"Lord, how the day passes! It's like a life - so quickly when we don't watch it and so slowly if we do." ~ Steinbeck
Just a hint of things to come.
Spent the weekend back in NC, listening to Mexican ESL students discuss the relative merits of Big Macs and the Dream Act. Rose at 5 a.m. Saturday to enter a panaderia kitchen cloud, eau de pasteles. Between batches of pink, chocolate and creme-crusted cakes, resident cooks Jose and Pepe mocked me for kneeling to get a better shot with the digital camera, then traipsing around with flour-covered knees. Both Veracruz natives, they could not understand why I would pass up the opportunity to spend carnaval in their hometowns.
I am reminded of the person who told me that I had the chance to go anywhere in the world during this fellowship and I picked my backyard. I might have agreed before I went to Florida and North Carolina. Mexico colored everywhere that I reported, and I longed for the time to pay attention. We have the fantastic power as writers to slow life down, to taste sugar suspended mid-air.
I leave on Saturday for the great adventure. I will be in Mexico for six weeks on a Pew Fellowship. I've been writing for The News & Observer and before that for The Palm Beach Post