The art box

and getting over yourself

So when I first got dropped off here I had little else to do but sit on the porch of that beach house and stare at the ocean. It turned out a nice view wasn't enough to make me appreciate walking away from a car accident. 

How many days can I stare at this flat ocean? I said to no one. I walked on the shore morning and night, the lyric in hundreds of love songs and bad personal ads.  The sand is more wet shells and tiny pebbles here and can get quite deep and the tide comes WAY in and goes WAY out faster than this suburban Florida girl was familiar with. It smells like fuel from the trucks pulling the boats back in and salty fish guts. There were tiny shark heads everywhere. Why? 

Those created 'beach towns' with flat powdery white imported sand that is 2 blocks wide for towel sitting tourists isn't actually how a coastline works. An industrial coastline even less friendly. A Mexican coastline that is mostly abandoned has nothing.

The further I walked East, the more dogs I found. Dogs like to walk in groups. I felt like the pied piper. Brady was slow because she had an injury and is old, but she still ambled along, River was her usual bouncy self if maybe a little traumatized. She was newly spayed and still had stitches. Two months into her new home with this weird lady in the van that was no more, escaping a crash and into the desert for days...and now fun time on the beach! But with everyone limping and now there are a million dogs we don't know and a lot of them dead on the beach. But no people for miles and miles which is nice but also apocalyptic. Also it's surface of Mars hot in the Sonoran Desert. It is August 2021.

I started picking up plastic bags and stuffing them with litter but soon realized I had no place to put them so I found construction sites (everything is a half finished block house, likely built when money comes in or just abandoned) with bigger bags left over from concrete mixing and started dragging those along the shore. Then I started collecting all these amazing shells and smooth rocks and cool pieces of driftwood shaped like dancing fairies. What a treasure trove! Soon I had a backpack, a fanny pack, plastic bags, my camera/phone, the construction bags and like 16 dogs on a morning stroll.

 

Can't you just go for a walk on the beach? Must you bring excavation gear? Surely this isn't what all those love songs are talking about. 

If you like Pina Coladas, getting caught in the rain, picking up 50# of plastic trash, broken beer bottles, finding dead dogs and watching pelicans occasionally near  the dunes on the cape... I definitely won't be making love after midnight (sandflies/cartel) Come to me and help me escape.

I walked and waited for 8 weeks to hear from the Mexican Insurance company to tell me they couldn't repair the van, I needed to get it towed outta here and junk it back in the US. (I didn't do that, I sold it for parts)  and then more weeks I waited for the $5000 minus $1000 because it was a total loss. Huh? That's the market rate for a 2004 Toyota minivan. I was hell bent on not driving a new fancy rig alone across Mexico, surely a great way to get gone, but the prudent car when disaster strikes doesn't net much profit. But it did save my life, so no shade to the older Toyota Sienna. It's funny what we do to prepare and Be Safe. Just live your life. (sidenote American insurance covered nothing)

The balance of my days was spent trying to hang sheets over the windows to cut down on the hellish glare from the sun. Biggest trick was doing so without tools or a ladder.  I finally found some little kid to stand on the windowsill and hook it over a rock and resorted to stacking pallets on top of the sofa on the other side. I am not one of the Life’s a Beach clan. So overrated.

I started using all the fishing line I found everywhere to string the mountain of shells I had collected into mobiles. The rest of the time I was pulling ticks and finding 5 liter water jugs to cut up for bowls for dozens of stray dogs who passed by. No one speaks English, even poquito, here. My Spanish is fine but Sonora has a different dialect. Or five. I only speak Dog.

Howdy ma'am.  It's 100+ out here in the desert, you'd be surprised how hard it is to find water. Can I ask a favor since you have thumbs? Can you pull this grape sized tick off my eyelid so I can see? Gracias. 

The clanking shells were 'beachy' sounding and I couldn't help think how much they'd sell for in some Shabby Chic boutique in Dunedin near the pier. $35? If only there was mail service! I started giving them away to neighbors and people who showed me any kindness at all. I thought they'd be delighted but I think they thought I was childish and maybe suffering a head injury from the wreck. 

Ohhhh, que bonita. Gracias. 

Most houses here are built of pallet wood or unsealed unpainted block. No one even has a chair. Some don't have doors or windows. They are miles away from Seaside Decor and Adornment. Upcycling is a rich person's game. I’m feeling awkward. Most folks work in the fishing trade and have stabbed themselves in the hand with a knife digging out caracols and scallops and have discarded the shells in mountains of trash. 

Along comes this gringa with our leftover fishing line and some rusted rebar wire stringing those stupid shells together and giving it back to us as "art". 

This morning I found a plastic crate with a bunch of shells I've been hoarding to go on another “creative” bender. It's been well over two years since I've picked up a shell or strung anything but a clothesline. I'm 5 blocks from the shore now (for economy) and most days it's hard to feel beachy. I walk down there with the dogs sometimes but it's a commitment. Proper footwear and the knowledge that we'll pass 40 perros sin duenos on the road keeps me walking on surface streets most days. I have to keep River on a lead because she'll roll in fish guts from the exit pipe at the packing plant. It can be a tangled mess of twisted leashes to get down and back. It's not like normal dog walking and training. Too many variables. 

I giggle at my “awesome shell” collection. They are literally everywhere and tossed out with the trash with baby diapers and beer bottles. I toss them out in the back yard under a tree. Do you know how hard it is to find a plastic crate without holes in it around here?