We boarded the elevator after returning home from school last Friday, crammed in with two men having an intense conversation in panicked German.  They were obviously new to the hotel, likely there for a few nights tops, on business, travelling light with cute carry-on luggage on wheels, white knuckle grips on the extended handles.  If steam could actually come out of fuming heads, their ears would have been spewing the high pressure kind and adding some MUCH needed humidity to this crackle-dry air.  One was obviously younger than the other and obviously hotter-headed.  The conflict?  His key card, when swiped across the sensor, did not register and as such, he was not able to punch in his floor number.  A slick security feature to keep riff-raff to their own floor!  At risk of sounding like an old fuddy-duddy, I was reminded just yesterday that this is a good policy when a bunch of 20 somethings were running all over the hotel involved in some fashion conference… you can imagine… poor Aaron enjoyed a hit of adrenaline when the girls in the hall began to squeal and chase each other and emit blood-curdling SCREAMS (according to Aaron during the dramatic re-tell).   I had the kids at the pool and he was getting caught up on some work and thought we were returning from the pool with an injured screaming kid – I guess who-invites-who to their floor is hard to control…and if Aaron was starting to doze in front of his screen, the so-called folks-in-distress he jumped up to rescue certainly helped him wake up! (he was less than impressed and it prompted a lecture later for the kids, re-emphasizing the importance of ONLY screaming if having an emergency… see?  We ARE turning into fuddy-duddies! )  🙂   I digress…

Our young German friend was swiping his card over and over, hoping to unleash the magic inside his lucky, one-of-a-kind trick card, maybe?… in the process, he began to punch all sorts of floor numbers, just to “see” if SOMETHING might work… remarkably, despite our initial “hello” as we piled in with them, his panic blinded him to our presence.  As you know, the kids take turns operating the elevator each day – today it was “Caleigh’s Day” and she was feeling quite timid about getting our card in there to swipe and punch in our floor.  She did try and I stepped in as Mama Bear to help her accomplish her goal.  But the damage had been done, the computer had already registered the random combo of floors requested and we got to go on an impromptu elevator tour!!  No key card is required to travel to the 15th or 9th floors and of course the lobby, and in his panicked punch-at-every-number-on-the-key-pad frenzy, we started at lobby level, and got to visit the 15th floor, then the 9th, then back to the lobby before we are once again heading to the 15th floor!! “Don’t worry” I hear myself say to them, breaking them out of their panic and forcing them to look up, “it happens all the time.  We have been here for 7 weeks and we’ve had to reset our cards I don’t know how many times.  It’s really easy – just head to the lobby and ask the concierge to reset them for you.”  Of course they were grateful and apologetic and departed during our third visit to the lobby level, after which we were finally able to stop at floor 2, kids heavily weighed with backpacks and SO done from a long week.   Disbelief  at how automatically “don’t worry” popped out of my mouth overcame me.  Until now, I’ve been extremely resentful of this comment, I’ve heard it SO many times I want to scream.  Do they have ANY idea how MUCH I actually have to worry about being here?????  I think I’m discovering that it is a coping mechanism here – because really, so much DOES NOT go as you think it will – so if one dwell’s, then one cannot really engage in living.   And what’s the point of that?  I may be starting to “get” the vibe here… might be good for us…

(for the record, I was JUST as incredulous as the young German I informed about our 7 weeks and counting stay – I’m not sure I’ve seen anyone’s eyebrows betray their disbelief so adequately or so instantly before!!)

Really, we’d be frustrated ALL THE TIME if we didn’t adopt this attitude… it’s kind of happening by osmosis I think – no one really responds well to flappable – and so we are adjusting our behaviour to a) get what we need and b) be accepted and acceptable.   When fuming and stewing achieves nothing, there is no incentive to participate in life this way.  We could be ready to erupt and no one would change their trajectory in the least.  Can you imagine?   At first, you want to lose it.  Over time it actually encourages a person to seek out relationships with those who really CAN help because they are effective at what they do and they begin to care about you.  One day, once settled snuggly into our house, I’ll share that sorry housing story and all the learning along these lines that happened in having the experience of simply trying to secure a place to live.  It’s a bit raw at this point.  While we won’t soon forget, we’re moving on.

Learning to curb my expectations too – was freely given this advice the second day of school; a well-meaning Mom shared some tidbits of wisdom about living here in Mexico, including, “don’t have expectations”.  We are beginning to accept that nothing goes as you think it will.  Absolutely nothing.  It really is admirable how people just carry on, despite setbacks.  I haven’t met any locals with any sort of chip on their shoulders!  What else can you do?  Even the climate, in every sense here, as lovely as everyone imagines it is, is harsh and raw.  You find yourself seeking shelter and comfort from the elements and the noise and the crazy.  Last week it took Aaron 30 minutes to travel 500 meters to the hotel due to traffic.  What can you do?  He took a picture of his Waze screen in his disbelief as he obviously had time to kill sitting in thick traffic and  shared it with me.  We actually had a good chuckle about that later.  Because what can you do?

To demonstrate my increasing flexibility (remember, this experience is showing us that we are not nearly as flexible as we thought we were!!), I will share my shifting attitude toward the seemingly simple task of taking a taxi or hotel shuttle to pick up Mansell afterschool from swim practice.  Our routine the past month has shifted to accomodate this new committment.  I walk up and pick up the little ones earlier, we walk back and then an hour later, take either a taxi or a shuttle to collect Mansell.  Thinking back a few weeks,  I would start to fret early-ish in the day over how this was going to happen.  Firstly, I would go through frustration and even more frustration over the fact that I can’t just do this for myself and that I have to rely on somewhat unreliable others… (that’s just my personality, for better or for worse), and then tried to “book” the taxi or the shuttle in advance to try to guarantee my needs met.  Being in the service industry, the customer is never wrong, so I was not directly corrected by the concierge, but subtle things began to happen to steer me in the right cultural direction.  Like the day I tried to “book” the shuttle first thing in the morning for an after school pick-up, a 12 person van, for just us, at a specific time.   At the end of the school day, I approach the concierge desk and see the shuttle sitting in front of the building, outside the window I was looking out of.  I let them know that I’d “booked” it earlier but was told that (for some undisclosed reason) the shuttle was NOT available at that moment, forcing me to pay for a taxi…(interestingly, it was STILL sitting there upon our return in the taxi…)  Was I a bit bewildered? Absolutely, but not looking too deeply for some logical explanation.  I just need to switch gears.  Also, I’m learning NOT to pre-book a ride, instead showing up 20 minutes before I need to go anywhere and simply requesting a taxi then – and I’m not falling apart if my ‘favourite’ driver (simply because I’ve already gone through the painful trouble of explaining what I need in Spanish, so he knows the routine, he knows where to go) is not available.  And you know what, at the end of the day, one eventually shows up, we get our needs met and on we go.  And I’m not taking it personally that the shuttle (although clearly available), is often unavailable…