Family Road Trip–Day Four

/ Juliana Lightle / 1 Comment

No rushing around this morning.  We wanted to stop by Old Towne, stroll around, and have lunch.  We doubted shops would open before ten.  After all the rain, everything sparkled in the morning sun.  We found a parking space–often extremely difficult to find there–on the west side of the church by the square and headed east in front of the church.  Because it was early or because of the rain earlier, it seemed much less hectic than usual.  We chatted with shop keepers, bargained, wandered.  My grandson announced he was very hungry so we sat outside at the Hacienda (I think that is the name of the restaurant we go to near the square–we just go and never pay attention to its name).  All I wanted was fry bread.  First, I dipped it in the salsa then switched to honey.  After this relaxing leisurely lunch, we finished our walk around the square and headed to Astro Zombie in Nob Hill.  I think my grandson could go there every day.

 

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Arrived home, fed Rosie, unpacked, and checked for water damage.  It rained almost 4 1/2 inches while we were gone.  That averages almost an inch a day for the last five days.  The weather forecasters predict possibilities for rain the rest of the week.  Some people in low lying areas of Amarillo experienced flooding in their homes.  That is what occurs when developers fill in playas and build houses there.  But that is another blog post for another day.

My daughter called to read me my grandson’s second blog post.  He asked me last night while we lounged at the hotel to help him start a blog.  He posted his first post last night.

Waking up for work will come sooner than I want.  Happy dreams!!

Family Road Trip–Day Three

/ Juliana Lightle / 3 Comments

Today we awakened earlier that we usually do on vacation in order to get to the train station in downtown Albuquerque to take the Rail Runner to Santa Fe.  Apparently, we worried too much about missing it because we arrived really too early and sat around for more than 45 minutes waiting and watching.  I walked around and took several photos of my grandson waiting and of one of the numerous murals one sees in downtown.

 

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I was surprised by the number of people using this train.  It takes one and one half hours to get from downtown Albuquerque to Santa Fe depot because there are quite a few stops on the way including one at Sandia Pueblo and another at Kewa Pueblo.  Photos are forbidden while traveling through Kewa.  The route basically follows the Rio Grande Valley.

I took a few photos from the train and several in Santa Fe.  Good friends, Dino and Zuriash, were already in Santa Fe and picked us up at the depot.  We went to the Chocolate Maven for brunch–my daughter totally loves this restaurant because they have crepes.  We walked around the art exhibits by the church near the square, stopped in a few shops, and just before the return trip on the train, went to Jalapeños for drinks.  A wonderful day with family and friends and a little train trip, my grandson’s first.

 

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Family Road Trip–Day Two

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This rainy spell brings chilly mornings.  After a leisurely wake up and breakfast at the hotel, daughter, grandson, and I headed toward the east end of Albuquerque, an area we rarely reach when we come here.  We ended up at Coronado Mall (I think that is its name but not sure), walked around for a while, and found a clothing shop where my daughter bought two dresses for upcoming weddings we will all attend.  At one end of this mall a huge Barnes & Noble resides.  My grandson and I ended up spending nearly two hours there–so many books, so much to browse.  The lady who waited on us wore a semi-precious stone skull necklace hanging around her neck, a dress the print of which displayed numerous characters from rather dark movies, including more skulls, and patent leather dress shoes.  She informed me she usually wears combat boots, but for some reason decided to wear dress shoes on this particular day.  She owns six pairs of Doc Martens, her favorites.  I remain clueless as to the reason why I frequently discover all sorts of personal things about people whom I have never met before.  Actually, my goal was to find one or more of the 2013 Man Booker short list books.  I picked one by a Nigerian woman.

Later we headed to the Nob Hill area to find a place the lady and a guy at the Barnes & Noble recommended, Astro Zombies.  No, I am not a gamer, but my grandson loves Magic, Yugioh, Pokemon, all that sort of thing.  He found a new game, Munchkin.  It sounded like a kids game to me, but the 21 year old young man at the store informed me that he and all his friends play it.  While there, who appeared but the grandparents of one of my grandson’s best friends.  Next came dinner at Nob Hill–the restaurant.  Delicious.  Of course, since grandson continues his vegetarianism, any place that actually manages to create good vegetarian food is always a hit.  As we walked back to the car, I happened to glance in the window of one of the endless restaurants on Central.  There sat a former student, Casey Ball, who was part of the group of eight of us who went to Costa Rica together the summer of 2012.  After we tried to mouth a conversation through the window, she ran outside; we hugged and played a quick catch-up on news.

Finally, back at the hotel room, guess what?  We learned to play Munchkin.

Family Road Trip-Day One

/ Juliana Lightle / 1 Comment

This afternoon, my daughter, grandson, and I headed toward Albuquerque on our first family road trip since last summer when we went to California.  We started late due to the rain causing a leak in a hallway in my house, not just any leak, a very large leak.  Whenever it rained–and it kept raining off and on, so much water accumulated that rapid drips fell to the floor from a dime sized hole in the ceiling.  Now a big black bucket resides on the floor underneath it.  Finally, I found someone to come out and take a look so he at least has some idea what the problem may be.  Nothing toward fixing it will occur until next week.  This will be no tiny project; first the facia has to come off part of the roof so they can locate the cause.  Then, well, it depends on what they find.  The young lady watching the house and caring for Isabella and Rosie can empty a bucket as well as I can so we decided to go ahead and take our weekend road trip.

This storm system covers a wide swath.  Rain signs all the way here, hail enough in one place to cover the sides of Interstate 40 like a light snow, and a deluge coming down from the pass into Albuquerque.  I hate driving in a hard rain; thankfully, my daughter was driving.

We went to dinner about 6:30 at our favorite Italian restaurant, Cabo’s.  I know it seems strange that any visitor to Albuquerque would eat Italian food here.  We discovered this restaurant years ago and always return every time we visit.  We even have certain memories of happenings there–like the time an amusing guy at another table “hit on” one of my handsome exchange students.  Our other favorite restaurant here is only slightly off the square in Old Towne; I have no idea its name.  I go there for the fry bread/sopapillas.  I order other things, but that is really what I want.  Theirs seem different in a subtle, indescribable way.

Now I sit here writing at the hotel swimming pool.  I cannot imagine what my grandson would do in a hotel without a swimming pool.  It remains his first desire anywhere we stay.  He did survive a recent trip to Austin when it was too cold for the pool outside.–perhaps because he discovered the Dragon’s Lair, a little bit of heaven for gamers who love Magic.  His ten year old self is now on the third Harry Potter book.  He informed us at dinner how he deals with life when he is “grounded” from all electronics–he goes into the magic of his imagination.

 

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At the Italian restaurant a couple of years ago during Christmas holidays.

 

 

Panhandle Weather

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After many rainless months, it decided to rain and won’t stop it.  Yesterday I wrote about a nice gentle rain, a rarity here.  Today came the deluge.  It rained over an inch in one hour.  The rain hit the west windows of my house so hard that at first I thought it was hail.  When I watched, it looked like a giant bucket of water poured on them continuously.  Then the water falls started.  When I first moved here nearly six years ago, a lot of rain brought only one giant waterfall most of the time.  More recently a lady built a house closer than I would like.  She cleared off a lot of native grass, various native bushes, and a number of juniper trees.  Even with the grass she planted, water runs off her property onto mine in a little river.  It runs so rapidly it is creating a small arroyo which gets deeper each time it rains.  Since they predict thunderstorms for the next few days, if it keeps this up we might have a chance to catch up a little on the rain.  Hopefully, next time the rain will flow more gently.  When it gushes like this afternoon and evening, rocks, dirt, debris wash onto my drive.  After the first round of rain, dirt lay more than an inch deep in some places and rocks lay scattered about.  I managed to clean off the worst of the dirt before the rain began again.

Living here in the Panhandle of Texas demands an new attitude about weather.  Expect anything.  I’ve seen it drop 50 degrees in an hour, go from 40 at night to 80 plus the next day, rain dirt, blow dust like fog, snow two feet and a couple of days later reach 55.  To an outsider, this may sound dreadful but I find numerous pluses:  the sun shines most days; it is not humid; summer days can be a bit of heaven on earth even if hot during the day–perfect evenings for lounging on the patio with food, friends, and wine; winter does not last forever and neither do the winter clouds.  Winter in the Midwest is downright gloomy.  Not here.

Now I am going to bed, hoping lightning streaks and thunder rolls do not awaken me at 3 in the morning.

Rain

/ Juliana Lightle / 1 Comment

Gradually, the clouds increased and the weather forecaster predicted rain tonight and tomorrow–a 30 per cent chance and even better chances toward the weekend.  After months of rainless days and nights, dust storms, and weather extremes, I hardly believed it.  On the way home from work, I stopped to buy two guara and one rosemary to replace those that died over the winter, an unusual occurrence; both usually make it through.  After feeding Rosie, I decided to plant them in case the forecaster’s predictions held.  Not really believing rain would come, I watered them, adding root stimulator.

The sprinkles started, but only a little, what people here call a “12 inch rain”–one drop every 12 inches.  It stopped, the wind blew harder, and a brown dust fog filled the canyon.  I shut the windows.  I almost went out to start the sprinkler.  Suddenly, lightning struck somewhere near the house, thunder boomed.  The sprinkles continued to start and stop with intermittent lightning and thunder.  After having two TVs struck by lightning in the last six years even with surge protectors and turned off, I’m a little leery about lightning storms.  I left the TV and computer off and initially wrote this by hand.

Just as I started to walk outside, having given up on real rain, it started, not the crashing, thunderstorm rain we usually receive, but a gentle, steady, back East kind of rain.  I opened the windows, inhaling the rain smell.  As I write this, the rain continues; it’s now been nearly an hour with writing and interruptions from phone calls and me checking to make sure it is not raining in the windows or the French doors to the patio.  It plays a staccato tune on the green steel roof.

Three miles down the road in front of a house at the intersection of two country roads, a sign stands:  “In the name of Jesus pray for rain.”  Perhaps they have been praying hard.

Is there any privacy anymore?

/ Juliana Lightle / 5 Comments

Last month, my book of poetry, On the Rim of Wonder, was published by Uno Mundo Press, a small press in Arizona.  It is available on Amazon, coming on Kindle soon, and signed copies can be ordered from me.  Today I checked to see what happens if I put my name in the Google search, hoping the two books I have authored would show up or at least this blog would. Not only did this blog show up, but my Facebook, Twitter, photos, and much, much more.  Although I am not obsessed much with privacy–I consider myself to be quite the open book sort of person or the proverbial “you get what you see” type, I looked in shock at what I saw on the computer.  I stared in disbelief.

One website, not Google–guess I was too astonished to even remember its name–listed my age, the main road of my address, and showed (no, I am not making this up) an aerial photo of my house.  In a way this latter part seemed a bit funny because recently when I had to call the sheriff’s office (a bullet or rock shattered my passenger side car window on my way to opera practice) and they sent out two deputies, these deputies could not find my house.  They actually called me and told me to meet them at the road because they had no idea where to go.  If it had been something scary serious, something like a robbery, the thieves would have been far away while the deputies wandered up and down the road.  Often when I invite people over who have not been to my house before, they get lost, even with detailed directions. After seeing this personal information on the Internet, I feel relieved that my house is still hard to find.  On some other sites, the information appeared to be either confusing or erroneous–not sure which is worse.  I thought about looking further, but guessed it could only get more alarming.

How do I feel about all this?  What upsets me the most?  For starters, I remain horrified, insulted, and dismayed that my age would be published like that.  Guess that tells all of you something about my sensitivities.  Another concern is safety.  Is it really personally safe to have all this information out there for just anyone to find with so little searching?  Thankfully, I live behind a locked gate and Isabella, my dog, alerts me to anything unusual.  She is big, 80 pounds, and fierce looking–a mix of wolf, German shepherd, and blue heeler.  She can destroy a huge steak bone in as little as fifteen minutes.  Still, all this out there for all to see gives me pause.

 

 

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Long Life

/ Juliana Lightle / Leave a comment

If you believe in averages and want to live long, don’t live in the United States of America, a country that failed to make it to the top ten for either men or women.  Some countries appear to be better for one gender than another.  A few countries remain in the top ten for both genders:  Japan, Switzerland, Singapore, Australia, Italy, and Luxembourg.  Iceland’s the place to be if you are a man, Spain for women.  Worldwide the mean for men is 68.1 and for women 72.7. Sadly, the discrepancy from country to country is immense.  Nine countries still show a life expectancy less than 55 years, all in sub-Sahara Africa.  War and AIDS take their toll.

Blue Zones remain the place to grow up and live if you desire a long healthy life.  Where are they?  Okinawa, a peninsula in Costa Rica–I’ve been close, Sardinia, Loma Linda in California–Seventh Day Adventists, to name a few.  Genetics, according to some experts, predicts only twenty per cent of longevity.  Then why do people in these places live long and healthy?  What do they have in common:

-healthy diets with lots of vegetables and fruit

-activity–the people there get a lot of exercise, e.g. climbing up and down the mountains of Sardinia

-a sense of community–people get together often

Some communities in the US plan to become Blue Zones.  Fort Worth, Texas, even has a Blue Zone project which includes encouraging restaurants to provide healthier options, a bike share program, and an initiative to combat childhood obesity.  My guess is that the United States will lag further and further behind unless the obesity epidemic can be controlled.  So far, I don’t see that happening.

What can you do to prolong your own life:

-don’t smoke

-eats lots of fruit and vegetables

-avoid sugar

-eat less meat and more fish

-eat less–Okinawans quit eating when they are 80 per cent full; they even have a saying for this

-spend time with friends and family

-find ways to increase your exercise even if it is as simple as throwing away your TV remote control

If I live the average of my parents and grandparents, I have a long way to go so I must take care of myself to stay healthy.

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Besame Mucho

/ Juliana Lightle / 3 Comments

Since I heard Besame Mucho twice in one night eight days ago, I cannot get this song out of my head.  First, a young opera singer sang it in a passionate, operatic style and later Trio Ellas sang it light heartedly.  Both sounded fine; not sure I even have a preference.  I translated for the young man I took with me, my grandson’s older brother who is Hispanic.  Students and parents in the United States seem to often ask why they need to know anything but English.  Once when I informed my students that Spanish was spoken here where we live before English and native languages before that, one student seemed shocked.  Guess he thought the natives spoke English before the English even arrived here.  He probably didn’t even think.  Thinking has become a lost art.

Here is a list of singers whose version of Besame Mucho you can find online.  I just listened to all of them; yes, it took a while.  Now what I want is a part-time boyfriend who likes to dance.

Andrea Bocelli

Pedro Infante

Consuelo Velasquez

Julio Iglesias

Julie Zorilla

Arturo Fuerte

Tino Rossi

Placido Domingo

Cesaria Evora

Il Divo

Yolanda Sanchez

 

Oh, and by the way, Besame Mucho means kiss me a lot.

 

Prom Night

/ Juliana Lightle / 6 Comments

Tonight was prom night where I teach high school  All teachers, unless they provide a really, really good excuse, must go.  Many teachers find this a rather tiresome assignment.  Last year I did not go until time for the cleanup crew because I was singing in a big concert.  Tonight I signed up for the first half and ended up staying a bit later because it was fun.  No kidding, I was having a good time for two reasons:  dancing and dressing up.  As a girlie girl, I really like to dress up and dancing is akin to heaven so…I teach in the “country”–not exactly far from town but they think country–horses, country music, guns, four wheelers–you get the idea.  I have owned horses for years, but I am not that kind of country.  Can I dance to country music–sure, but I never listen to it.  What did they play a lot of??  You guessed it, country music.  I did not dance to that, oh,no.  Once in a while they played something else.  I danced some fast dances.  I asked one student why he wasn’t dancing and he told me he did not know how to two step so I taught him.  It took less than five minutes.  He can dance–I had already fast danced for a few minutes with him.

Can most of these students dance well?  Not exactly, except for a few.  And then there is the question of super high heels.  Most of the girls arrived with them on their feet.  One half hour later they were dancing barefoot.  In a brief chat with the new principal, we discussed how perhaps we should provide dance  and high heel etiquette classes, starting about two months before prom night.  I often wonder how these ballroom dancers spend so much time dancing in high heels. Dancing is such fabulous exercise, I think I will try it alone at home to get in shape.  If I plan to take even a little walk in about six weeks at Simien National Park in Ethiopia, I must get in better shape than I am just doing yoga.  The mountains there are over 13,000 feet high.  Now I need some sleep.