Striving for simplicity...

Another thing I noticed on my travels to Mexico was the fact that adults, children, and animals are all on an equal plane there. Every being is respected. You'll be walking down the street and a dog just strolls past. Or you're having lunch at an outdoor cafe and the waitress is actually feeding the pigeons. A bee lands on a man's head and he continues about his business unaffected.

I noticed it was the same amongst the different classes of people. Everyone gives money to the beggars. No one chases them away from the front steps of the churches, or the street corners. Vendors walk amongst tables in outdoor and indoor cafes selling their beaded necklaces, woven table runners, and carved wooden combs. The managers don't ask them to leave. And, the other thing I noticed is there is no underlying animosity toward tourists the way there is in European countries. They welcome everyone.

Possibly one of the greatest experiences I had while we were there was the very first night we arrived. We got in late. We'd been traveling all day. The lady at the hotel had just talked our ears off and pressured us to buy into her vacation club, and all we wanted to do was eat and get to our condo to sleep. Because the restaurants were supposedly all closed due to the hour, our future tour guide, Jose Maria, drove us to the local mini-market, Pitico, to pick up some groceries for the night. As the restaurants were closed, so were the banks, and we had only a few pesos on us. They obviously don't accept Traveler's Checks in a small market (or anywhere else we later found out). It was then that Jose Maria offered us all the money in his pocket. He had just met us and offered to pay for our groceries. For whatever reason, at that moment, in that tired state, it was the sweetest thing anyone had ever done. Immediately, he gained all of our respect. It was him, too, later in the week, who helped me through a difficult time, offering his knowledge of ancient Mexican healing traditions.

Here in the US the fad is to simplify life- to recycle, to buy organic, to use cloth bags at the grocery store. But these are all superficial actions. Without the actual mindset of simplicity, none of it is any good. To simplify life we must first erase the invisible and nonexistent barriers between us that we have created in the names of legality and independence. In Mexico, everyone is family. Here it seems we are all strangers.

In fact, I was reading an interview with Michelle Obama today and she was discussing the importance of extended family's part in raising children. She called for Americans to disperse the newly touted hero of the mom who does it all. No one can do it all; we all need help, she claimed. And the most interesting part was when she pointed out that not too long ago, people had children in order to help them, whether it be on the farm or just with the household chores. When she told the staff at the White House that she expected her daughters to make their own beds and clean their own dishes, they were surprised. But that is an important lesson for us all. If everyone plays their part, we can all live in peace.



I write all of this in honor of our newest housemate- the orbweaver who built her amazing home on our front walk while we were out of town. My normal reaction would have been to knock down her week's work, even though it is in no one's way. But, in honor of the Mexican way of life, we live side by side.