At my friend’s advice I have decided to give the giant
spider in my bathroom a better name than “mother of all spiders”. It has gotten
bigger by the way. Anyway these critters are less surprising and, let’s face
it, scary when they have names. Kind of like when I named the mouse in my house
Andre. May he rest in peace. So I would like to welcome Maximilian to the
(out)house. May he also rest in peace soon.
So now for some good news! I went to the dentist last Friday
(yikes) and I have no cavities or anything! Sweet. I had a “stain” but she put
a sealant on it and now I’m good as new. I’ve even been flossing and this was
the first time in maybe my entire life when the dentist hasn’t looked at my
teeth and patronizingly asked “Do you floss?”. So I scored some universe points
there. But that’s good because I had lost some MAJOR universe points the day
before. I had gone for a run. It was lovely and I was halfway done (re: as far
away as I get from my house before turning around) and I was in the next town
over. A little girl had been calling out
to me, “Sarah! Sarah!” and I had stopped to chat and explain that I am not in
fact the super extremely long haired blonde who lives in Banica, but rather the
short haired way less blonde who lives in Pedro Santana. And my name is
Virginia. So we chatted a bit (as much as you can chat with a 3 year old who is
absolutely convinced you are Sarah) and I took off running again. My dog loves
to follow me on my runs which is adorable by the way. But he got spooked by
some other dogs and came running up behind me and straight up took me out. He
came barreling into the back of my legs and I ATE IT on the gravelly street. I
cussed like nobody’s business in front of the children, oops, and ran home. I
stopped to visit with my friend Ramona and as luck has it, she has an aloe
plant. So she took some leaves, crushed them up inside a cloth, and squeezed
the juices over my cuts. It did not feel good. Then I got home and poured salt
water over them. That also did not feel good. Then the next day at the doctors
I had the wonderful experience of Lisette taking a pair of tweezers and picking
out all the dirt from my hand and knee. That REALLY didn’t feel good. Anyway
what it boils down to is that I was due for some positive universe points. PS I
haven’t gone running since and my knee is still at least 4 colors.
And yesterday was a very fun day. My friend Matt, who is
COSing, came to visit and I gave him the Banica/Pedro Santana tour. We spent
most of the day walking around outside in intervals and recovering from the
heat in my rocking chairs. Somehow I managed to get a bit burned. You would
think after so much time here I would be past burning, but you’d be wrong.
Which reminds me: my friend informed me the other day that I am no longer American
because my skin isn’t the right color anymore. So I asked him what I am then,
and his response “not American.” Ha. But I really loved showing off my town
because people are always impressed by how cute it is. And beautiful. I live in
a small community, but it still has a town-like feel to it. Well it is a town,
but it does not have a super-campo feel despite the fact that it is way smaller
than a city. Our empanada stand even put some tables outside! So know we
basically have a restaurant. And ice-cream. Recently I think I’ve been feeling
down on this place, so it was really nice having someone come visit because it
made me feel happy and lucky to be here again. Which is how I should be
feeling, because it’s true.
Wanna know the other reason I’m lucky? People have started
fighting to see who can bring me the best mangos. And now one of my muchachos is frying a
banana in my house. Life is good.