While We've Still Got Feet

Here's a poem by David Budbill.

Tomorrow

Tomorrow
we are
bones and ash,
the roots of weeds
poking through
our skulls.

Today,
simple clothes,
empty mind,
full stomach,
alive, aware,
right here,
right now.

Drunk on music,
who needs wine?

Come on,
Sweetheart,
let's go dancing
while we've
still got feet.


Rebecca's parents arrived on Monday. They are going to be staying with us for the next 59 days (but who's counting!). Seriously, that may sound like a bad thing to some of you, but probably only those of you who haven't met them. They are really generous, humble, talented and fun people who are great with Maya and Jonah. I'm glad that they decided to come, even though it does change the dynamic that Maya, Jonah and I have established over the past two weeks.

Anyway, I put the poem up because it would have been easy for them to say no to coming to Ecuador and just sit around and do the thing they have going on in Alexandria. But, that isn't really their style. They like to dance (I mean that figuratively, of course. My mother-in-law doing the Macarena would probably embarrass me more than it would her).

So, Maya, Jonah and I picked Opa (German for grandpa) and PoPo (pronounced PawPaw, Chinese for Grandma) up at the airport yesterday afternoon. The kids were really excited to see them. In Alexandria, Maya and Jonah spend the better part of at least two days a week with them (while Rebecca works) and then as much of the weekend as Rebecca and I can manage to coax from them. So Maya and Jonah not seeing them for nearly a month (my in-laws were on a cruise the early part of May until we left on May 15) was like heroin withdrawal. Though, one day last week, after I had brought Maya and Jonah ice cream and gumballs while we were at the park, and then put frosted flakes in the shopping cart while we were at the grocery, Maya said that being with me was like being with Opa and PoPo. So, we now understand that being without Opa and PoPo for so long really WAS like heroin withdrawal - the kiddy-candy-crack variety.

Anyway, the kids were so excited to see Opa and PoPo that Jonah fell asleep on the bus ride to the airport and didn't wake up until Opa and PoPo were walking out of customs (or the Ecuadorian equivalent of customs). Then, as if he smelled them, he woke up, jumped out of my arms, and joined Maya as she ran past the security guards and down the ramp to waiting arms. It was pretty cute. If my arms weren't numb from carrying Jonah while he slept, I would have taken the camera out and gotten a picture. (NOTE - Opa and PoPo brought with them the software that we thought would solver our technical difficulties in not being to upload pictures from the camera to the computer, but it didn't work as we had hoped. Stay tuned.)

Maya and Jonah really haven't left Opa and PoPo alone since they arrived. Jonah even insists that Opa carry him despite the fact that Opa is laying flat on the ground with a stiff back.

Jonah falling asleep on the bus ride to the airport was a mixed bag. It was nice not to have to follow him around the airport and tell him to stop putting his dirty fingers in his mouth and not touch the garbage laying on the ground and stay away from the security areas, but it was also hell on my arms and back. Shortly after we got there and sat down in the waiting area, Maya had to use the restroom. And she wouldn't go into the ladies room by herself. So, I had to squeeze into a stall in the mens room with her with Jonah in my arms. If you haven't seen one, a stall in a men's bathrooms is not a pretty sight - even in the US. Think a sweaty John Goodman in a mini-skirt and halter top. And, Maya kept dropping the toilet paper she was trying to line the seat with into the toilet, so it took her forever to finally sit on the damn seat. Plus, the door wouldn't lock. I kept hitting it with my backpack and it kept opening, and the girl who runs around the house naked most days suddenly became ms. bashful and would jump up and cover herself each time the door opened. Of course the paper would fall in the toilet and it would take forever to line the seat again. After all that, she ended up not even going poop. Too much pressure I guess.

Anyway, that was a lot about Maya in the toilet. My arms were really aching after that. and when we came back to the waiting area, there were no seats. So I had to stand the next twenty minutes or so until Opa and PoPo emerged from customs. But, I managed to soldier on.

Finally, we managed to squeeze Opa, PoPo, Maya, Jonah and myself and their four suitcases (one was full of stuff we asked them to bring for us in hindsight) and two carry-ons into the taxi and make the five minute ride back to our apartment.

Incidentally, Maya and Jonah haven't sat in a car seat the entire time here. Well, Jonah has when he has ridden in Paul and Sylvia's car, but that has only been once or twice. Whenever I get in a taxi with them, they are rolling all over the back seat (partly for fun and partly because it is necessary. Taxi drivers drive about a hundred miles an hour between stop lights, slam on the brakes when swerving into another lane of traffic won't solve the problem (i.e., when brakes are absolutely necessary) and take turns without slowing down (but they do blow their horns to let whoever is on the other side of the turn know that they better get the hell out of the way). I guess it is pretty safe if you know what you are doing and everyone drives the same way. I hadn't seen any accidents before today. We passed the typical rear-ender in traffic on the way out to Tumbaco today. Everyone in our bus got up and crowded to the accident side to see.

We actually didn't take the bus to Tumbaco, we took it back from Tumbaco. Sylvia picked us up to go out there. As soon as we got in her truck, it stalled because it was out of gas. She called the Ecuadorian equivalent of Triple A, and we waited. Then she called her husband Paul, and he sent one of his employees on a motorcycle with a five liter water jug filled with gas to us. Motorcycles travel well through the nearly constant traffic jams in Quito because they can pay even less attention to the rules of the road than cars do. So, the motorcycle got there about a minute earlier than the Triple A truck, even though the Triple A truck had a twenty-five minute head start. And when I say Triple A truck, I mean a random guy in a random pick up truck. There is no way you could tell he was part of a roadside service.

When we got to our house in Tumbaco, our landlord, Vinicio, was there fixing things up. We had given him a long list of things to do, and the place looked like he had done most of them. Though, the two biggest (hot water and a second double bed) weren't done. But he was working on them and I think we will definitely be able to move in this weekend, if not before. In fact, we are thinking that we will spend Thursday night there so Maya and Jonah can start at the Pachamama school on Friday.

The reason for going to Tumbaco today was so I could visit the school. I did that, and the main teacher tried to sell me on it. But the sales pitch was in Spanish and I caught very little of it. Little did she know, though, that we were already sold. When I told her we would send Maya and Jonah there, she almost did a little dance. Like it was a big score for her. Well, that's cool. I'm glad she's excited to have our kids on board. Even though I didn't understand all that she was saying, I could see that the school building, facilities and grounds were pretty awesome. What she said only would have impressed me more, I'm sure. Anyway, I'll write more about the school some other time. I've already rambled on without much point long enough.