the designs painted in white on many of the stone streets, from a simple line to mark the center to flowers, bees and geometric figures. Then I walk down another alley-street where a repair crew is working, and weaving between careful piles of black and shiny white stone I realize that it's not painted. It's all hand inlay work. If this strangeness is just the first afternoon, I can't wait to see what strange dreams I have tonight...
Finally, I'm admiring the designs painted in white on many of the stone streets, from a simple line to mark the center to flowers, bees and geometric figures. Then I walk down another alley-street where a repair crew is working, and weaving between careful piles of black and shiny white stone I realize that it's not painted. It's all hand inlay work. If this strangeness is just the first afternoon, I can't wait to see what strange dreams I have tonight...
(two days later, energy shift)
Four days left in Mexico. Exhausted. Claustrophobic. The constant noise has me about to snap, and the piles of trash everywhere are making me cry. Deeply missing my precious Earth-connection in Taos. Made 5 different plans yesterday and gave them all up. Nothing seems worth the effort at this point. Getting anywhere means either walking hours in traffic where emissions testing is unheard of and pedestrians have no rights, or riding hours on a bus playing one violent, soulless movie after another. The small towns are no quieter than the City, and the country least of all. I went back last night to a restaurant that had offered peace and unusually tranquil music the first time, only to find that they were playing the radio AND the TV, both at once.
Only clear thought this morning, in Taxco, was to get a coffee and sit on the plaza for 20 minutes before heading out. This is a very difficult action for me, sitting still. But I did it. It was early, and workers of all kinds were putting the city together a piece at a time. A young man set down a bundle of brush, carefully shaped and tied it together in several places, and stood up with a broom, which he used to begin sweeping leaves off the plaza. Right next to me, another guy set up a straight-backed wooden chair with a metal platform attached, for shining shoes. He set out brushes and polish, checked the change in a small drawer underneath, went for a stack of newspapers from a nearby vendor, and then carefully buffed and polished his own shoes (might as well be your own advertising). A woman at one side of the church set down a large plastic bucket topped with an embroidered cloth. I thought she was waiting for a bus, but after several combis passed her by and she stood patiently, it looked more likely that she was selling tamales. In the middle ground, a guy crossed repeatedly, each time carrying a plastic crate full of bottles of Coke on one shoulder. The driver of a Nissan truck with a bed full of 5-gallon water bottles parked in front of a nice restaurant. A handsome grandfatherly man with silvery mustache, cowboy hat and boots stopped next to the woman with tamales, gazed attentively across the square, and then crossed the plaza and did the same at its opposite corner. Mothers and fathers walked little kids in red and white jogging-suit uniforms to school.
I watched them all and added another major item to the list of things deeply missed: work. A role and a task to fill the days. I've never liked being a tourist. I'm terrible at it, really. Can't wait til spring offers earth to turn, chance to labor and sweat and be useful for something.
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