If you ever get a chance, watch “Meet the Robinson’s.”  Such a beautiful little movie that we watched again this past week, and the timing could not have been better!  In these early days of this new normal I definitely still have moments of panic where I just so want to bail, where I no longer have perspective, where I yearn for what I knew. (I wonder how long this will go on for?)  We are now at a point where the biggest kid in the family protests over having to watch a movie without “real people”, but being “forced” to watch an animated Disney film didn’t hurt him and by the end, we all felt better and more inspired – it is just a REALLY good movie, with quirky humour and an excellent message that we (I) needed to hear (see Disney quote above).  Funny, very shortly after we arrived in Mexico City, I put Dory from “Finding Nemo” on my screen saver to remind me to “Just Keep Swimming.”  Eventually you’ll get there, it will get easier, just keep going.  The ending of the movie gets me every time, so consistently that when we get to it, the kids always look over to see if Mom is weepy. 🙂  It’s like “The Giving Tree” (Shel Silverstein) – can’t get through that one ever, and they know it, and they make me read it to them!!  Now that I think about it, there are a few that are just so achingly beautiful and poignant that open the tear flood-gates.  If you like to read the book before the movie, this one is based on a children’s book by one of my absolute favourite authors William Joyce called “A Day with Wilbur Robinson” (1993 HarperCollins).  Love Joyce’s illustrations and quirky wit and ideas. (Another super fun one to check out is “The Mischievians”; our kids LOVE that one and quote it often when things run a-muck – check it out!)

Our first week in the new house Aaron was working in France and I had the kids home from school for Semana Santa break.  Easter Holy Week is a very big deal here, as was evidenced by the two-day work week which caused us to carefully plan out our set-up-house shopping trips!  The most wonderful “fallout” was the many hours we spent just spending time together.  On Caleigh’s Birthday (thankfully one of the week’s working days!) she wanted to go check out “Fantasias Miguel”, a GIANT craft store dangerously close to our house (literally 5 minutes away).  It really is like a Mexico City-sized Michaels!!  She chose a new craft and the four of us chose a fun Easter Egg decorating craft we could all putter away at, which was actually quite soothing for everyone, despite a few mishaps re-acquainting ourselves with proper glue gun use… Technique dramatically improved after the first few slightly crisped finger tips and everyone truly understood just how HOT a hot glue gun can be!

With all the newness and my partner in crime away, my senses, my vigilance and anxieties were all heightened.  Honestly though, finding a scorpion in my kid’s bedroom on the second night in the house certainly did not foster feelings of ease!  But seriously, it’s amazing how small one can feel in this great big place.  And how unsettling not knowing if the person on the other end of the line if you had to call for help or for assistance could even understand you.   And I worried that I couldn’t even really run to the neighbours as their homes, like mine, are gated and chained and barbed-wired…I figured I could just run out and find a security guard if I had to – they patrol on foot and in car 24/7.  I queued up internet installation (which happened to work out to be three weeks before we moved in) in hopes that it would all fall into place very soon after moving in.  This would give us a home phone and I wouldn’t run out of minutes on my pay as you go cell “plan”, which isn’t such a big deal if you have home wifi, which was the real plan!   We got the keys on a Friday so I was so excited when I received a text from the Telmex guy saying he could come at 5:00 pm Friday, that same day, to install!  6:30 rolls around and he’s still not here and a text comes -” I can’t come now –  9:00 a.m. mañana work for you? ”  Oh Dear, there’s that “mañana” word again… what choice do we have?  There is one telecommunications company in Mexico, owned by one of the wealthiest people in the world; a sense of urgency to drum up business just isn’t there.  Fast forward to 9:30 a.m. mañana, and he’s still not here…I text to wonder if he is still coming today – he says traffic is bad but he’s on his way – hmmm, Saturday morning traffic?  That’s a new one!  11:30 a.m. he arrives… An hour and a half later after checking the Telmex junction boxes, lifting cement slabs to look underground, placing many calls, he tells me he can’t install today…something happened administratively at the office when I ordered my bundle – they got it wrong and he would fix it and come back “in maybe a week”…

We were not ruled by a schedule and everything seemed to slow…some things out of necessity…there was a “slow laundry” movement happening at our house last week as the dryer still sits pristine and Saran-wrapped, awaiting the gas guys who told me they would be back “mañana” to hook it up – that was way over a week ago now. 😊  So Aaron hung some rope in the backyard before heading out, cause we’re growing wise to this promise of “mañana” and are figuring out alternative solutions in the meantime, the waiting-time.  He also hooked up the water for the washer so that was an easy plug in and go.  Hanging the clothes in the morning with my coffee in the beautiful azul mug Mansell brought me from his adventure in Torreon, and my robin friends munching in the lawn, dog sitting on her steps surveying her new yard,  was so lovely.  Our clothes smelled so fresh after being on the line all day.  We filled our days with cleaning, unpacking and setting up as well as a bit of restorative sleep (aka naps!!), walking our Rosie, reading, and cooking!  It was so exciting for all of us to be preparing and cooking our own food!  Caleigh’s choice for her Birthday dinner was stir fry and we had Tres Leches (three milks) cake, a classic Latin American dessert that Costco here actually makes fresh daily!  Lol!!  By the end of the dinner faces were getting smooshed into half eaten, too-full-to-finish plates of cake!!  The next night kids wanted spaghetti – so we made a big pot of sauce from scratch.  All three kids jumped in to chop, Hudson especially enthusiastic about this prep work.  He’s never really used a sharp knife before but he assured me he could handle it and he did a fine job, approaching the task with his characteristic  methodical focus.  While at the hotel home they loved to watch Master Chef junior “Colombia”- a cooking show about kids cooking, all in Spanish!!  They pretended they were little Master Chef Junior’s and were teaching me about knife cuts and how to make chicken roulade.  I pretended that our kitchen was a cooking show set and we were learning to make spaghetti sauce!! (Was super funny when they saw me grab some red wine and pour it into the pot – “what about the alcohol?!” they all protested… a lesson in changing properties, as I assured them that the alcohol cooks off and then Hudson says, grabbing the spoon to give it a stir, “you have good rich flavour leftover”!!

This week was a work-hard challenge, but also a gift, mainly of time. Time to just be aware.  I often found myself there in the room, but watching as if from a distance, acutely aware of every sensation, every sound, every colour, so wanting to memorize the feelings and the scene of busy kids in my kitchen, snuggling up to watch a movie, walking our so-in-the-moment pooch (we can learn SO much from dogs!).   And despite all the “issues” we seem to encounter here (which followed us to the new house, by the way!) all of that matters so little in the grand scheme of it all.  It’s the everyday, “small hours” where the magic that we carry with us in our hearts and souls happens.  We have been so stripped down to the bare bones through this experience and what we have left is each other and the moments.  Hopefully we are making the most of them!

CHECK THIS OUT!! “Little Wonders” (you can listen to: “Little Wonders” by Rob Thomas 2007 here) is a song he was tasked to write for the “Meet the Robinson’s” movie soundtrack.  I knew the song before I knew the movie, and when it first was released,  it struck me as very beautiful and true.  I listened to it over and over again.  He so eloquently chooses exactly the right words that get at the essence of what really matters in life.    In preparing this post I thought I’d add a link so you could listen and I stumbled across the original video but also a couple of live acoustic versions.  These were not my favourite versions of the song, but I really enjoyed his pre-amble to the song – it shed some light on what his inspiration was when he wrote it; I wanted to include that version but his colourful vocabulary prevents me from doing that without potentially causing offence! 🙂   You can look it up on your own if you like.  The gist of it was that after a concert it was 1:00 a.m. and pouring rain and he still had to take his dog for a walk.  He was ticked that he had to do this mundane task, watching for poop, when two hours ago he had been a rock star.  But then he said, standing there in the pouring rain, that his dog looked up at him with eyes that so celebrated that they were out there together, and he realized that this was one of those “moments” and he was missing it because of his own self-focus.  And his dog died not long after that and he said he’d give anything to have more of those moments again.   The movie is about continuing to move forward, but it’s also about celebrating every moment.   The timing of things (perfect or perfectly off!) always amazes me!