Life on the Island

Life on the Island
I tell you, life on the Island is blissful and I don’t want to ever leave. As I am writing this there is a 3 piece matachi band playing next door, it takes me back to my childhood when my father would be in nostalgic mood and bring out his Mexican music. These guys are all dressed up with the hat, the boots, the belt buckles and thick black moustaches, I’m watching them out one window and every once in a while I run to my other window where I am watching my landlady open up coconuts, the way she is chopping at it with a machete I don’t know how she still has any fingers. Getting into a coconut is a lot of work, and she’s got a big pile, not sure what she is planning on doing with all that coconut but I’m watching and learning. This is what I do when I am inside, I run from window to window and spy on all my neighbours, between that and keeping an eye out on all the people coming by selling stuff I can’t keep my face out of the windows. I caught the produce truck again today; I bought a big papaya, 2 avocados, 3 monster mandarin oranges, 6 bananas, 3 tomatoes, 2 apples and 5 limes for 53 pesos. I like having a fruit shake for breakfast or fruit in my yogurt. As well as the regular honking gas and water guy, I also had a guy selling shrimp come by, a young lad selling pastries, a guy on a bike pulling a cart selling cheese and a few others that I missed when I was in the bathroom (I have to leave the window once in awhile). I also headed to the beach in search of my English speaking guy that might sell me a table but of course his restaurant is closed on Mondays, so I just hung out on a lounger and read a book for about an hour and went for a walk and then headed home again where I settled in my chair on my roof top until it got cold...yes cold. The weather has not been the greatest for the last 3 weeks, the Pastor was saying on Sunday that these last 3 weeks have been the coldest he’s ever seen it here in 11 years. Unless you’re sitting in the direct sunlight and away from the wind it is cold enough to wear a long sleeve sweater or even a sweat shirt. I had put a skirt on Sunday morning but I changed my mind before I headed out when I thought of my early morning boat ride and put on pants, good thing....it was cold. Whenever I want to go to the city I have to take a little boat across, it costs 5 pesos and only takes about 5 minutes but when it’s cold and windy it can feel a lot longer.
I love the relaxed feel to this Island, there are more bikes, motorbikes and donkey carts on this Island than vehicles. It is not uncommon to see horses walking by my house. This afternoon when I was walking back from the beach I passed a horse slowly walking up the road, all geared up with saddle and bridal but no rider, he had his head down and was just walking along, didn’t even lift his head when I passed him....there’s one POed cowboy somewhere.