Low water, high bridge
Today I’m in Las Juntas y Los Veranos, a tiny town in the hills near Puerto Vallarta, and mis suegras have been kind enough to put me and my spouse in a lovely, tiny brick-and-wood kitchenette facing the river Horcones. As you can see from the photo here, it’s dry season. There’s a woody green odor here that would lift anyone’s spirits. The crickets, frogs, and chickens keep up a dadaist symphony.
It may be dry season, but that doesn’t stop flocks of raucous birds from swirling through in the morning. And you may also be able to see, via the size of the powder-white boulders, that when it is wet season, powerful floods come through. This bridge was replaced just three years ago, they tell me —
And it seems to be used by everyone and everything (save auto traffic). I think of the bridge today as a bit of an analogue for the state of my spine: functional, but don’t be directing freeway traffic on it!
In fact my spine has pretty much kept me in bed today, so I won’t be adding much to my daily considerations. I do want to let you get a look at Chac, a Cholo Esquitle who has been quite essentially helpful to me today, by remembering to grab and play with my fingers whenever I start staring off into space. I have a variety of arthritic spondilitis that abrades, compresses, and tears at my spinal discs and cord with bone spurs — so on a bad day, I can’t move around much.
Doctor Chac knows to keep me laughing. Here he is, on duty.
And in the background you can see Rev. Ani Haines, Witch. She is also indispensable in this adventure. Her mother and her partner also give me great aid, and have laid out a bed in the back of their van so that I will be able to travel Mexico, whether I can walk two blocks at a time, or not.
I count myself amoung the Blessed. One of them just brought me a beer.