Of course, I was homesick. And, on top of that, I had not ever felt like I knew for sure that moving to Mexico was the right thing to do nor was it the right time to do it. It is perfectly natural to miss friends and family and I know I’m not the first person to move to a foreign country and wonder what the hell I had done.

Rebecca had asked me to come early so that she could personally hand off the keys, talk to me about the house and utilities and so we had some time to get to know one another a little. She was going to leave the day after I arrived, which would have made it the 28th of April. Hannah, and at least Nori, was going to come with me, spend a couple of weeks, help me get settled and have some time to enjoy the beach. With Rebecca leaving, that would have been perfect. She had packed up some of her belongings that were still in the house and they were stored in the second floor bedroom, named the Frida Kahlo room. The next day, Hannah and Enora would have the room.

Rebecca had an arrangement with the previous tenant to stay in the house during high season. She has a business selling these amazing dolls that she and women in prison make by hand. Now, the Rebecca Roth story is a long story and I will tell it, but not now, but be assured, you will be mad, sad and shaken by it. The markets are very active here during the fall through spring. I had already discussed with her that I expected visitors during the high season and my agreement with her as a tenant was not to share the house with her, so she would not be staying here. She would look for other lodgings  when she came back. For now, she was moving to a small town near Guadalajara where she spends the summers.

When I arrived, Rebecca informed me that she wouldn’t be leaving until Friday. This wasn’t a bad revelation since Hannah had decided that it would be just too expensive to come, especially now that her expenses for the house would be tripling since she would have no roommates to share them. I was feeling very bad about her predicament but I also thought that she, within two months, would have affordable housing for her and the kids. I made arrangements to pay half the rent on the house for two months so that she could afford to stay there for at least that long. I felt some relief but this was weighing heavy on my heart and mind.

So, Rebecca and I spent the days changing the electricity into my name, going to Costco and to Mega, a Fred Myer type store and running errands as she tied up loose ends. I spent $60.00 at Mega buying things for the kitchen and about $276.00 at Costco on gin and tonic, vodka, wine, and three shade sails for the roof, toilet paper, laundry soap, a nice roast of beef and such. We were hoping that the shade sails would help to keep the house cooler and make the roof a cool hangout. That was a lot more than I had planned to spend, but it wasn’t more than I had brought with me. I wanted to be comfortable and feel at home and there’s something about having some liquor around to share that did that.

Rebecca cooked the beef and the tuna. She is a fabulous cook and knew just what to do to make special meals with not much work . We ate only at home and had thinly sliced rare roast to eat with horseradish and tuna medallions to eat with salad and whatever for the days before she left. Finally, on Thursday, knowing that she was leaving, she started to gather things out of the kitchen to put into bags. Rebecca is an extraordinary woman. I felt immediately like I was with a sister. I came to love her in these short days together. Rebecca read to me from her published anthology of poems. We watched Gravity, we talked and we talked and I learned more of her incredible story. My life was enriched by spending time with her.

I was grateful that Rebecca was not leaving until Friday. I wanted to know more about her and what about her journey made her so tough. Her son, with his Mexican girlfriend and her two sons were coming to pack up two cars and drive the six hours to Lake Chapala with no AC, just as the weather was beginning to heat up. Thursday, as I said, she started to move things out of the kitchen in earnest and to actually put things in garbage bags that were, to my eye, in total chaos in the bedroom. To my relief, she was leaving more in the kitchen than I thought and there was no need for me to fully furnish it.

By this point, I was getting tired of just sitting around, so I decided to clean. The kitchen was not bad but not good either. Rebecca had a cleaning woman, Lupe, but I knew once I got into the shelves and counters and floors that I would not be engaging Lupe as my cleaning woman. I found a lot that Rebecca needed to pack and I pulled everything out of the shelves and tore that place apart. After a full day of cleaning, I was finally satisfied. There are enough cleaning supplies in the house for a couple of years.

After a lovely dinner and more conversation, I went to bed, knowing that Rebecca would be leaving the next morning and the house would be mine and I would be on my own in this entirely Mexican neighborhood in a city I had never wanted to move to in the first place.

I was still on Portland time. I didn’t wake until after 9:30 Friday morning. I came downstairs and the living room was not navigable. Everything that Rebecca was taking was on the floor. Her son was late and it was going to be a wonder: #1 if everything would fit into two cars with 5 people and their luggage; #2 that they would actually be able to get out of here before noon. Rebecca wanted to leave in the early morning. It wasn’t going to happen. She was cooking potatoes and beef to feed the family while she and her son bickered about how to pack the cars. I curled up in the corner of the couch to stay out of their way. I was hungry but I wasn’t going to try to get to the kitchen… not even for coffee.

Miracles do happen. They filled the cars to their over-full capacity. Everyone but the drivers were sitting on something with their feet propped straight out. While Rebecca and her son fought about where the antifreeze and extra oil would fit, the two old Chihuahuas, Obi Juan and Don Juan, looked about furtively from their perches. I wondered how everyone, including these cars would fare on the long, hot drive.

I stood on the sidewalk knowing that I would miss Rebecca and the dogs (though they pooped and peed all over my bedroom). As they started the engines, a woman walked by saying “Red Alert”. I had no idea what this meant. But later, I found out that while we were busy, members of the New Generation drug cartel were busy both in Vallarta and Guadalajara, burning gas stations, breaking into banks and setting cars on fire as we spoke. People were killed but no tourists or locals, just the military, police and members of the gang.

Off they went, leaving me standing there to go into the house on my own. It was hot; I was sweating as I had been since I stepped off the plane at PVR and as I have been since. I knew nothing about anything, not how to catch the bus, get what I needed nor how to make myself happy and content, I do know Spanish, thank goodness. Little did I know that Vallarta was on fire.

From here, things got strange and very fast.