Wow, Plus 365 days and counting, Max and I and a bunch of boxes arrived at this place today a year ago at about 5pm. Funny how we measure time, for each of us it's different, to say it was 4 years ago means little, but for me to say "it was 4 years ago I lost Chris" suddenly crystallizes it in stone and so it is as I say "one year ago today we arrived here" because we left our “home” in Texas and moved to Mexico.

Now, as Max and I walked out to the casita this morning to turn off the nite lites and I said gee, one year since we arrived, he just blinked and walked ahead, the main thing he wanted last year was to get out of the car and stretch his legs, he’s completely happy with me gong back to TX in a couple weeks without him, he’s not much of a traveler.

As I've written lately I've learned much in this last year, but most of all I’ve learned to enjoy this place, if not love (that may ultimately be reserved only for Texas). It’s really a fun place and I’ve been very lucky to find the house I’m renting and if they sell the place next year, and I have to move, it will be a heartbreak, but that’s then, not now.

Overall the weather here is great, I’ve now experienced a full year and actually the 8 dry or “dusty” months as I call them are almost better than the 4 rainy season months which are beautiful green and flowering, but muddy and a nuisance with clouds and almost cool days.

Probably the two things you need most here are patience and tolerance because if you don’t strap them on every morning you won’t have a good day. And, that varies from day to day, recently it took 2 ½ months to get an FM3 Visa when normally it should be a month and that included going to Guadalajara with 3 other folks to the “heart of the beast” and to the Federal Palacio which is an experience in itself – but, I got it! Or, keeping extension cords at the ready when power goes out on one leg of the system to plug in and draw from the other to run critical stuff like computers and  - well, the TV on race day. And, having Dish TV which thinks it’s in NYC (because it’s basically illegal in MX) means NO TX football and instead you get the Hackensak Hobos or the Back East foot draggers etc. – but, so it goes.

Electricity, especially during the stormy season, is a challenge and so you need voltage regulators on everything and even then sometimes you take damage. You learn to drive with the local folks here (slowly) and the Tapatios when in Guadalajara (fast and aggressively) and of course a thousand other things. But, I’ve lived in NE, CO, CA and LA (among others) and each is different and each is unique and good in its own way – as is Riberas del Pilar, Jalisco, Mexico.

I brought the weather station down www.chapalaweather.net and we’re getting an average of 3,000 hits a day so I guess folks find it helpful, it’s fun and at times keeps me busy keeping it working with all the connectivity issues etc. On the down side, my connectivity this last month has been a challenge and hopefully will be “fixed” this next week – or, I WILL fix it in another way – hint to my ISP.

On an interesting note I find living on a “fixed” income a bit of a challenge and so am trying to modify some of my errant ways, but just in case, another fellow who now lives in NM and I are starting an export/import business for some high end specialties like copper and onyx sinks, copper topped furniture and other specialty MX building items. Our goal is not to be big per se, but to offer specialty items of high quality – (see profitable).

I’m not excited about “going back to work” but this isn’t too much of a strain and it will help fill in for “living on a fixed income” I hope.

All this being said, living here is good and I enjoy it, I’ve met some nice folks and while it’s “different” as was moving to Slidell in ’65, Austin in ’85 etc., so like the old adage says, “life is 20% what happens to you and 80% what you do about it”.

Of course I often lament how much Chris would enjoy this and how I miss her, but that’s just a part of what brought Max and I here so you have to smile and move on past it.

I suppose if I could change one single thing it would be to own this place so I don’t have to think about moving next year, I’ve really become attached to this place and for now and foreseeable future? – it’s where I should be. Now, ask me next year and the answer might be completely different, but then that’s life, the older I get the more I realize how little my “plans” mean in the big picture of life.

Oh, and if I can add a wish for this next year, I’d like to see some friends and family down here for a visit.