For numerous reasons I’ve been blog-negligent, be it preoccupation with parenting two teens and a tween, living fully in the moment, or simple tropical-induced laziness. No se porque.
Madi started back in the same school she and Kier were in last year. That’s the same school Kier has been going to since September. Cali started back in the same school she attended last year, all in Spanish. Both Kier and Cali are fluent in Spanish, Madi becomes more fluent each day. On Cali`s first day back at school she already had a couple of friends scheduling sleepovers. I find whatever culture we live in, the girls`different personalities are the same in their friendships and relationships, situations just play out in a different language. Makes sense that no matter where we go in the world, we take ourselves with us.
After a few bouts of stomach sickness accompanied by (what we have now popularly coined) faucet-butt, we determined a family of five cannot live with only one bathroom, or more specifically, one toilet. Because hypothetically speaking ONLY, when two people have faucet-butt and need to go with immediate urgency, and a normally functioning sphincter is no match for the emminent forceful torrent the strength of two Japanese tsunamis, two butts squeezing onto one toilet ain`t a pretty thang (hypothetically speaking only, of course). So when a house came available with 4 toilets (who cares about the number of bedrooms those are attached to), and some additional dense bushes in the backyard for back-up, it was a done deal. Now, if (hypothetically speaking) we would all require a thrown simultaneously, only two butts need share one toilet, and it`ll have to be some of the smaller butts in the family, so I`m safe (hypothetically speaking again, of course). We move February first into a home that is like a slice of heaven. There are four different outdoor balconies or living areas, a view of the volcanoes from the bed, a lime tree, and my very own washer and dryer. Having a dryer here is a rare thing, and I am so excited I can’t even put it into words. I have mixed feelings of being spoiled and guilty simulaneously, since there are many people here who have much less all around us. But I lovessss my dryer, especially in the rainy season.
Probably the biggest lesson I’ve learned since returning, is that watching a daughter date a latin guy is not for the faint of heart, but a great way to drop a few unwanted pounds. The cultural differences and expectations are more significant than one would guess, especially when it comes to fidelity and monogomy. I don’t know if this is more the case for young men in our smaller tourist town in particular or if it is more far-reaching cultural reality. For my personal psychie this has been a slow torture that has drawn on all of my parenting abilities, leaving me wishing I could compartmentalize my feelings like a full-fledged Japanese, and not some watered down one. I kept having variations of this recurring dream where I was a large African American woman, running down the aisle of this Baptist Church that’s in the neighborhood where I grew up. I was hurling myself onto the steps at the front of the sanctuary under this huge sparkling gold cross, screaming, “Help me sweet Lord Jesus, have mercy on me!!” while the choir was just a-swaying, screaming out some gospel song. Yup, was kinda freaking me out, those dreams. Luckily Kier has emerged from the experience a much, much wiser person, so all is well. That’s all I have to say about that.
If the first few weeks are any indication, we are in for an adventure once again.