A guest cottage over 40 years in the making

When my mother, Louise Schwartz, first bought this cottage on the shores of Seneca Lake, New York in the early 1960s, one of her early projects was to convert the free-standing garage into a cabin for overflow for the many kids that came to spend their summer.

We were living in White Plains, outside of New York City, and racing up to the lake for summers with all the cousins, who still live around the lake.

Eventually, my mother had a vision to turn the cabin into a guest house in the woods or a studio for her while she turned over the 'main' house over to the rest of us. She had a friend of my brother's help design and construct an upstairs loft bedroom, a small kitchen, and a bathroom that resembled more of an indoor outhouse.

In the past four years that Michael and I have been spending summers here, we've made baby steps of progress, with a lot of help from friends and family. Cousin Brett did some carpentry for us. Our friend from Hazlitt's winery, Brad Phillips, painted the cottage inside and out in exchange for rent. We got the better deal, we think....

Brother Dan became the plumbing and electrical maestro. Michael did everything else, and I got to decorate.

So almost 50 years later, our first official guests are set to arrive.

I've felt my mother's presence on the property this past week as I put the finishing touches on the cottage. She is tickled, I'm sure, with how the place looks and how her vision finally has come to pass.

It took a lot of years and a lot of people to make it happen. But it was her vision, once again, exactly as she planned.

If you knew my mother, this is no surprise.

More pictures of the cottage.

Jammin' for Betsy's birthday

Betsy, our fearless leader in Watkins Glen who hosts us every other week to play music at her place, let the cat out of the bag about her upcoming 'big' birthday.

So her good friends Kate and Danni, both hammered dulcimer players, threw the big surprise birthday bash for her last week, and even the sun showed up to help the celebration. It was the nicest weather we've had since our arrival in late May.

The company was great, the food was fantastic and the music was even better (at least for those of us who got to play). Betsy lives to sing the old time tunes (or anything else), plays the dulcimer and the bass, joins every jam in the area.

I also got to hear a great singer and local musician, Chris Holder, play (he's in the video too). Check him out!

A perfect celebration, for all of us.

Here's a wrap-up of some of the day's tunes (courtesy of Cap'n Michael):

A lot of cold, wet 'civilization'

It's been three weeks since I've had anything to say.

That might be a record. I've hit a state of ohmmmmmmmmmmm --- or something. Just taking one day at a time, making a list, waiting for the weather to clear.

Especially waiting for the weather to heal.

Today is the Waterfront Festival in Watkins Glen and the much-anticipated Cardboard Boat Races. And this is our radar picture for today.

One of the biggest changes after living in Mexico for six months is that we now have to check the weather forecast daily --- or hourly --- and we actually talk about the weather. In Mexico, you knew every day was going to be perfect. Here in New York, Michael has already told me to clear my schedule for Tuesday and Wednesday because the forecast is finally looking good.

Not that the forecast can't and won't change. But I'm (finally) adapting. And not whining as much. I'm also layered up in fleece with a rain slicker, shoes and socks.


Re-entry to Civilization

The first few weeks back is a process of re-adapting to a country that offers pretty much everything and anything and is easy --- all for a price, of course.

Some of the things I've been enjoying:
• Just rinsing our fruits and veggies, rather than treating them in anti-bacterial rinse before eating.
• Drinking the water out of the faucet.
• Getting dressed in the morning without having to shake my clothes and shoes to make sure a scorpion hasn't taken up residence.
• Streaming video on Netflix!

Some of the things I'm still wrapping my brain around:
• The price of everything! --- food in the grocery stores, restaurants, gas, any services.
• The difficulty of finding people to work in some service areas, especially housecleaning. It pays pretty well but nobody's doing it. What's up with that?
• The weather. (Of course).

My latest venture into civilization was Friday's visit to a dentist in Ithaca, Dr. Chris Devenpeck (in practice with Dr. Ira Kamp) to have a tooth extracted. Friday's are also spa day at the office so you get massage while they yank your tooth out.

Silly as it sounds, dang, it works. It's hard to concentrate on exactly how uncomfortable and anxious I am when someone's massaging my feet.


How 'bout it, Dr. Pam?

Roots

I'm also so pleasantly reminded of the history of family, of the length of the roots we have here. Our ancestors arrived in upstate New York sometime in the 1700s and I have cousins and siblings, nieces and nephews to visit up and down the lake.

About 50 years ago, when my mother bought this place near Hector, we built a steep, narrow path down to our lakefront and dock. The cables we attached to the saplings have now grown into and become a part of the trunk of the tree, a reminder of how long we've been here.


The cable is a handrail tacked on to the tree 50 years ago


Our dock at the bottom of the 'goat trail'

Although my mother has been gone since February 2005, I still use her name to remind people of my connection to the area and she's still remembered, her house is still known.

But the memory of the locals goes so much farther back than us that often I have to remind the oldtimers that 'you know, the cottage that old Stoney owned?' And they know right where I live. And I think, 'Gee whiz. How long do we have to live here before we're not the newcomers?'

I guess longer than 50 years.

Catapulting out of Mexico

I left Arroyo Seco last Tuesday for a quick trip to see Sasha and family, have an early celebration with Dustin for his 29th birthday, then on to Flagstaff, Arizona to sneak in a quick 'girls visit' with Beth.

A Mexican veteran herself (with a place in Kino Bay), she surprised me with appointments for massage and a haircut.

Wise woman.

She took me shopping at the new huge New Frontiers, which rivals any Whole Foods store in California. The choices were overwhelming after running next door to Xavier's tiny tienda for my limited groceries for the past six months.

Welcome to America!

Beth encouraged me to get a new look from her hair stylist, who I grilled with more than 20 questions about how many layers, how easy to take care of, can I still pull it back? By the time I agreed to the cut, I think he was more nervous than I was.

But it's great to have shorter hair again, great to come back to 'civilization' and try to fit in a bit more. At least at first. No makeup yet. We'll see how long I can hold out....


Beth talks me into a new 'look'

I met Michael on Friday at Sky Harbor in Phoenix for our annual red-eye flight home, first to Philly, followed by a commuter flight up to Elmira. It makes for a really long day (and night) but it's worth it to live in such a beautiful and remote area in the New York Finger Lakes.

The weather is unseasonably cold (oh great...), but it's great that all our flowers are still in full bloom, we have time to get the Spirit of Louise pontoon boat out of storage and into the water without missing any great lake days, time to reconnect with my fiddle-playing friends, get back up to speed.

Here's a video of our first afternoon on the ground. We arrived at 11 in the morning, borrowed a car from Brother Dan, went to Wegman's grocery for lunch and shopping, then on to our favorite used car dealer.

We were home at the lake by 3 with a new Jeep on order to drive for the summer and a carload of supplies, cranked up the jacuzzi and started to pull weeds.

We're getting this relocation thing down to a new art form....

Hope to see many of you now that we're back in the States!

A Mother's Day surprise

The president of Mexico canceled Mother’s day this year, el dia de los madres, but the people didn’t get the whole message.
The Arroyo Seco fiesta will be held sometime this week --- and you have to be here to figure out when....
Chena and Chon did a booming business this weekend in their tienda across the street by selling silk flower arrangements, which they picked up in La Huerta the day before. They started with about 25 arrangements, including a 3-D piece of artwork with pitchers of flowing water (Michael suggested it would sell quicker if it was pouring tequila). By the end of Mother’s Day, they only had a few flowers left.
Several women stopped by to give me flowers and gifts, a very sweet and appreciated gesture.
But the real gift of Sunday was an impromptu visit by Sasha, accompanied with parents Dustin and Camelia. This was Sasha’s first real trip to an ocean beach.
She loved it.


Sasha's first trip to the ocean

She loved the textures, the water, the sand, the whole she-bang.


Sasha recharging the batteries for more beach time

We took the quad down to the surf beach for sunset on Saturday night. Then an afternoon at Tenacatita beach where Sasha loved being in the water and the waves. Even our 8-year-old neighbor, Julliette, swam with us in Tenacatita, where the water is deliciously warm.
It’s a relief to know our granddaughter has inherited the water gene required for holidays at the beach in Mexico or the lake in New York.

Dustin, of course, loved our Honda quad, and Cami was game for a sunny vacation on a beach and out of the house.


Really, this was safer than it looks!
While they were here, Dustin mentioned wanting a smaller dog as a companion dog to Max, their black lab mutt.
Careful what you wish for.
He went home with a tiny three-week old black and white pup that he has to feed formula and bathe daily.


Dustin feeds the newborn while Mama dog takes a snooze

We walked down to our neighbor’s house whose cocker spaniel had given birth to nine pups about three weeks before.
We were surprised and disappointed to find all the pups had died but one --- and that one was left was in a back room on a dirt floor, in the dark, with the owners out of town for the night.
I had given their cocker spaniel, Canela, a flea bath and a haircut right after the pups were born because the owners were complaining about the fleas.
Fleas? Yes, and dozens of ticks.
An ugly job.
I had taken Rocio, our friendly vet, to see the mom and pups right after they were born and she had encouraged the owners to get the pups out of the dirt and to get the mom more nourishing food so she’d have enough milk.
The advice apparently wasn’t enough.
A neighbor hopped the fence and grabbed the puppy for us. Dustin brought it back to our place for its first of many baths with a mild flea soap designed for puppies.
Our first report from Dustin and Cami, back home in Puerto Vallarta, is that the puppy is eating and sleeping well and starting to walk around, albeit a bit wobbly.


The last of the nine pups

As the last one of nine pups, he must be quite a survivor and he’s just gotten a real chance at a good life.
And Dustin must have gotten that ‘save the dog’ gene from me.

A quick update on the dogs:

Capitan is doing well again and living back at home with Marta, who is in charge of his medications. He seems to be getting energy back and is happy to be at home with his buddy, Paloma. We go up to give the occasional injection, provide antibiotics. He has a severe case of ehrlichia, which he got from a tick. One of the symptoms was the anemia and the bleeding. It’s treatable with a 30-day regime of strong antibiotics and a lot of vitamins.

Leona, the female with TVT, a venereal cancer, has suddenly gotten a lot better. We were three or four shots into her treatment with little improvement. On Sunday, she looks almost normal. She’s also getting a little easier to handle. It still takes three of us to hold her down, with a muzzle, to give her an IV injection. But there’s less thrashing, gnashing and gnawing going on. We’re all relieved (especially Leona?).

Canela, the cocker, has just gotten a full-strength flea bath, which we’ll follow up with a frontline treatment and spray around her house as well. We’ll find a way to get her spayed soon. No more pups!

I’ve learned a lot about how to help the animals down here and I’m more committed than ever to getting as many of them neutered as possible. This year I’ll be raising money in the states for the spay and neutering clinics, so please let me know if this is something you’d like to support.
You can email me a fitzfoxATgmail.com ---- we'll be back in the states at the end of the month.

Update on Swine flu in Mexico

A quick update tonight: check Michael's blog tomorrow and there will probably be a lot more detail and pictures.

First of all, we're safe. We live in a remote place on the coast, we live outside most of the time in a warm (non-friendly to flu) climate, there's no wheezing and hacking by our neighbors. We're probably living in as safe a place as we could be.

But there's definitely impact to the citizens of Mexico, regardless of the health issues.

At mid-day today, just as we were taking our friends Pat and Sanders Lamont out for a last lunch before they caught their plane back to the California from Manzanillo, the governor of Jalisco closed all the restaurants in the state.

No lie!

Everything was closed or closing in Melaque, we went on to Barre de Navidad -- ditto. We didn't realize that it had been mandated. We just thought the owners had decided to close.

When we got back to La Manzanilla late this afternoon, we found Palapa Joe's was closed. We figured there had to something pretty dramatic going on. Friends on the street told us what was up.

When we got back to Arroyo Seco, the police were just coming thru posting the declaration on the walls of the tiendas in town.

Our friends on the beach say they're pretty happy that the governor is getting in front of this thing, rather than waiting for the citizens of Jalisco to start spreading some virus.

But for the people of Mexico who have to work to feed their kids, there's a lot of disbelief and panic going on. Our friend Chena said she thinks we'll all soon be feeding the poorest of the poor who aren't able to work right now and won't be able to feed their children.

It's a little scary to watch a country shut down. It makes me worry for the economy of the country, and the global economy as well. But I'm willing to wait and see how this unfolds, hope that this virus will die a rapid death as the weather starts to turn hot.

What is also a little disheartening is how the U.S. and European news coverage of Mexico is confined to simply reporting on the number of sick, the number of deaths, and no reporting on actions and impacts, especially outside of Mexico City.

Just imagine living in a city the size of Puerto Vallarta --- almost 200,000 people --- and having all the restaurants, malls, theatres, bars and all other areas where people can gather closed down for more than a week.

In the meantime, it's a quiet, lovely night in the village. All is calm, for now. We'll try to keep you updated as we can.

News from Mexico

For all of you lovely friends that have been concerned about our health and welfare, thanks for caring --- and we're fine.

We've been reading about the swine flu and the possible pandemic. Veracruz and Mexico City seem to be Ground Zero for the virus. In Arroyo Seco, the only impact on our little village is that all the schools in Mexico have been closed for the next week or so, much to the chagrin of the parents.

The locals seem to be up on the news and on the threat. But it's all a watch and wait. We'll probably avoid the cities, wash our hands a lot and wait for the news, just as all of you are probably doing.

Otherwise, life is going on as usual. Michael is up watering all the plants and the grass. I'm getting ready to walk to the beach. We're meeting Sanders and Pat later in La Manzanilla for a beach afternoon and a nice dinner out. They fly home to Northern California tomorrow.

We'll update the blogs as we get information, but we feel pretty safe living in a tiny beach town where there aren't many people and everyone lives outdoors.

Apologies to all for not staying in touch through email. We've updated our wireless modem when the original one died and my old laptop no longer can connect through the wireless connection. So I have to trundle out to the 'comunications tent' to plug in to do my emails or hunt and peck on the iTouch.