What a beast of a cold. Or flu. Or covid. Or whatever nonsense that was.
Parts still linger, I’m a bit congested. I tried running and almost immediately began coughing. My throat was painfully sore most of this week.
I had to text you cause NW Natural billed our joint account.
What if you were the love of my life. What if I never love someone again like I did you.
I don’t know why this feels so pervasive. I don’t even believe in these concepts, or rather not that way. I don’t believe in one love of my life. I don’t believe I will love someone the same way, but that doesn’t mean I’d love less. But I’m still at this point where I actually can’t imagine loving someone. Part of me wants to force it, leaning into the whole “the best way to get over someone is to get under someone else” mentality, just to even give myself the imagination of another relationship. I almost feel like I’ve done all I can on my own and it does not appear to be working. I miss you every day.
And it continues to feel so ironic that I’m more like you than I’ve ever been. Things feel overwhelming, I don’t wake up bright eyed and bushy tailed, I find more joy in exercise and less in work than ever before. You told me I wasn’t happy, but fuck were you wrong, this is unhappy. This state of numbness. Living off mini thrills and adventures in place of a life.
The thrill this week? A shit ton of plane tickets. Turns out my fancy travel card is bumping the annual fee about $300 bucks, dropping one of my favorite benefits (1.5x points redemption) and adding in some I won’t use, like hotel credits. So I now have to use all these miles I’ve racked up.
I have also done some very basic be alive things like tidied my house, put away the excess pillows and blankets on the couch, relocated the tissue box and cold medicine back to the bathroom and ate a vegetable. I made soup and cuddled with this cutie. I also started watching Mad Men.
In complete 180, I am finally feeling better this Thurdsay and I am a little aflutter. That’s maybe not the right word, I feel a kind of warmness from this long distance flirtation of mine, maybe giddy? Antes got upped a little, but in such a peaceful, playful, and soothing way. So much of the last year and a half seems like life on pause. This offers a path to imagining a life, feeling alive, again. And yes, the feminist in me is horrified. Seems like a good time for a cry. I googled ‘why do I cry when I’m happy’ and this is the explanation I like best. “Healing & Release: If you’ve experienced hardship, happiness can bring tears as you process past pain or feel the sheer relief and beauty of the present moment, a sign of healing.” I recognize that experience, I remember feeling it walking one relatively quiet morning through Parque Mexico in the way the light filtered through the trees and flora, in the trust Leo has in me, and in some art work I’ve found here. I like this interpretation, like it’s a different kind of letting go to find joy in a life without you, and sometimes it’s sad, cause you were my person for a long time and I’m still adapting to not sharing things with you. But I am seeing new possibility and while it may sometimes bring forth a sort of bittersweetness, I think this is progress.
My body still apparently needed recovery cause I missed my hike this weekend which I was really bummed about since it was to take me to Refugio de los Cien on Iztaccihuatl which would’ve been the highest I’ve ever been. Liz, my darling friend and fearless leader, has promised we’ll go before my birthday and to load Sundays with excellent hikes since I will be in school on Saturdays the upcoming semester.
I am now quasi in hiding. Turns out my HR manager is in Mexico City this week. And is staying in my neighborhood. Plus side- I am well known in my agency for many Mexican treks and was therefore asked for recommendations, so I at least I know he’s here. I wore sunglasses inside a store. A plus side of this is that I am more inclined to explore further off the beaten path.
Accordingly, Sunday I went to El Museo el Chopo in colonia Santa Maria la Ribera. I’ve decided I’m safe wandering into the non touristy hoods. It’s a contemporary art musuem that is part of UNAM, despite being situated far, far away from the main campus and while not nearly as gothic in appearance as its website would suggest, it is still a bit of an architectural marvel.
It’s an immense and light filled space with very little direction. The description on social media is
“A social center disguised as a museum
Exhibitions | Live Arts | Music | Fanzine | Disobedient Archive | Free Workshops | Bookstore | Café”
This feels apt.
The first floor was mostly open space, with a few pieces, including a massive wall of x rays. Some of the floor appeared to be undergoing a remodel, downstairs appears to be movie and music venues, nothing currently going on. The second floor is being staged for an exhibition and also featured an open sitting area. And then third floor, where Elyla’s exhibit “Elyla. Corpordivinidades.” is on display.
This was a really striking and powerful exhibit. Elyla is a Nicaraguan queer performance artist and activist. I don’t really know how to describe it. It wasn’t a big space. There was sculpture, movies, incredible photographs and costume. It has a deep sense of place and culture, but imagined in new way. It’s provoking, at times, disturbing. El Gueguense is a signature piece of Nicaraguan satire and folklore, ridiculing greed and moral corruption and exploring the relations between the colonists, the mestizos and the indigenous populations of Nicaragua. The play features dance, masks & music and has been passed down through oral tradition for centuries before finally being transcribed 1942. One mask in particular rose to become a symbol of the Sandinista movement. Commonly made of mesh, it’s a pale European face. The mask is pinned to one’s face, yes pinned, through flesh, to stay in place. In one video, Elyla painfally slowly unpins the mask to reveal their face, blood trickling down from where the pins were. They crumple the mask, chew it, and spit it out.
These are two photographs that are shocking in their clarity, color, and resemblance to paintings. Like the rest of Elyla’s work, they feature strong elements of tradition, of culture, contrasted with gender fluidity and sexuality. The work feels deeply intimate, both patient and pushy, and I’m not doing it justice. For more on Elyla, click!
I walked back home, felt good to get some movement in on this maybe 3 mile walk.
Tacos of the Week: Estacion Suadero
This week I was down in Condesa and Fran & Gus recommended this place a short walk from Fran’s apartment. The design is meant to look like a subway and for all that it’s pretty kitschy, they had some solid tacos.
I tried a campechano, cause I always do, and a suadero, cause well it’s in their name. Suadero is an interesting thing here being sometimes freakin’ awful and sometimes delightful and rarely recognizable for me. It’s a cut of meat we don’t really do in the US from between the belly and hind leg of a cow. It’s extremely fatty and is slow cooked in its own fat (ala confit), which is delectable when well done, but also means done poorly, it’s both greasy & chewy. This one was a bit shreddy and crisped. While I would never have identified it as suadero, it was quite tasty,
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