You Make Beautiful Things, Part 2

Girasoles & the Sea of Cortez

When you swim in the ocean off the beaches in Cabo San Lucas you’re actually swimming in the Sea of Cortez. Swimming in warm, teal colored water is life changing. I realize this sounds melodramatic, and maybe it is, but my experience *was* life changing. The waters were rough and beautiful, warm and frightening. They were and are everything that life is, captured in nature. The fullness of life, which contains all things beautiful and yet horrific in the water. And when you float and swim and duck under the waves you feel everything that quite possibly was meant to be felt.

My children loved everything about the beach. The water, the sun, the sand. Holy moments occurred when I watched them run on the wet sand, leaving their delicious little footprints behind. Footprints that would never be that exact size again. Each moment and each print to be cherished for the moment of time they were in, for only brief seconds for we quickly continued moving forward in time, never to return to that particular holy moment again.

All around
Hope is springing up from this old ground
Out of chaos life is being found in You

Three mornings out of our week we had breakfast at a delicious restaurant called Girasoles de la Hacienda. The restaurant overlooks the ocean, it’s a peaceful atmosphere and the food is delicious. But what made our mornings most beautiful were the people of Girasoles: Daniel, Norman, Francisco, Deisy, Araceli, to name a few. There was truly a connection between our family and these amazing people.

The Mexican people in general were some of the most beautiful and gracious people I have ever met in my life. They were kind and friendly, they smiled and they were accommodating in ways that Americans never even dream of. The Mexican people I met smile a lot and that’s refreshing. They make eye contact with you when you pass and they say “Hola!” and “Buenos Dias!” They are humble, genuine and encouraging. (”It doesn’t matter that it’s only ten o’clock in the morning, David, have some tequila, it’s your birthday!”)

You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of the dust
You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of us

In my cynicism I wondered a time or two if our treatment was purely based on what US dollar someone may receive from this American. However, in my limited experience with humanity, I’ve learned that there are connections that cannot be explained, and that it was more important for me to trust this particular instinct instead of allowing my cynicism to prevail.

In the movie “Before Sunrise” the character Celine describes God as not someone or something inside of us, but as existing in “this little space in between” us. She says: “If there’s any kind of magic in this world it must be in the attempt of understanding someone sharing something.” Our times with our friends at Girasoles were at the very least magical, but much more likely Divine.

You make me new, You are making me new
You make me new, You are making me new
You are making me new

The day before we left I spent some time contemplating how fortunate we had been to broaden our horizons and embrace a new and different culture. It occurred to me that our experience was only one of many to be had. Our world is so huge and yet our personal worlds are often so small. How many more geographies, cultures, languages, and, most importantly, people are there for us to experience on this great Earth? Countless, I presume. I hope that this is only the beginning of that type of journey for the W5

You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of the dust
You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of us

Like most things in my life I feel as if God ordained each moment of my trip for me. Not only the beautiful moments, but also the busy, the stressful, the sick, the tense, and of course as equally the intimate, the peaceful, the silent, the rest. My husband Dave shared at our Thanksgiving meal how grateful he is to be able to embrace the fullness of life which includes both the beautiful and the ugly, the happy and the sad. He likes to explain that without both sides of each and every coin our life as we know is probably not full. I like to think our time in Mexico embodied Dave’s theory completely. And for that I am eternally grateful.

You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of us

PS As per the addition to my bucket list I downloaded an app for my iPhone called “Learn Spanish Quick”. Muy bueno!

(*) Lyrics “Beautiful Things” by Gungor. Watch their YouTube video below.

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You Make Beautiful Things

Our Mexican Thanksgiving Part 1

My end of the year reflections tend to start when the holidays start. The weather changes us from summer into fall and with the change, and awareness of holiday and the sacred, I contemplate my past year. The new year is coming soon after all. How can I embrace the new year without pondering where I’ve been in 2011?

All this pain
I wonder if I’ll ever find my way
I wonder if my life could really change at all(*)

Every five years the immediate side of my family takes a big vacation, all 10 of us together. In both 2001 & 2006 we vacationed in Hawaii. This year my mom made the suggestion we make a change and visit Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. It felt like the right time for change. Hawaii, incidentally, is at the same latitude on the globe as Cabo, so in terms of both warm weather and water temp we could expect pretty much the same climate. Both pretty darn close to paradise if you ask me.

So we scheduled our time away, packed up the kids and headed off for vacation during this past Thanksgiving week.

On the plane just before we landed I asked my sister what she hoped to accomplish on her trip. She shared a couple of deeply moving goals she had as she continues on her own personal journey. She asked me about my goals. Without missing a beat I answered: “Sit and stare.” Insert hilarious banter between Jerry (Seinfeld) & Elaine:

I spent a lot of time that week sitting and staring. Me and my thoughts. Long breaks from books, magazines, conversation and most importantly my phone and social media. To say it was glorious is an understatement.

All this earth
Could all that is lost ever be found
Could a garden come up from this ground at all

I’d visited Mexico only a handful of times prior to this trip, always youth mission trips to Ensenada or Tijuana (just a smidge south of San Diego), but nothing ever as south as the most southern point of Baja California. When you get off the plane (about a 1/2 hour from where we’d stay in Cabo, a short drive to the actual beach) you immediately see beautiful desert mountains. Just stepping off the plane I felt the welcomed rush of different scenery, culture and people and it made me instantly happy.

My mom is a second generation Mexican-American. Her maiden name was Vasquez and her maternal family are Lopez. Even though my mom was raised by a Spanish speaking mother she grew up in the 50s & 60s when (some) Mexican-American children weren’t taught the language of their parents. They were essentially encouraged to be “white”. Not to mention, my grandmother and her sisters gossiped in Spanish, they didn’t want the little kids to know what they were saying or who they were talking about. And so my mom never learned Spanish, which to this day makes her sad. And because she didn’t learn neither did my sisters nor I. Which I wasn’t that sad about…until Cabo.

In Cabo we quickly discovered everyone speaks Spanish (I know that sounds obvious, doesn’t it?). What I mean is they don’t necessarily cater to the American tourists and speak only English. No, in general they speak only Spanish. And you know what? Spanish is beautiful.

About 4 years of high school Spanish y yo puedo hablar un poco Espanol. I was able to speak a little bit of Spanish, but not much. After our week in Cabo I added learning this beautiful language to my bucket list. My sisters and I joke: “So we can speak to our people!” But in all seriousness, after spending a week in Mexico and being immersed in the language I was changed, awakened, and challenged.

You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of the dust
You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of us

(To be continued…)

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