I Am A Tourist - Buying Local

I have not been posting recently because my mother is still hospitalized after her emergency surgery last Tuesday.  She is recovering  very well and has earned the title "Amazing Grace!"  We rushed her to the ER when we returned from our trip to Cabo San Lucas last Monday evening.  Here is a post I wrote while we were in Cabo that I would like to capture on my blog.

Maybe it is because I am of Italian heritage where family is the priority and the saying "Take care of your own first" is a cardinal rule, but I feel responsible to support my local economy.  In our little corner of Los Angeles, called Playa del Rey, we buy local.  Our pharmacist, Joe, and his wife May live in the area and while they may not have all the glitz or specials of a Walgreen's, they greet us by name and talk to us about our prescriptions.  Our florist is Felicia, who lives across the street from us and has a flower shop and a coffee shop about 4 blocks away.  We buy our produce at the local Farmers' Market, volunteer at the local library and eat out at local Restaurants.

So I guess it isn't surprising that when we travel we take our priorities with us.  12 years ago, on our first trip to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, in a weak moment we bought a timeshare.  But after a bit of buyers' remorse we decided to make the best of it and use it! And we have. Every November we travel to Cabo for one week and we enjoy our room with a fantastic balcony view of the Sea of Cortez at the Pueblo Bonito Rose Resort.

View from our balcony on the 4th floor

Over the years we have watched the town of Cabo San Lucas grow.  They now have more than one stop light, they have a Costco, and their Marina is filled with very up-scale, glamorous restaurants.  Our resort also has two fancy restaurants and a Spa where you can be treated to a full-body massage to the tune of $130 US.  While we enjoy relaxing at the resort, when we are ready to spend our "gringo dollars" we head for the narrow streets of the locals.  Here are some of our favorite places:

Los Michoacanos is the absolutely best place to buy authentic carnitas.

When we first stumbled on this place it was rather run down....a small palapa style building with a few chairs and a large oven and cooking vat where huge chunks of pork were being cooked and stirred with a large wooden paddle.  They are doing well and have a new place in the old location. It is still open-air, just off the sidewalk.  No one speaks English but we can make ourselves understood.  We purchase a 1/2 kilo of  carnitas that comes with a variety of salsas, handmade tortillas, and a cup of freshly-made bean soup.  What we don't eat for lunch we bring back to our room to eat for lunch for a few more days.

We also enjoy meals at Felix's...again with authentic old style Mexican recipes.

This place really makes the most of its space.  In the morning, it converts to Mama Royal's and serves fantastic breakfasts. Wonderful Sangria and old Mexican recipes like "Chili en Nogada!"

We discovered an Argentine style steak place next door to the community center for the local children, called Patagonia.

Here they cook huge slabs of beef and goat on a large BBQ with servings that are so large you can share them with two people.

Another favorite eating place is Gardenia's.  Open only for lunch it has the absolutely best fish tacos in the town.  Family owned and operated, the service is quick, the food is great, and grandma brings you the bill.

Grandma at the register!

This time we tried a new restaurant, Los Tres Gallos, that is also owned and operated by locals and features very authentic recipes of old Mexico. 

Each recipe was explained to us in detail...where it originated and how it was prepared.

We stock up on cerveza at the local super mercato.

This year we treated ourselves to massage.  We found Eden's Professional Massage a few streets away from the resort, owned and operated by local certified masseuses where we each got a 40 minute deep tissue massage for $25 US each and a generous tip!

Our masseuses!

If I am going to buy any silver while in Cabo, my man to go to is Paco.  He is a vendor on Medano Beach and has been there for years.  He shows me pictures of his family.  He is not into bargaining.  He gives you his fair price and says..."If you really love this piece, you will pay my price.  If you don't want to pay it then, it is not really something you want." 

He is a true caballero "gentleman" and all the vendors on the beach know Paco.

We love the local flavor of Cabo San Lucas and we want those who have their roots there to know we appreciate and admire them and we want them to flourish.  Fancy, smancy restaurants we can find down the street in Manhattan Beach, CA...when in Mexico we want to support the locals.

I Am A Daughter - Caring For My Mother

This is a quick message to say why I have not been posting.  My mother, Grace Rinaldi...95 years young...has been hospitalized with a serious medical condition.  I was in Cabo San Lucas for an annual week-long vacation to our timeshare.  My mother began to experience stomach pain after I left but would not let my brother take her to the hospital...she was waiting for my return.  The day I returned I went to her home and immediately took her to the UCLA Emergency Room in Santa Monica.  She was experiencing stomach pain that she dismissed as not important.  She had a perforated bowel and needed immediate surgery.

She tolerated the surgery well and is now in the Critical Care Unit.  She still is intubated with a respiratory tube as they wait for her kidneys to begin to function.  I am with her from about 9 am to 6 pm.  I am her voice...her advocate...her hand holder...her head caressor...her reassurer...I am the parent and she is my child.   I cannot begin to tell you the emotions that flow through my body as I care for her.  She is so helpless and dependent upon me. 

She is still feisty....when I tell her the details of the situation, she rolls her eyes...she expresses her frustration and her anger and annoyance are all sign of life to me.  I applaud them.  It is our hope that tomorrow they will be able to remove the tube and she will be able talk...that may be a blessing and it may be a curse!  She can not talk but we have found ways to communicate.  She is ever the school teacher and she writes with her finger into the air above her and I call out the letters as she writes.  I realize how trapped she is in her body and I want to be her voice.  When she is able to talk again, she will let us all know how she feels. But I so admire her spirit. 

This experience is teaching me how important it is to have someone who is willing to be patiently with you...to be willing to wait while you try to communicate...to help you not be imprisoned in your body.  We live in a fast-paced world.  Doctors come in  and shout at her because they know she is hard of hearing but they can't wait for a sign from her that she has heard them.  She might as well be the headboard of the bed.  My role is to be her voice.  To advocate for her and I willing assume the role.

Grace Montalto Rinaldi

Please keep us in your thoughts.

I Am A Rescuer - Caring for Gidget

Life changes in an instant!  At 10 am on Thursday morning, Jay called to me from the front deck.  Three fire trucks had pulled up in front of our house. 

Smoke was pouring out from under the eaves of our neighbor, Mal's, home.  Fortunately, another neighbor, Dan, was working outside in his yard when he smelled and then saw smoke...he called 911...and then he and his wife, Judy, coaxed Mal out of his house.  Mal was reluctant to leave because he could not find his cat, Gidget.

The fire crew arrived and did what they know how to do.  After entering the house, breaking out the kitchen windows and knocking a hole in the roof, they were able to put out the fire that was engulfing the kitchen.  

"He had a cat," neighbors called out to the crew...and then a 6-plus-foot fireman, Carl Cronchite, exited the house with Gidget in his arms.  "I'll take her," Jay called out to him and Gidget ended up on our deck. 

She was heaving and struggling to breathe and we didn't know what to do for her when this 6-plus-foot hero climbed the steps to our deck with an oxygen tank and began to resuscitate Gidget.

He was very solemn as he monitored her heart rate and gave her CPR using his thumb to compress her chest.  Slowly she began to revive. 

Then our house guest, Adadot...a retired physician and a docent at her local zoo...took over.  She swaddled Gidget in an old towel and cradled her in her arms.  Gidget was going to be fine.

Mal was taken to St. John's Hospital in Santa Monica with first and second degree burns from trying to extinguish the fire himself.  The house is boarded up waiting for insurance adjustors to begin their task.  Gidget stayed with us overnight and then Mal called us with arrangements he had made for her care.  Gidget has actually lived between our house and Mal's house for the past 20 some years. She is Mal's cat but when he travels we feed her and she loves to sun herself on our deck.  She is an old cat but we think she must have a couple of her nine lives left in her.

The bad news is that Mal's life is in disarray at the moment.  Little did he know on Thursday morning, as he planned to prepare his coffee, that his life was going to change in an instant.  The good news is that he is OK, Gidget is OK and the fire was an opportunity for the neighbors to gather in the street and talk. 

New neighbors introduced themselves.  We all acknowledged our appreciation of Station 5 and our fire crew who so professionally handled this crisis and we all saluted our neighborhood hero, Dan, who could go to bed Thursday night knowing he had saved two lives that day...Mal's and Gidget's!

I Am A Voyeur - Looking For The Light

Two weeks ago Jay and I embarked on a weight management plan.  In an effort to out-run death we are trying to build a healthier lifestyle.  It does not mean giving up the essential of life...like pasta or wine. But it does mean honoring our bodies that have carried us so well for so many years. One aspect of this effort is to make time to move the body...to exercise in various forms.  So, when I had a free half hour between classes last week, I decided to take a walk around the neighborhood that surrounds the Franklin Center, where we hold our Omnilore classes.

I have always enjoyed walking.  Some of my best ideas have come while putting one foot in front of the other.  It is also a time when I work out problems or have imaginary conversations in my head.  But that is often the downside of my walking...I am often just "in my head" and when I return I have no memories of what I have seen.

Maybe it was because I am in the middle of a very soul-touching memoir, "The Journal Keeper" where the author, Phyllis Theroux, comments about not using her journal as a wailing wall, immortalizing the darkness, but as a place in which to collect the light...but I felt very "awake" as I set out on this walk...anticipating seeing the light.

And I found it, in a very delightful neighborhood park.  When I came to Franklin Park, winding sidewalks invited me to meander through it and I was pleasantly surprised by the life and light that was contained in this little public space.

First I heard some guitar strings being plucked and found myself in front of a couple who were both holding stringed instruments. One seemed to be instructing the other, but they both paused to say hello before putting their heads together again to proceed with the music.  What a wonderful setting for their activity

Then a little "bumblebee" almost ran into me...a three year old decked out in her Halloween costume, being chased by her young mother.  They were part of a group of mothers...not nannies...but stay-at-home mothers who had gathered for a Halloween picnic.  There were pirates, Indians, super heroes, ballerinas and I was immediately brought back to years in my past when I was able to take my toddlers out in the stroller with other young mothers.

Farther along I saw a lone man shooting hoops.

This was not a young high school student but instead "a man of a certain age." He saw me take out my camera and said..."You can't take my picture, I just signed with the NBA!"  He then consented and told me how he loved this park.  He has lived in the neighborhood for 57 years and comes here often.  A panorama of ages and activities...everyone involved in life.  I left the park uplifted, with a bit more of a spring in my step. I could also log in about 20 minutes of exercise into my nutrition log. There is a lot to be said for "looking for the light!"