The Most Beautiful Ocean You Ever Saw. Plus Other Stuff.

We did drive to the other side today through the jungle past the ruins and the tiny ranches and the Mayan stick homes and the concrete block homes and the bigger homes but none of them imposing, a very humbling ride of realization how other people live in this world. 

Even though I do not truly need reminding, driving past, as I do, some of the poorest single-wides in the world in the very same county I live in the Great United States of America. 

Rather same-same in some ways. 

But then you get to the ocean and these pictures do not do it justice. The blues and the greens are other-worldly. You just think, Okay, I get it. You're incredible. Stop it. My head is going to explode now.

We stopped at a beach bar, had a beer, looked at the water, the surf, the sky. 

The surf is rough on the other side but there are protected places where people come to swim.

To hang out under the coconut palms to have a beer, to eat shrimps and lobster.

As we sat there, watching it all, suddenly a panga boat appeared in the surf, having come through the cut in the rocks. I did not see them coming and magic might as well have been involved. And then, even as I was amazed, it happened again.

We drove on around the tip of the island and back up north and pulled into the little village of El Cedral which is also a magical place. Pretty little houses on beautifully manicured lots. A an ancient Mayan structure with trees growing out of it right next to a beautiful little church which smells of fresh stucco and has windows overlooking what you see below.

And again, while I wasn't paying attention, this guy showed up. He will pose with you for pictures for tips. How could I refuse? 

He said, "I am descended from the Maya."

I wanted to say, "Dude. You ARE the Maya."

I was too shy to look at his butt. 

We got home in time to eat a very late lunch of ceviche, take naps, get up, play cards and watch another glorious sunset. 

A sweet slow drive to town for supper, then an ice cream cone and a walk around the square, home to the Blue Angel again. Time for bed and tomorrow we are actually signed up FOR AN ACTIVITY!

I know. Stop it. But it's a hotel thing of a boat ride, some snorkeling, lunch. And the people here are so very nice. The owner is a woman named Eva and she comes around daily with her little dog LaLoo who kisses and licks anyone who will hold still. Eva insists that you take her card with you everywhere in case you run into trouble so that you can call her and she can help.

I'll let you know how the activity goes. It might be a lot of fun. It surely won't be horrible.

Sweet dreams, y'all.

Love...Ms. Moon

I am feeling a bit angsty today, as I just wrote to a friend. Which makes me feel guilty because...

I mean seriously. What kind of a crazy person feels angsty sitting in front of that?

Of course that picture was taken half an hour ago and now it's blowing and clouded over and the rain is about to fall but it will all blow over and be beautiful again in a little while and the rain is beautiful too. 

Here it comes. And it is beautiful. It's coming down in curtains of gray, ruffling the water. We sit here on our snug patio and watch it. 

But back to me. I am having one of those I-am-not-worthy moments. Why do I get to be here in Paradise when people are suffering all over the world? What did I do to deserve this? How could I have left my grandchildren for this long? My chickens? I am enjoying this all to much/I am not enjoying it as much as I should be. I am so lazy (I tidied my shelf of skirts a few minutes ago- the most housework I have done in a week). I am eating too much, drinking too much rum. My husband is surely bored. With me. I am ugly and old. 

I should be learning Spanish or riding through the jungle on horseback or climbing a pyramid. Nah. Probably not. 

Yesterday we found a little shop we had been looking for which we remembered from the last time we were here. This required about an hour of cross-street mopeding, up and down the blocks. We had a vague idea of where it might be. We found it and parked the moped and an older local woman, very elegantly dressed, opened her car door and said something to us in Spanish. I finally got what she was saying. We were in a loading zone and the police would tow us. Or arrest us or something. But anyway, we thanked her profusely and moved the bike and all was well. But this is the way it is here. Everyone seems to look out for everyone and are not afraid to interact with strangers. I think this is truly what I love about Cozumel. We stopped in a back neighborhood to buy our lunch at a chicken-roasting place. You buy a roasted chicken and they accompany it with plastic bags, twisted at the top filled with: rice, spaghetti, a sort of macaroni soup, some spicy pickled cabbage, and some bean sauce. And two types of hot sauce. Less than ten dollars.

We brought it back to the room and ate our fill and there is still about half a chicken left and the birds got a lot of leftover rice. 

Anyway, while we were there, a woman and her little girl were getting their own chicken. The nina looked to be about eighteen months old, perhaps although who knows? She was tiny in her little helmet, her little outfit and she smiled at me and I smiled at her and before I knew it, I was reaching out my hand to her and she grabbed on and I wanted to snatch her up and kiss her and kiss her and I honestly do not think her mama would have cared. I am so obviously an abuela. But. You know. I am a reserved American in that way. We do not snatch up babies not our own to kiss the cheeks off of. When they left on their moped, I waved and the little child blew kisses at me. I blew kisses back and said, "I love you!" which was ridiculous, but rather true. 

An older gentleman in the dollar/peso exchange place yesterday who was making jewelry (yes, they exchange money and sell jewelry and I have my eyes on a pair of earrings there) told me that I had a beautiful smile. 

I think of all of this and my eyes overfill a little. 

It goes on and on.

Today is the day we definitely plan to cross the island, drive through the jungle past the ranches and the Tequila Factory and Los Ruinas to the other side which is the wild side where there isn't even electricity, just wild surf pounding on rocks and beach bars, conveniently placed for your dining pleasure. Somehow they manage to create entire delicious menus and we shall certainly never starve here as long as we have pesos or dollars. 

The rain has gone again. The blues and greens are back. 

I am on vacation, DAMMIT! I am going to enjoy myself. And that is good and it is okay. 

I think.

Pictures

Traveling in the neighborhoods on the moped.

 The Virgin of the Mercado. We had an extremely delicious mango liquado there.

Fruit.

A scary statue at the booth in the Mercado where they sell charms, potions, and candles.

A statue behind the market place. 

The bitchy baby bird demanding food from his poor mama. I have no idea why she puts up with that child. And yet, she does.

I Could Be Wrong But

It seems to me that the people who drink only coffee

leave to go to supper early while the people who drink rum stick around and watch the sunset. 

And then applaud when it is over.

Jesus. How can baby lobsters compare with that? 

Morning Hours

It is still startling to me to look up and see one of the cruise ships going by. They are enormous, gigantic, like floating villages or continents. I wonder how many Lloyds would fit into one.

God, we are so lazy. It's hard to pull ourselves away from this little patio overlooking the pool, the water. We drink our coffee, we slowly amble upstairs to eat, we watch other people, the water, the birds that come in and beg politely for food. No one seems to pay them much mind.
Then we come back to the patio and drink a little more coffee and read and space out and occasionally say, "What do you want to do today?"

Our neighbors here are not from Louisiana or Texas but from Atlanta. They are friendly and do not seem mysterious like the Very Thin Woman I was so fascinated with at Hotel B two years ago. They stop to chat and we discuss restaurants, being old hippies, etc.
They are coffee drinkers. Yes, so are we, and yes, we did buy our own pot as did they but they have an entire patio table set up for constant coffee making and consumption and they brought their own stainless steel thermos mugs. I have not seen them take a drink of alcoholic nature but they sure do love their coffee.

Not much wild partying here at the Blue Angel. We may have truly found our place.

I think we are going to ride the scooter around town today. One of my favorite things to do. We may ever travel across the transverse road. Who knows? Whatever we do, I will enjoy it. That's a given.

I have a belly full of eggs and tortillas and black beans, a mind full of not much at all.

I could hardly be happier because when you are in your paradise, it is all, by very definition, paradisaical. There seems to be some confusion about the spelling of that word and I do not give a rat's ass.

Here come the boats, there go the boats, sail boats, dive boats, ferry boats, pilot boats.
The birds fuss, the pelicans sit on piers. The waves sigh in and out. Perhaps the mama turtle is somewhere laying her eggs. If so, she is in private but I can imagine her and it is restful to think of it.

Good morning.

Love from Cozumel...Ms. Moon

This Day

We got on the moped today and drove down to Playa Corona. We have been visiting Playa Corona for going on 27 years now and the same man has owned it, run it, and I remember the first time we ever went there and saw him and he looked like a pirate and I was smitten.
We went back a few days later to watch the sunset and he was leaving.
"Are you closed?" we asked.
He shrugged his shoulders and said, "I have no walls."
Ay yi.
Like that.

Over the years we have met the woman who became his wife, we have met his three children, I held one of the girls a few days after she was born. We have heard the stories of Rogelio's life, his struggles, his joys. He has heard ours. He met Jessie and Vergil the last time we were here. So when we walked in, he looked up and saw me. His eyes grew large and he got out of his chair and came to me and clasped me to him.
"Senora!" he said. "Senora, Senora, mi amiga."
And then Glen was hugged and he told us, as he always does, that he was just thinking of us, wondering when he would see us again. His beautiful wife, Elsie, was there doing the books and I went to her and we hugged too and talked about our children, caught up a little bit. Yes. I cried again.

And I must tell you that over the course of the time we were there, Rogelio cried as well. He struggles in this life with marriage, with family, with his deeply-felt religion, with his demons. But as he always says, "We are here. We are alive."

He, like us, is dealing with the results and ravages of age. A hand which has required surgery. Cervical discs which pain him and cause problems. Daughters who are coming of age. And when we are together, we talk of all of it. We go straight to it. He said something today to me like, "You can't talk to everyone about these things."

And I told him, "I have no interest in shallow social interactions. If I can't share my heart, I am not interested."

He got it. 

Here we are all together. Glen and I had been snorkeling and then the wind blew up and it got chilly and I had the towel wrapped around me and looked absurd but here we were. Today. This is what we looked like. All of us alive. Happy to see each other.

They are always so surprised at how tall Glen is. All of the Mayans find him incredibly amusing.  We went to Mega tonight, the BIG grocery store, 

and a little girl told him that he was muy grande, even bigger than her papa. We all smiled. 

The snorkeling was good. The reefs have suffered since we first came here. The cruise ships, global weather changes, Hurricane Wilma. But there was color, there were fish. There is something so otherworldly in putting on those fins, that mask, that snorkel and dipping one's head down into the water, gliding off. The only sound that of your breathing and the surf crashing on the shore just a few yards away. The corals where the tiny fish spend their nursery days, the sea urchins, the barracudas hiding in the crags and caves. The colors of the fish pastel pinks and blues and greens or neon blues and blacks and yellows. They dart and fly through the water and when we went out deeper where the floor of the ocean drops many feet I looked at my husband as he dove down and came up, surrounded by a school, like a flock, of Sargent Majors and it was ethereal, the vast blue, the man rising up in the cloud of fishes. 

We got out of the water, chilled. Our lips were swollen with salt. We ordered a beer and quesadillas with shrimps and we ate every bite, and drank bottles of water and then sat with Rogelio and Elsa some more and talked, talked, talked. The rain came up as I said and the wind blew like a hurricane and it was beautiful. Elsa said they haven't had any rain and although their business suffers when the weather is bad, they appreciate the rain as do we at home in Florida. 

When we asked Elsa how business was, she shrugged and said, "It's enough for beans."

Yes. But they have three children, one of whom wants to go to law school, two daughters who may want to do anything in this world and Rogelio says, "It is my duty to send them to college. I will do it."

He will.

The cruise ship people get taxis to the beach club and they all wear their flotation devises and there is a guy who gives them a short lecture on how to snorkel and they do and then they do not buy food, they do not buy beer, and what can you do? 

Rogelio is tending the corals on his property, in his stretch of water, but he says, "I can do no more than that." And he is resigned but proud of what he has managed to save. 

We drove home through the rain, slowly, slowly and carefully on the moped and ate some nachos at the restaurant here at the Blue Angel. Delicious. And then we took another nap. My god, we are sleeping so much. We got up and played some cards and watched the sunset, such as it was, and then drove into town and had our supper at a place we have been going for many years. Abuelo Gerardo's. I had snapper, Mr. Moon had pork chops. We were tended to most solicitously and here is a picture of my favorite vegetable on earth.

Breakfast, lunch and dinner. Bring it on. I eat it on everything. I never grow tired of it. 

Yesterday I made the mistake of eating TWO KINDS of incredibly hot peppers, one plain and one in a salsa. 

Here's the thing with peppers- like most things in life, they afford you the opportunity to learn from your mistakes. Not once, but twice, and perhaps even three or four times. And yet, I make the same mistake over and over, taking the waiters' warnings about heat with a casual disregard, going for the endorphin rush of it all. I sat there yesterday thinking, "Okay. I may die now. I have blistered my lips, my tongue, my mouth." And yet, I did not die. And finally and slowly the burn diminished although not much longer from then, I was reminded again. 

Well. So what? And the restaurant here serves a salsa which I have never seen before, a sort of finely crushed red peppers in oil and I am quickly becoming addicted. That I can handle. It is nothing compared to the Serrano's, the habenero's. 

The best things in life may bite you back. Peppers, tequila (which I have not availed myself of very much at all) and love. 

And yet, they worth the pain for the passion and rush they bring us. 

It is time for bed. 

Bite the pepper. Be prepared for the after burn. Share your heart. Don't be afraid to drive through the rain. Go see old friends. Keep your eyes out for that which may amaze you.

Don't be afraid to cry and don't be afraid to hug someone who is crying. Smile at children, say "Buenos noches" to the guy walking down the street. Breathe with the ocean as it washes the rocks at the shore over and over again. Drift in parallel to the fishes and be still and float above and as one with it all. 

You will be rewarded.

That's what I think tonight.

Love...Ms. Moon

Preciosa. All Of It

Okay. I've seen and done so many amazing things today that I can't even begin to tell you. And yet, we've barely left the hotel and when we did, it was to go to the grocery store and then to a restaurant way downtown in the 'hood which has been here for sixty years and yet, this is the first time I've ever been there. Our hotel-neighbors told us about it and I am most ashamed that I had never made my way there before.
El Moro. And Mr. Moon piloted us through the streets and we had to stop once to ask some kids for directions and they pointed and said, "Aqui, y aqui, ye aqui," and he found it and it may well have been the best food I ever put in my mouth. Shrimps Mexican style and I don't even know what they put in there but my god. And the man who waited on us was so dear and brought us shots of Xtabentun which is a Mayan honey liqueur and when we left the restaurant I had a beautiful conversation with four ninos who were playing in the street and who wanted to speak English and we all introduced ourselves and I asked them if they had abuelas and they all did and I asked them if they loved their abuelas and they said they did and I told them about my grandsons and it was simply grand.
I'm going back tomorrow. And then the next day as well.

We watched two turtles having a full-on courtship this morning. The male caught up to the female as she strolled across the cement in front of our room and he got right up in her business and did a little preliminary sniffing and then hustled as she shuffled to position himself in front of her and did a little sweet kissing of her face and neck and then he backed up and got on top of her and got things going and then he backed up and got it done. I probably spent forty-five minutes watching all of this and was a tiny bit embarrassed when one of the employees here caught me being a voyeur but I just smiled and shrugged and said, "Turtles making love." He smiled back.

I met and talked to an ex-pat at the pool. She has lived here in Cozumel for six years and loves it and has no desire to go back to live in the states. Hey. Dreams can come true. Have a dream, hang on to it, make it happen. That's what she's done and I admire her tremendously.

We watched an amazing sunset.
And more stuff that I don't talk about here on the blog but let me just say- love is in the air and not just for the turtles.

Here are the pictures. In no real order. Make up your own story.

And as a lagniappe, here's a little video of some of the teenaged boy testosterone-fueled breakdancing going on in the Zocaro tonight. 

I will also say that there is nothing in this world I love more for pure sensuous pleasure than riding behind my husband on a moped in the Cozumel night, smelling the jungle, the sea, the little town, him, as we make our way back to where we have made our cozy home-for-this time, my skirts tucked up under my thighs, my eyes swoony in the darkness, the soft air kissing me everywhere it possibly can.

There isn't much more to say than that. 

Buenos noches...Senora Luna 

I Believe It May Be Sunday

Do you see that bird? He is the most annoying thing we've encountered so far here. He's a young'un and he screams for food incessantly. His poor exhausted mother follows him around and when he's not demanding food from people, he's demanding it from her. Meanwhile she is building another nest in the coconut palm right above us and has lined it with soft fibers she found on the ground. I watched her yesterday, teasing the ones she wanted out of the knot of the whole. 

It rained hard last night and is cloudy this morning and so we are slowly waking up, thinking about breakfast, not much beyond. 

Here's the little resident turtle making his way across the cement. 

And the water. 

One of these days we shall actually get in it. 

Meanwhile I am content to simply be beside it, pondering not the great questions but the small wonders as they present themselves. 

Blue But Not Blue

Downtown was happening tonight.
There was music and dancing and babies and mamas and daddy's and grandmothers and grandfathers and the clock tower and now we are home and the wind is gone although the water crashes against the rocks like the breath of the sea, in and out. Amen.

Food And Design And Other Stuff

It has been a quiet day here at the Blue Angel. We have stuck close to home, not leaving at all except to take a walk which was not that pleasant as the ships were in and there were people beginning to pour out through the terminals and the shop venders were set up and ready to sell and wanted us to spend one hour only to listen to a talk about a time-sharing thing, I guess, after which we would be rewarded with free tequila and a day's free rental of a jeep.

"No, gracias," we said, over and over again as we strolled. We checked out places we might want to snorkle when the water truly calms down and we saw a few iguanas sunning themselves on rubble and rock.

Breakfast comes with this room and so we eat at the palapa restaurant

 just a few steps away. Here's what I had for breakfast.

Grapefruit, pineapple, kiwi, strawberries, watermelon, cantaloupe. And delicious vanilla and honey-flavored yogurt. I sat and looked at the water and slowly ate and it was a sort of heaven for me. I will be quite honest with you- a large part of my enjoyment here is the food which is always fresh and unprocessed, and usually eaten in the most pleasant of surroundings, slowly and with great appreciation on my part. Because I do cook most of our meals at home, it is the largest gift to me to have someone else cook my food, and someone else to serve it and clean up after.
Our server this morning was the youngest of the servers, a mere boy whom I am ready to adopt right this second. His name is Elmer, as strange as that may sound, and he is just pure sweet. He has no qualms about placing his hand on a shoulder, man's or woman's, and this is the way the people are here. When the cook came out at lunch to talk to people and introduce herself (Marta) she too, after speaking to us, put her hand on my back, gave it a little rub.
Here's the lunch she made me.

If that is not the most perfect of perfect meals, I do not know what is. A ceviche of shrimps and fish with tomatoes, onions, peppers, lime juice, salt, cilantro. Avocados and limes on the side. That was the small platter and thank god I did not order the large. You have fat, you have protein, you have citrus, vegetables, you have heaven.

I love this island. I love these people. I love their sea and their ways on it in the panga boats they build and use. I love their gentle humor, their patience, the pride they have in this place, their home. At sunset, it is not unusual at all to see the employees making their way to watch it along with the guests. 

Speaking of guests, some new people moved in next door a few hours ago. They must be from Texas or Louisiana, judging from their accents. One of the men sounds so much like Jase on Duck Dynasty I literally had to get up and walk past him on an invented excuse to make sure it was not. 

It wasn't but damn, vocally, he could be him. 

I think this is my favorite place on the island we have ever stayed with the possible exception of the old Plaza Las Glorias which has been turned into an all-inclusive. This place has a charm all its own and the lovely funk of form and function which you find here. If one needs a light fixture, one does not run down to the Lowe's or Home Depot. One may make one's own with two pieces of log, peeled and smoothed and lacquered, holes drilled to put light bulbs in. 

Or, perhaps, a large calabaza shell, again lacquered, with holes for the light from the bulb to shine through. I love this one which is over the bed.

The form of the palapa never ceases to amaze me. A design which is thousands upon thousands of years old, made from palm fibers and wood, it is strong enough to withstand high winds and rains. It is a thing of beauty and the people who create them are, in my mind, true artisans. 

Well, it is getting on towards sunset. Mr. Moon has driven the scoot into town to check out the weigh-in from the fishing tournament and here I sit, writing this, watching the dive boats come in, the people wet and happy from their dives, the tanks clank on the cement as they unload them. The wind has died down considerably and perhaps tomorrow we will snorkel. We made the conscious decision to lay low today because in my experience, it is always the third day in which the most adjustments must be made, whether of the psyche or the gut and so it has been, but it has been the most easy of adjustments. We have walked, eaten, napped, fooled around, and now it is this part of the day. I think I will go take a shower and wash my hair and sit here and let it dry and wait for my husband to come home and for the sun to set. 

We will go into town for our supper. I can barely wait. But I will be happy to come back here too, walk through the pretty lobby, say hello to the nice people.

Oh wait, Mr. Moon has returned and reports that he saw a six-hundred pound marlin as well as a bunch of bare-butted women in thongs. The Sol girls, they may have been.

"Did they have big chi-chi's?" I asked him. 

"Well..." 

He did not want to admit that he had truly studied the situation but he can't fool me.

"I'll let you see the pictures," he said. 

Uh-huh. 

Nothing wrong with a nice thonged lady-rump and nothing wrong with pretty chi-chi's either and the day he quits looking at them is the day I truly begin to worry. 

Talk to you later. 

Love...Ms. Moon

P.S. I have finished Larry McMurtry's The Last Kind Words Saloon. It is not one of his epics but it is a small jewel of dialogue and spareness, character and sense of place. I would love to read it out loud. Each chapter is very short, a tiny delicious bite, sharpening the appetite for the next one. I have handed it off to Mr. Moon. 

I recommend it. 

This Is Not Hyperbole

So much today. So much and all of it good. I am not kidding you. All of it.
We rented our scooter from the same place we always rent it and it takes hours of negotiations and I just looked up at the trees and was happy the entire time. Found some volunteer tiny tomatoes growing on a fence, picked a few, ate them. They were delicious.
I love being on the back of the scooter behind my husband, driving through the streets and neighborhoods and beside the sea. There is a freedom to it, and the air and the smells are offered immediately and then we pass and they are replaced by others.

While we were outside before sunset after  our nap the most exciting thing happened. A pilot boat appeared, nudging, it would seem, a huge sailboat. There was bumping in the high seas and then a line was thrown off the stern of the sailboat and the pilot boat towed it backwards to an area a few hundred feet from the boat lift and dry-storage place next door.

And then it chugged off into the distance, leaving the sailboat to its own crew's devices. A group of men, employees at the storage place I suppose, gathered and by remote control moved a huge hoist into place.

A man whom I am thinking was the captain and not the owner of the boat paced the dock and put his head into his hands and paced some more. He was frantic.

Mr. Moon and I watched for well over an hour as the boat was rescued. It obviously needed to be pulled from the water as soon as possible and I knew, I KNEW that the Mayans would do the job.

A diver went into the water at one point, the rough, roiling water, to swim a line from the boat to the men on the dock. He was in the water for almost an hour with nothing but fins and snorkel and when he got out, I was amazed to see that he wasn't some young diving cowboy but an older man and I wanted to kiss him and give him a medal or a trident or something. A beer and a shot of rum, at the very least. The way he walked spoke of exhaustion and the presumed captain hugged him tightly to him.

The boat was pulled, first by the men

and then the line was attached to a large van and slowly and with great care the boat was pulled into position without further damage and the great bands of the hoist cradled it and they pulled it up and out of the water and the keel had been damaged badly and the prop was mangled metal. I suppose it had run into a reef. And it was hauled off and all was well and I knew the Mayans would do it and they did.
They are the Vikings of the new world and the sea is their universe and they are the masters of it. They look as natural on it and in it as do the fishes and the dolphins. I have huge respect for them.

And then came the sunset.

And while it was happening, I spoke to a lady who works here and it was one of those women-heart-conversations where age or nationality or culture or nothing matters but that we are women and there we were, watching the sunset and she has a four-year old son and her mama helps her.
"Mothers are wonderful," she said.
Of course I cried. Of course.

Here. From my journal tonight.

Such joy to write with a pen on paper and thank you, May for the pen. So much. It kisses the paper just right. 

We drove slowly to town on the moped and got a supper. Mine was mahi cooked in banana leaves with tomatoes and peppers and onions and it was so good. Our lunch today was lime soup at the place we love where the waiter looks like the Mayan Keith Richards, his hands as gnarled as Keith's, his face as deeply etched and beautiful. The people next to us were from a cruise ship and they were so funny. They couldn't believe Cozumel is safe to walk about in, even the not-touristy places and one of them men told us that he had three entire lobster dinners on the ship last night because why not? They were paid for already and I told Mr. Moon later that I was sure that our bowls of soup had more flavor in them than those three lobster dinners and I am sure I was right. 

On our way home tonight we stopped at Chaudrai, the big super market and everyone was there, buying groceries and as always, people were amazed at my husband's height. He scared one little girl to death even though he smiled at her and spoke to her softly. We spent less than twenty dollars on a coffee pot so that we can make coffee in our room because, well, coffee...

And then we drove home and it was night and the rain was falling a little bit and El Norte continues to blow and it is 11:20 at night and there is so much more to tell but it's time for bed and I wonder what we'll do tomorrow but whatever we do, there will be coffee and the sky and the water and the wind and I am so full of it all that I can scarcely tell you and I can certainly not contain it all which is why I cry a lot and perhaps the most magical thing of all is how much fun I have with this man, thirty years lover and friend, partner and co-parent, now co-grandparent and if I die in my sleep tonight, it will have been as sweet as the smiles of the people who live here and I will have lived well and been happier than any human deserves.