Through the Looking Glass

Tremble

Patricio and I were stretched out on the couch, me with my feet pressed against his calves to keep the toes from cold, and we were drifting while a late-night Chilean war movie played on Channel 11. Friday morning had just begun only half an hour before. This is why, when sinuous electronic sirens sounded out beneath a voice repeating "seismic warning," we mused and then sleepily figured it a strange twist to the film. But the warning kept playing over the actors' voices, and we realized the earthquake was about to happen right here. Well, there, really. In the capital, where the shifting lake bed of a city rocks with the tremors sent in from the Pacific.

Up here, some twenty miles away on the foothills, in our sturdy brick one-story house, we sat up and waited, wondering if the shake would make it as far as our place. And it did, when we felt the room slip into an almost imperceptible dizzying sway. We'd have thought it was only imagined--a hoped-for effect--if our light bulbs and towels and other dangling things weren't left swinging back and forth until the momentum was finally lost. It was so quiet and brief. If we'd been fast asleep, it wouldn't have woken us.

And I thought to myself, "The wise man didn't build his house upon the rock in a strictly metaphorical sense."

Decemberist

Mornings seem so easy to fill, with drowsy attempts at keeping eyes open, stirring cinnamon and sugar into a white oatmeal bowl, reading a chapter from a book, re-reading a note from a friend, and turning on the day's music. Even now into the afternoon, The Decemberists are enjoying a strong, non-stop monopoly of sound in the house. After listening to their NPR live concert, I wasn't ready for Colin Meloy's voice to stop, and tapped into itunes for their songs I had waiting at the click of the mouse. It's the right kind of December day to be listening to the month's namesaked band. Some of their lyrics are eerie enough to send the skin a good goosebump or two, or perhaps an odd shiver of recognition, and shivering is undoubtedly what this month has been marked by.

I've written about the cold here in Mexico's high plains before, but that was the rainy season chill, and for someone attuned to the nuances of nippy temperatures, this decembery cold is quite another thing. It hovers inside our house in highs of sixty degrees. I bless the person who brought space-heaters into the Mexican market; we can, at least, keep one room at a time in a state of comfort above seventy.

Granted, this cold lacks the winds that will buffet a bare face in New York. The lack of it, keeping the smog over the city like a sinister sister cat of Carl Sandburg's "Fog," is a happy advantage to living within a valley. And though the outside temperatures don't often drop far below those thirty-two degrees, houses aren't much made for fooling the skin of its freezing force.

The majority having been built of concrete, brick or cinder block walls, insulation is merely a dream and central heating even less than that. And so many in the mountains to the north and to the west are constructed of materials even less able to keep the cold at bay. The weather may not be North Dakota cold, but holding off a thirty-five degree night with a small stove and a drafty set of walls is a yearly losing battle for the very young and the very old and the respiratory health of them both. Patricio and I are fortunate enough to have that small heater we can move from room to room, an electric blanket in the night, small luxuries of heat when our fingers begin to feel a bit like ice.

And these decemberist cold days have led us to ideas much less chilling, hoping for a day to come when Insulating Concrete Form (ICF) technology would arrive in full force here in the high Mexican plateau, inexpensively allowing residents to build strong homes that feel more cozy than cold when the calendar reads December. It's humanitarian architecture, something viable and desperately needed. And it's a tune I'm sure we'd all like to sing to.

talk about the weather

reports of extreme heat from germany, to england, to south korea, to my old borough of queens are stirring up a whole lot of my sympathy, but i confess it’s been difficult these past few days to imagine what it must feel like. in spite of my rain-soaked sockless episode yesterday afternoon, i’ve been covered from neck to toe for the past four days, fending off (sometimes in vain) the cold that’s been hanging around underneath the cloud-cover. the space heater even made an appearance yesterday evening, keeping my toes from turning into toecicles.

heaven knows i’m cold natured, and more so it seems as the birthdays continue to add up. those toes turn white with astonishing speed, and my favorite accessory to wear in the grocery store is always, always a jacket. but even patricio donned a decent sweater yesterday, and he never gets cold on a trip to the grocery store.

i had no good concept of what a “rainy season” might be, until now, since we’re in its midst. the season here in mexico city seems to span the six warmer months of the year. and i must say “warmer” with a sly little grin. the waters can come daily, for weeks at a time, cleaning the streets, washing trash into the rivers, flooding a few neighborhoods, and liberating us from any yard watering for a long, long time. and those rains seem to have a deal with the sun; letting it shine for most of the morning, but nipping it's ambitions of heat in the bud with a cooling, cloudy shower in late afternoon.

the showers are most often quite short, hard, and sweet. but this weekend's been an exception, with heavy clouds trying their best to steal the whole show. patricio and i were invited on saturday to attend an equestrian event this side of cuernavaca, in which a good law school friend of patricio's was signed up to ride and compete. the all-day, off-and-on drizzle never did decide to rain, leaving me shivering and white-toed at day's end, in the car with the heater on high. but the show still went to fabián and his beautiful white-gray horse, with green first place ribbons to rival the rain-soaked grass underneath our fabián fan club feet.

this weekend's exaggerated chilliness reminded me of a quote about new mexico and a popular misconception: if you think new mexico is all desert, go take a hike.

i know plenty of people who are surprised to know i've never watched fourth of july fireworks in my hometown without bundling up against the cold mountain weather. mexico city is so similar in that way; i count on questions about how i handle the heat, now that i live south of the border, and my answer always lays out how i handle the cold. the average high temperature for the month of july is 77 degrees farehnheit.

i may be a world away from the news-making heatwaves, and though power-demanding air-conditioning is a fairly rare find in homes and businesses here, i'm still able to hold solidarity with my former fellow residents of queens, since rain and power outages go so happily hand in hand here. it sure helps on the sympathy end, even if a bit of their heat would be a welcome guest in my little corner.