Letters from Lorraine
December 22, 2021
 
Dear friends,
I have never kept any kind of journal or diary— never had a desire to — none, nada, zip. A good friend of mine on the Vineyard suggested that I try something along those lines, which interested me as I had thought about writing a series of letters between my essays. I write my essays when moments of inspiration hijack my thoughts, and I never know when those moments may come. So, in the meantime, I’ll try finding my voice in a series of letters, my version of a journal.
 
In these letters, I’ll share my thoughts and observations about this new life of mine. Also, I’ll tell you about the surprises, disappointments, and unexpected joys I experience. Most important, I’ll include stories of interesting people I encounter and the humorous, remarkable experiences I am fortunate to have along the way.
 
And I will honestly try to keep the kvetching and ranting to a minimum. A hard thing for me to do, but it is a much easier promise to make in Mexico! What’s there to bitch and moan about? The tacos not being crisp enough? The avocados too ripe?
 
Some Surprises
I have discovered that I dislike Americans. And I mean really dislike them. What do I dislike about them? Just about everything! I said this to my dog-walking neighbors one day, who are all Americans: “Hey, is this unusual? Most the times when I see Americans, in the grocery store or wherever, I immediately dislike them. I kind of cringe inside.” They looked at each other, laughed, and replied, “Boy, you’re adjusting quick!”.
 
Surprisingly but not really all that surprisingly — I miss the Vineyard more than I thought I would. And I miss it for all the reasons I thought I would. The walks with my dogs on the Landbank trails, the trees, the wildlife, and my friends and customers. But I have not a tinge of regret, not even a tiny one, for the life change I have made. I always felt positive about what I was doing, no matter how monumental and risky it may have been, and I still do. And it is a good thing, this longing for my old home of Martha’s Vineyard. My previous life was good, and I should have these feelings. I have not one iota of bitterness, regret, or resentment. This is good too. Honestly, I wish I could have both lives. I see many trips back to the Vineyard in my future.
 
A Couple of Disappointments
 
Assholes exist everywhere in the world, including San Miguel de Allende. Bummer.
Crazy, even potentially crazy-dangerous, people exist everywhere in the world, including
San Miguel de Allende. Dang.
 
A Few Unexpected Joys
A big unexpected joy has been the realization that I could love a common little Mexican mix-breed puppy as much as I have ever loved one of my gorgeous, fancy, hoity-toity standard poodles! And to boot, my poodle Pearl loves her to pieces too. Pearl has become a fabulous big sister to our little puppy, Ruby, and her affection for her grows every day. Truly, it’s a joy for me to watch.
 
Another unexpected joy is the sanity and geniality I see all around me. It is a breath of fresh air. You can smile and say, “Hola,” “Buenos dias,” “Buenas tardes,” or “Buenas noches” to a perfect stranger, and if they aren’t wearing a mask, you see a huge grin cut across their face, and they echo the words back. And if they are wearing a mask, they nod, and their eyes then give you a genuine warm smile. As of yet, I have not encountered angry, pissed-off people except maybe when driving my car. And usually, one of those people is me! Old habits die hard. But honestly, Mexicans are shitty drivers!
 
Two Stories
Many friends and acquaintances have told me they thought that this life-changing move, which I began to plan several years ago, was brave — but that’s not so. It was gutsy, yes, but the move was something that only I would benefit from or pay the price for, and therefore it was not brave. Bravery is when you put your safety aside in the face of danger for someone or something else. Soldiers, firemen, everyday heroes, and people in the medical world throughout the pandemic — they are brave. I did experience my own act of bravery three weeks ago, which I will tell you about in a minute.
 
The Booster Border Trip
Covid booster shots are coming to Mexico for those over sixty, but Mexico is only getting the AstraZeneca shots. I found an ad on an email list I subscribe to from a man who does runs to the border for people who want the other vaccines and want them immediately. I wanted the Pfizer, So I signed up and rode to the border town of Brownsville, Texas, with six other people, including our driver. There was one Canadian, two Mexican-Americans, and two hot-shit American women a little bit older than me. It was a long ride, seventeen hours there and back. My ass hurt bigly after the fourth hour each way, but it was fun and an adventure I will never forget!
 
We left at the crack of dawn  Mondays the thirteenth. We arrived in Brownsville, Texas, at 6 or 7 pm, and let me tell you, the ride was magnificent! The mountains, canyons, and farmland flabbergasted all of us, and the little Mexican food stands along the way were wonderful. All of the passengers, including myself, have a sincere love of Mexico and its people, and even though I was the new kid on the block, my love for this amazing country was equal to theirs.
 
Our driver, Lino, was a Mexican-American and had driven this route many times, including with his father as a child, so he knew lots of interesting details about places along the way and was an excellent driver, to my relief!
 
I had not a clue as to what I was in for when I signed up for this trip, but, fortunately, the Gods of Chance were good to me once again. And even though I was only gone maybe thirty-eight hours, I pined for my dogs, Ruby and Pearl, and surprisingly, my house and my daily routine of exercising in my little pool at 3 pm and dog walking with my neighbors at 5. At that point, I knew SMA was becoming my home.
 
Want to hear about the strange hour I had while shopping at the Walmart in Brownsville, Texas? Okay, so, before stopping at Walmart, we had gotten our shots at a really weird discount place (though it was totally legit) that I described at the time to my fellow passengers as a low-rent Walmart. I also had said to them, that before the pandemic, I would not have been caught dead getting a shot of anything in my arm, in a place like this. Uh, uh, no way. But these pandemic times have changed everything, even my discount-store snobbery I have prized for so long is no longer the same. 
 
I was shopping for only a Bluetooth speaker, and my friend Ann, who was dog sitting for me, had but one request: brand name Q-tips. So, I get the Q-tips and speaker, then head to our designated meeting place — when all of a sudden, the floor seemed to drop out from under me. I had had a terrible headache all day, even before the booster shot, and rarely do I get headaches these days. Now I’m thinking, oh shit, I am going to have a fucking stroke and die in a Walmart in Brownsville, Texas! I thought, what a shitty joke the Universe has played on me; it got me and Pearl to our new life in Mexico in one piece, only to kill me in a goddamn Walmart in fucking Texas! And leaving my beloved dogs orphans on top of it. Fuck you, Universe!
 
Seriously, these thoughts did run through my mind. I mean, anybody would have them, right? Though I was laughing at myself the whole time, I do know that shit happens, and unfortunately, I also know that I have no special immunity from this kind of shit happening.
 
I obviously survived, and everyone on the trip attributed this “episode” of mine to exhaustion and dehydration, and I agree.
 
Mad Dog Story
There are stray dogs in SMA; they are called street dogs, and every street dog I have ever encountered here has been wonderful. They are clean, well fed, and benign, as far as I have experienced. The dog I am about to tell you about, a pit bull, was not a street dog. We aren’t sure where he came from. I think we was dumped in our neighborhood of Los Frailes.
 
My neighbor Ann is the mom of a labradoodle I have grown to love as my own. His name is Momo and is Pearl’s age. About a month before this pit bull encounter (most pit bulls are not like this, and all dog owners are 100% responsible for animals’ behaviors, good or bad), Ann had told me of a maneuver to use if a dog has pinned another dog down and is trying to kill it. She said to grab the attack dog’s hind legs, then hold the legs up in the air while their front legs stay on the ground, making the dog into a kind of wheelbarrow. I now had this knowledge stored in my brain, not knowing that very soon I would use it.
 
I had had an upsetting morning; I was missing my old dog Rudy like never before. I decided a walk with Ruby and Pearl would help. A block away from the house, we encounter three dogs that the owner likes to dress up. Normally they are perched atop their courtyard wall barking their heads off in their costumes du jour. These are not small dogs, mind you, so they look even more ridiculous dressed up. But today they are loose and come tearing down the street in their Santa outfits, all three focused on Pearl. I scream bloody murder, and the owner comes out and corrals them back into his courtyard. It was kind of amusing and no big deal, so we continue along our way.
 
Another short block down, I see Ann at the end of the street holding a pit bull up by his hind legs. Momo, her labradoodle, and a lady dressed in red are running toward me. I know what has happened — the pit bull has attacked Momo and the lady is running to get Momo as far away from him as possible.
 
Ann loses her grip on the pit bull. Now not only are the lady in red and Momo running toward me, so is the goddamn pit bull! It catches up to Momo and throws him down at my feet with his jaws on his neck. I know what to do because Ann had told me. But I had Pearl on the leash and Ruby stuffed in her papoose strapped to my stomach.
 
The lady in red, Norma, is beating the pit bull with her walking stick, to no avail. I am grabbing this vicious dog by the skin on his neck with my one free hand, attempting to pry him loose from Momo, also to no avail. The dog is killing our beloved Momo, and it is happening right at my feet!
 
I then spot Cynthia, another neighbor who has a house about 400 yards away. She is running toward us, her nightgown flapping in the wind. Trying to free both my hands, I throw Pearl’s leash to her and say, “Take Pearl.” Then I realize little Ruby has fallen out of her pouch and is nowhere to be seen.
 
Cynthia runs back to her house with Pearl, and Norma and I are trying to save Momo. My hands are now free, so I pull the pit bull’s legs up in the air, having no idea what would happen or what I would do with him once all the dogs were safe from this horrible beast. If I had had a gun and a clear shot, I would have blown his head off, right then and there.
 
The pit bull, because he has no leverage now that his back legs are off the ground, let’s go of Momo, and Norma grabs Momo’s leash and runs with him toward the safety of Cynthia’s house.
 
I am hanging on to this pit bull’s hind legs now, but where is Ruby? I call her name, and she comes running around the corner, crying and shaking. Ann is running towards me, and I yell, “Get Ruby.” She scoops up the screaming puppy and also runs to Cynthia’s house.
 
Finally, all the dogs are safe. And I want to say here that never, even for a minute, were any of us concerned that the dog was going to attack us. He clearly had his sights on Momo — or any one of our dogs, for that matter.
 
Now, what the fuck am I going to do with this foaming-at-the-mouth canine wheelbarrow? The owner of the house in front of which we are desperately screaming and yelling comes running out with a leash. He ties it around the pit bull’s neck, and I am then able to let go. Whew! And fortunately, we were correct — the dog has no designs on us humans. The man takes over and ties the dog to a lamppost down the street, and we make a series of calls to the police and the animal control people.
 
Thank the Universe, everyone involved except the pit bull were okay. I feel sure he was put down. I felt so sorry for the dog. He was not made this way; a terrible, sick human made him like this. But he was ruined and could not be left to do this again. It could be someone else’s dog or even a little kid the next time. Momo by the way, was severely shaken but okay. And to this day he’s afraid to walk the street where this took place.
 
As I have gotten older, I have developed such disgust for humans, though not all of us, of course. However, we have been blessed with so much as a species, and we have squandered it all.
 
One strange detail in all of this: After the dog was tied to the lamppost and I had said quite a few times that I wanted to kill him and he had to be put down, I asked the man who had helped us to fetch a bowl of water from his house for the poor beast. Our emotions can sure work in different directions at the same times — I wanted to kill him but didn’t want to let him suffer from thirst!
 
So that is my story of the day I learned the difference between bravery and everyday gutsy decisions, as critical as they may be at times. I have grown to love Momo; he reminds me so much of my beautiful dog Rudy, and I’ll be goddamned if I was going to let this dog kill him. Ann, I feel certain, would have done the same for one of my dogs. What I find amazing was that she’d told me about this life-saving maneuver a month before the event, not knowing the information she was passing along would save her dog in the near future. The Universe does work in mysterious ways, and if you are paying attention, little miracles reveal themselves more often than you can imagine.
 
I hope you enjoyed my first installment of “Letters from Lorraine”. Have a wonderful day!
 
Forever your friend,
Lorraine