There is a Guad!
By Dione Goyette 

My birthday came on the wrong day this year. It came yesterday, two days before the actual day I was born, but there was no mistaking that March 23 was my real birthday. Sometimes your life just feels so heavy with emotion-sometimes with good stuff and sometimes with bad. Yesterday was so heavy with the good kind that I could hardly catch my breath, and I realized that yesterday's moments were going to be my real birthday presents. I joked with my kids by saying, "I cried three times today and only one of them was from chopping onions!"

Two nights ago, I had the opportunity to give away one of my paintings to someone I have come to know over the past two years. He seemed to love the painting when he first saw it at a show I had last year, but we could never decide on the right price and so it became a wee joke between us. This week, we all had to say goodbye to him and his girlfriend, and so I took the opportunity to wrap the painting up and surprise him with it. He was beautifully stunned and thankful, and I was thrilled at how the exchange had taken place. If I had sold it to him last year, I would have missed out on this moment. Yesterday, I got an email from him with a short but very sincere thank you, and attached was a poem he had written. I felt this huge physical pang when I read it, and it was more of a thank you than I could ever have hoped for.

Another present came with such intensity I consider it divine intervention (truly). My husband and I were running in the early morning and freaking out at all the blossoming jacaranda trees. To me this tree is such a fantastically beautiful thing that it just dominates any view. Anyhow, on this morning we were running and talking about the small parcel of land we had bought in San Antonio, which contains a huge, broad tree that appears to be dead. We were discussing the best way to remove the tree when all of a sudden my husband turned and said, "What if it's a jacaranda?" Oh my gosh! It had never occurred to me. I was even planning on planting a jacaranda on the property so that it would have a few years to grow before we could afford to build anything there. We immediately changed our route and headed up the hill to the property. As we entered the privada and slowly made our way to our little blue door in the wall, the tree just took us by surprise-a jacaranda out in full-feathered bloom. The purpleness ove
rwhelmed us, and we gasped in joy (OK, I teared up a bit!). It was just so stunning, and I just knew at that moment there was a Guad!!

Another incident happened that day as a result of changed plans (welcome to Mexico!). I drove my son Jackson to his guitar lesson. We normally wait outside the gate of his teacher's house; the teacher usually arrives in a taxi from who-knows-where right as the lesson is about to begin. On this day, he was late, so Jax and I pulled out the guitar and slid open the van doors and took turns playing our songs and singing. We were staring up at the view of San Miguel on a beautiful day (what else?), sitting on the floor of our van and singing together. I didn't want his teacher to arrive, and when it was clear that he wasn't going to arrive we replaced the guitar in its case and decided to go to Oxxo to see whether we could find some Guadalupe car accessories to adorn our car (I love her and all she represents but also secretly wanted to buy a token to remember this day forever), but alas there was nada in the Guadalupe department, so we grabbed some drinks and drove to our property to see the jacaranda again. Jax 
was thrilled (and believe me, it's getting harder to thrill a 12-year-old!), and we took tons of pictures. I would have to say it was my favorite guitar lesson to date (sorry, David!).

As I write this it is March 24 and my birthday is tomorrow, but I can take it or leave it because I feel as though I am laden with presents already-although I am secretly hoping for a Sensual Chocolate or two. 


Dione Goyette is the mother of three and novia/esposa to one. She and her family currently live in San Miguel. She can be contacted at mexgoyettes@yahoo.com