Hiking in Mexico City (?!?)

Arriving back in CDMX from my lonelier than expected stay in San Miguel De Allende, I was thrilled to hit the ground running again in the vibrance of the capital. On Saturday I received a text from my dear friend Bella, my Mexico City source of all things must-see and must-do. We have known each other since Kindergarten, and around a decade ago she pulled up her roots from Northern California and relocated to Colonia Tacubaya in CDMX where she runs her own creative shop and is generally chic as hell.

The text read: “Want to go hiking tomorrow? Bring pesos for the entrance fee and quesadillas.”

I asked zero questions. Every activity in life should involve quesadillas in my book, and combining them with outdoor exercise was a new and welcome integrative experience. We arranged to meet at her place in Tacubaya, dubbed TacuBella, obviously, the next morning at nine.

We took an Uber 30 minutes outside the city to Parque Los Dinamos, with Bella directing the driver to the second highest of the four levels serving as starting points for trekking. After our first trail took us on a meandering and mostly flat 60 minute stroll through a river and past a few cows, we decided to break for snacks.

Fortified by cerveza, tacos, quesadillas and gorditas, we headed back to the trails to explore the next tier of Los Dinamos. I could not get over the quiet, the waterfalls, the greenery, all a quick ride from one of the busiest sprawling metropolises the world has to offer. We dangled our feet in the icy water of the river, a balm to the heat of the day and sat on warm boulders, absorbing the warmth like lizards.

Maybe Parque Los Dinamos isn’t a hidden gem so much as a counterintuitive jewel, as most people don’t land in CDMX with the intention of lacing up their hiking boots. It was a unique experience that felt like a secret between me and the locals enjoying their Sunday taking a dip or wandering the cool paths.

What I read July through september

July, August and September, months of long awaited rich texts! Every season is the best season for reading, but there’s something about spending lazy afternoons with your legs slung over the arm of a cozy, overstuffed chair to escape the heat of the day that brings out strong notes of pleasure. Admittedly I planned to do monthly roundups with synopses but life got in the way, so I’ll just highlight the big winners and skippers.

Walk, don’t run:

• The God of the Woods by Liz Moore. When I think about books I rate 5 stars, the criteria is usually that they consume me completely until I turn the last page. This mystery spanning two timelines set in upstate New York fit that criteria to a tee. I was reaching for this book in any free minute I had and was mourning the inevitable approaching ending as I devoured it. I’ve loved Moore’s work since Heft, her debut, and admire how each of her subsequent novels has been a steady handed departure from the last.

• James by Percival Everett. If you’ve already heard of this book, you know that James captures the events of Huckleberry Finn as told by Jim, a slave. Beautifully written and reimagined.

Very, very good

• Margo’s Got Money Troubles by Rufi Thorpe. Margo’s money troubles stressed me out a little bit tbh, but I loved her mess to success story. Warmly drawn characters, particularly her second chance at a close relationship with her father, a former professional wrestler working through his addiction issues. Compulsively fun and readable while deftly balancing the complicated topics of money and power, sex work as legitimate work, family, custodial battles, and addiction.

So very, very bad:

• All the Colors of the Dark by Chris Whitaker. I yelled OH COME ON out loud multiple times reading this one. I don’t understand the good reviews.

Won’t get my non-existent vote for a Pulitzer but scratched a particular itch

• Funny Story by Emily Henry. I will read every new book she spits out, though the demanding annual publishing schedule of contemporary romance novels feels like it is impacting the quality of her last two. Still enjoyed them, but they were less swoony and sparkly.

June reading roundup

Usually when I am traveling solo I tear through books since I pass a lot of time reading at bars or in restaurants. The batch of books during my first month of nomading were a bit of a mixed bag. I started out with The Seven Year Slip, thinking the rom-com by Ashley Poston would give good escapism, vacay vibes. Not so much - there was a time travel element that was just not for me.

Next up was Piglet, by Lottie Hazell. I could not put this book down. The way I compulsively devoured it mirrored the outsized appetites of the titular protagonist of the novel. When I turned the last page I was dying for someone to discuss it with. If you have read it, let me know what you think!

Abby Jimenez is one of the current masters of the contemporary rom-com genre, and as soon as Just For The Summer was available to download, I smashed that buy button. My favorite thing about her books is how she weaves mental health struggles into her plots and characters. A lot of romance novels suffer from situational or weak conflict, but with Jimenez the stakes feel high and real.

I rounded out the month with The Barbarian Nurseries by Héctor Tobar, a novel that unfolds in the Southern California home of a white wealthy couple who are beginning to suffer the consequences of living outside their means. Their financial irresponsibility puts their longtime housekeeper, Araceli, in a compromised position. My takeaway on this one is that Tobar tried to do too much and it ultimately fell flat.

Heading into July, I am currently reading The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd and will report back in next month’s roundup.

Recommendations Corner: San Miguel De allende

Final verdict on San Miguel de Allende? I guess I’m glad I didn’t blindly buy property here after all. Maybe when I’m of retirement age I’ll feel differently, but for now it was just a little too sleepy of a small town for me.

These are the spots and experiences I most enjoyed during my three week stay:

The basil sour at Tostévere

Tostévere: Tiny space, reservations are recommended. Amazing cocktails, friendly staff. I ordered the tempura shrimp tacos and ahi tuna tostada. The basil sour cocktail was super refreshing.

Essential Massage and Watsu: A 90 minute deep tissue massage with Adriana for $1250 pesos ($68 dollars) was absolute heaven. I wish I had gone back to try the Watsu water based modality.

Café Umaran: I had coffee and breakfast here several times. Fantastic café de olla lattes, pastries, and savory breakfast options like enchiladas and chilaquiles for the egg hater in me.

Café de Olla latte at Café Umaran

Cien 24: Great café in San Antonio filled to the brim with expats both times I visited. Super affordable prices and generous portions.

Bocaciega: Chic Greek restaurant that provided a break from Mexican flavors when I needed one.

Tunki by Handshake: Terrace bar at the Belmond Hotel. Reservations are recommended. Great food and a beautiful spot to take in the sunset.

Fabrica La Aurora: I spent half a day wandering through the former textile mill, since converted into art galleries and shops. San Miguel is known for it’s vibrant art and music scene, and the Fabrica has something for everyone including antiques, art capturing the charm of the city, workshops, jewelry, textiles and more. With zero luggage space to work with, I bought this necklace designed by CDMX based designer, Lila Parrilla.

An artist’s studio space at Fábrica La Aurora

A piece by Lila Parrilla that my turquoise obsessed Granny would have loved

Hierba Santa Cocina Del Sur: I stopped by this adorable outdoor spot on my way to Fabrica La Aurora for breakfast and coffee. It’s tucked away into a little market with boutiques, an English bookstore, and other well-curated gems.

Tarot reading with Ximena: One hour reading, $999 pesos. Prior to my visit, I joined a Facebook group for people living in SMA and stumbled upon recommendations for Tarot readers. Ximena was warm, intuitive, and easy to relate to. She offers readings in English and Spanish.

Don Taco Tequila: I didn’t stop in until the end of my trip since the idea of vegan tacos didn’t appeal to me. Oh, how very, very wrong I was! Not only was the food delicious and the ambiance lively (hard to find during the week in the low season), but the guayaba and mint margarita was the best cocktail I had over the entire month in Mexico.

Mexico is gatekeeping their best limes (and avocados, tbh) and I don’t blame them one bit. The amount of juice you get out of one of these puppies is unbelievable.

The mint and guayaba mezcalita at Don Taco Tequila

The prettiest block in San Miguel de Allende

Is this it? Probably not, but after three days of food poisoning and rain that washed the entire city clean, I drank in the beauty of these doors and bougainvillea.

a tumbleweed blows through san miguel de allende

During the early months of the pandemic I started a Google Doc titled “Places We’ll Go If We Can Ever Go Anywhere Again”. We were still in the toilet paper hoarding, Clorox package wipe-down phase of lockdown where the initial stay at home and quarantine guidelines had stretched far longer than anticipated and hopelessness was setting in. Around this time my Instagram algorithm must have surfaced photos of San Miguel De Allende into my feed and I became obsessed. Suddenly, I was combing real estate listings and daydreaming myself into the painterly streets from my condo in Oakland.

I penciled SMA in as my first nomading stop and prepared to be wooed by the city.

Cut to the morning after my first night in my adorable rental: I have 31 mosquito bites. My adorable rental does not have AC and the 10 day forecast is a a copy/paste of 95 degree F days. I am teary eyed, pulling out my laptop preparing to sit and work in the saunalike conditions for the next 8 hours, wielding a flyswatter to slay mosquitos just out of frame of my fellow Zoom particpants.

Determined to make the best of it, as soon as my meetings wrapped for the day, I walked the ten minutes into town and opted for a bar known to attract expats, which seemed like a safe bet to start making friends. I walked into Hank’s, scanned the bar for empty seats, and grabbed a stool next to a man in his 80’s wearing a panama hat. When he hears I have just arrived in town, he invites me to dinner. I pat myself on the back for getting plugged into some sort of social community within 48 hours of arrival and images from The Holiday dance in my head.

The Holiday - Kate Winslet and Eli Wallach as Iris Simpkins and Arthur Abbott

After I accept his invitation, because hey, why not, new life phase, BE OPEN BAILEY, he begins telling me about how his doctors have told him he has the vitals of a 40 year old man and I realize that he does not share my vision of us as two mismatched buddies. I pay my tab and head out, a little concerned that this man plans to pick me up in his Jeep the following night at 6pm but that’s a tomorrow problem. I have his number and can just cancel, right?

Wrong. I try and text the following afternoon to beg off and every message is kicked back to me by ATT. The number must be a landline. Here’s where I know I could call, but I do not want to. I consult my friends and we agree that I don’t owe this guy anything. That’s how I end up ghosting an octogenarian.

Karma is nearly instant. A few hours later I am roving the streets trying to find somewhere to grab a mezcalita and dinner that isn’t a complete and total ghost town. After circling a bar a few times with music blasting and lots of people in the window, I decide to go in. I order a drink and bartender is giving me a funny look. Shrugging it off, I find a seat and wait for my cocktail. From my vantage point, I realize everyone looks young. Really, really young. The hostess materializes at my side and leans in. “This is actually a private party for a graduation. The bartender thought you were one of the moms.” She laughs, not realizing that she has just absolutely roasted my ego as a newly minted 40 year old. “You can take your drink to this other room, ok?” I watch as they rope off the entrance, which SHOULD HAVE BEEN DONE ALL ALONG. Or perhaps a sign?

It was definitely more of a slow burn than love at first sight in San Miguel.

putting it all in storage

Last July I was playing with my niece and nephew at my brother’s house, trying to distract myself while waiting for my phone to ring. My 12.5 year old dog, Skylar was 15 miles away having an MRI on her brain. After months of increasingly strange behavior and new habits (getting stuck in corners, waking up throughout the night to bark at me, doing loops in the house, having accidents on furniture) that my regular vet had chalked up to old age, my gut kept pushing me to find better answers and so I had made an appointment with one of two veterinary neurologists in Northern California, who happened to be in spitting distance to where I grew up.

Earlier that morning Dr. Westworth had observed her a short period of time before my mom and I joined him in the treatment room. He asked me what I thought was going on, and I had said that she seemed confused and was worried she had canine dementia. That was the the bottom of his list of suspected root causes, but he said an MRI and spinal tap if the imaging didn’t turn anything up would give us answers. One we had answers, we would know how to help her. No more googling symptoms or behaviors trying to puzzle together what was going on. After signing her treatment plan and swiping my credit card on a very large deposit (human MRIs are expensive, a dog’s will make your eyes water - thank god for pet insurance), I felt a sense of relief that we BOTH were getting the help we needed.

My phone finally rings. Sky is waking up from the anesthesia, Dr. Westworth tells me, and her vitals are good. I wait. He tells me they didn’t have to do a spinal tap, that she has a large mass in the frontal lobe of her brain. Can I be back there in 30 minutes to pick her up and look at the images?

Back in the observation room, he explains that without a biopsy of the tumor, that there is no way of knowing whether it is a glioma (very very bad, “of the brain”) or a meningioma (bad, but between the brain and skull, therefore more easily operable). A biopsy of the brain is effectively surgery of the brain, and he explains that if she were to pull through, it would maybe give us a few more months. Months of a dog not understanding why she is being put through pain. That was a no for me, which I intellectually know was the right choice, but still sometimes torture myself wondering if I should have at least tried. They sent us on our way with steroids and pain meds, and a plan to keep her as comfortable as possible for her final weeks or months.

I started this post thinking I’d talk about how travel as a fight or flight response has always been my ‘push button in case of emergency’ reaction. After a breakup in high school, before I had really been anywhere other than a resort in Mexico, I self-soothed with a visit to the library, checking out travel guides for Italy and France to mentally transport myself to a richer frame of existence than being seventeen and devoid of agency.

Absorbing the news of a prognosis that set a timer on when my heart would be broken by the loss of my best friend, the constant in my life, I knew that when the time came I would need to get the fuck out of town.

This dog was the love of my life: an intuitive, perfect creature in a world of disconnection. Relationships are tricky for me, and she gave me the security of unconditional love. Should a dog hold so much space in a person’s heart? In her absence, it feels like the answer is no, but she was so safe to give and receive love to, and I don’t regret a second I chose to sit with her for company on a Friday night.

So, six months after I lost her and was strong enough again to choose things again, I put all my stuff in storage. First stop, Mexico.