Housesitting and Home and Dogs

Winter California hiking

 

The first half of 2024 has been a mix of housesitting and staying home at our casita. At home, Dave loves to garden, I like to hill hike, we enjoy being close to the beach, and we like our community. So why not stay put? Because we like exploring. And we like living many different lives.

California coyote

In January we housesat in California, in a home I first stepped my size-10 foot in more than 30 years ago. It belonged to Gabriele Rico, my other-mother and mentor, whom I've written about in Call It Wonder. She died a decade ago, and the last time I stood in her house was for her celebration of life. 

Bath with a view in Cupertino.

Her former husband asked Dave and me if we'd come care for the home for five weeks--a book-and-art studded place in the Cupertino hills. All we had to do was feed the koi and haul the garbage cans to the bottom of the driveway once a week. He sweetened the deal by letting us use his car. It's always good to see friends and to nestle into the familiarity of the area (until the reality of traffic and prices hit).

Happy to get some Stacey time.

And some Sally & Kelly time...on the deck of the house.

Much of the home is the way it had been when Gabriele lived there, including her office. She taught me so much about writing, and she helped my creative soul come alive. I pulled off the shelf several books I'd given her over the years, including the first literary magazine that published my poetry. As I sat at her desk, I could feel her energy as I worked on planning for my forthcoming writing retreat. 

Fast-forward a few months to that, back in Mexico:

Revolutionary Writers!

Seventeen revolutionary women gathered in Baja Sur for Angela Yarber's and my Reimagining Writing retreat, where we wrote, beach walked, swam, got massages, rode horses, did yoga, ate incredible food, played music, experienced the eclipse and a sound bath--and most importantly, created a community of writers we will never forget. This retreat had been in the making for a year--and it surpassed my dreams in quality, heart, and intensity. Afterward, I slept three 10-hour nights!

Dave, Miles & Jude 

At home, we got some magical hang-out time with our friends Jude, Melissa, and their son Miles who visited Todos Santos. We enjoyed our regular lives of cooking, reading, and yoga--and I borrowed my friends' dogs for walks. 

walking with Sierra

walking with Deva

Whenever we're gone I especially miss Zumba. The Todos Santos class makes me feel like a teenager dancing in the chorus of the spring musical. The whole thing is so positive and uplifting.

I'm in the back in pink, flashing a peace sign.

Even though I love to  move my body, I discovered my cholesterol had soared. So I cut off the half-and-half that had slipped back into my mornings and finally and happily quit alcohol for good (that one's been coming on for 9 years). I also began eating oatmeal with flax and fruit every morning, dates for dessert, and cut back on portions. In just over two months, my cholesterol dropped 100 points! Eating this way makes me feel great, so that's my motivation now.

Another housesit opportunity came along: two weeks at a big house with a pool and jacuzzi and darling dog named Ollie, an hour south of us in Cabo. 

It was nice to have our own pool and jacuzzi for a couple of weeks.

The owner said we could have a friend come stay. So we got to celebrate Dave's birthday with one of his best friends, Craig.

Dave and Craig in Cabo.

with Craig in San Jose del Cabo for a taco feast

Also, lucky us, one of my BFFs Nancy, with her husband Andy, happened to be in Cabo for the weekend--and they took us to a local soccer (futbol) game. The stands were packed and when Los Cabos United won, the celebration began with people drumming and singing and dancing. I loved seeing this side of Mexico.

Futbol in our new jerseys!

The Cabo homeowner asked us if we could come back in June for a few days. I was tempted since I'd fallen head-over-paws in love with Ollie, who followed me around like he loved me just as much.

Ollie  with me, the jacuzzi, and the mermaid.

But I wanted to suck up every moment at home until we leave in early July (more on that in a moment). So here's a first: she's bringing him to me for a few days in June. I can't wait to take him on my hikes and beach walks.

I'm realizing there are lots of DOGS in this entry. I casually said to Dave the other day that I might be ready soon to get our own dog. He looked at me cross-eyed, trying to register that I said this on the eve of our leaving to travel for 8 months. Would I really want to leave my own dog for that long, even if it was with loving sitters like us?

Hm...okay, maybe I was jumping the pistola. Who knows how I'll feel when we return after traveling to:

England

Wales

Portugal 

Paris

Spain

Cape Verde

Brazil

Argentina

Peru

Colombia

and ?

Our itinerary isn't completely set, but we know this will involve housesits, rentals, visiting friends, flights, trains, a rental car, and at least one boat.

A nice couple with, yes, a dog, will be in our home during that time. Why won't that be us? Because over a decade ago we decided we wanted to see the world. And we're not done yet.

*

PS: I've been talking about nomadding and housesitting on podcasts lately. Check these out:

Casa sweet casa

The road to home.

It's strange that we own a house. How did this happen? Last I checked we were living on the road, homeless by choice.

Oh yeah, we bought a casita sight unseen over a year ago. A house in Mexico, in a part of Baja neither one of us had been to. It's a long story...but we were running on pure instinct.

In November when we landed here, I wondered if our success jumping off cliffs had run its course. I was totally overwhelmed by our empty place. We had to make it livable...in a country where we barely spoke the language. The first few nights we slept on a leaky air mattress on the cement floor.

I know a lot of people have a blast flipping houses, decorating, remodeling, landscaping, shopping. That stuff isn't really my bag. The kinds of projects I like usually involve words, like writing and editing books. Or exploration, like traveling to India and Sri Lanka.

It's funny how I've done some pretty major things in my life, such as retiring early and undergoing brain surgery, but the idea of tackling an empty house in a foreign country freaked me out. The place didn't even have cabinets, just empty spaces below the counters.

New cabinets.

And now, three months later, that emptiness is a hazy memory. Today the workers finished our cabinets. Our place is fully furnished, including a day bed on the roof. It's beautiful. My vision of creating "uncluttered color" has come to pass.

How did we do it? First, I had to get my head right. I consciously decided to enjoy the process, to be thankful for our fortune, to enjoy the beauty of the area--even if that meant gazing through the windshield at the turquoise sea as we drove to the store.

Finally some landscaping around the outdoor shower.

We shopped primarily in Todos Santos (10 minutes away) and Cabo (an hour away). We'd go out with a long list and come back exhausted, with just two or three items marked off. I used Google translate to look up key words before we ventured out, tucking the notes into my purse. My sister and our new friends helped us out, suggesting places to go, making referrals, and giving us stuff (an electric kettle, a slow cooker). Our friends from L.A. brought a suitcase full of things we had a hard time finding here. We got plants from a nursery down the road; others were pulled out the desert ground.

Day bed

A few things--like a BBQ and day bed for our roof--we ordered online and sent to a warehouse in San Diego to be trucked down. After trying to sleep on a pillow-top Mexican queen mattress (which is six inches shorter than an American queen), we broke down and bought a Temperpedic knock-off and had that delivered. If we've learned one thing, get a good night's sleep.

It all happened little by little, poco a poco. And now, it's done. Well, as done as a house ever is. There are always tweaks, things to move, things to discard, things to add.

Making our house a home has provided me with another reminder to trust the process. Did I really need another reminder? Apparently so.

Grilling on the new bbq!

 

Home is Here

Mark and Dave biking in Zion.

Last night as we sat under the stars in Zion, a friend asked:

"What's it like to live without a house? When I'm on a trip, I love traveling, but I always reach a point where I look forward to going home. Then I enjoy being back in my familiar surroundings, involved in my rituals."

I turned to Dave, curious how he'd answer. He talked about the mindset of living on the road. We didn't leave with the expectation that we'd return. So it's about being at home wherever we are.

In our year on the road, whenever I feel that yearning for "home," I get curious about it. What, exactly, am I wanting? A sense of peace, perhaps. So I can provide that to myself wherever we are--by getting still, by breathing, by feeling my body from the inside out. That might involve sprawling on the couch, listening to music, taking a mindful walk, meditating--or eating popcorn! It's up to me to soothe myself. It's up to me to, as Dave said, be at home wherever I am.

Hanging out with friends old and new in the Virgin River.

It also means embracing life as a journey. We aren't on vacation. We aren't driven to see and experience all the highlights of wherever we are. We enjoy our surroundings best by exploring new places without worrying about "missing something"--and we balance activity with downtime. The journey is the point.

Right now we are in Zion, Utah in a house with almost twenty people spread over three generations. Mark, a longtime friend of Dave's, leased a place for a week and invited us. He said there might be some others--but we hadn't realized we were walking into the open arms of a family reunion! I feel like we are at camp. In just three days, we've bonded with this awesome group by exploring the amazing national park, cooking, and talking and laughing for hours. Last night was a big dance party late into the night. We cleared the living room of furniture, and Mark--who's a DJ--played the music, complete with laser lights!

Once again, connections with people and nature have become central to our lives.

Before coming to Zion, we spent some time in the L.A. area with friends.

Huck Finn Bluegrass Jubilee

 

With Jude, Melissa and Reggie

With Ricardo, Dave's friend since the 1980s--and Cecelia and Charlie

Paul and the boys

All this socializing was punctuated by some time with just the two of us in Big Bear. We rented a great cabin on Airbnb.

I'd never before been on a ski lift in the summer, but we took it up, with our bikes dangling on the chair in front of us.

Then we rode down the mountain!

(and sometimes walked )

We also visited the Big Bear Alpine Zoo, which rescues and rehabilitates wild animals. It was incredible to be so close to a grizzly...

and a mountain lion.

We also stopped in Sedona for a few days, where we stayed at another Airbnb place and hiked to the four reputed vortexes.
 

They are beautiful spots. But I didn't feel more "vortexy" there. Just another reminder that spiritual energy--like home--is there for you whenever you want it.

What I Learned This Epic Year

Swimmable water in Cerritos Beach, Baja California Sur

Breathe in the precious moments and love fiercely.

This has become my mantra during an epic year--a year in which I stared down life and death.

It was a year that reminded me how way leads onto way. How everything is a catalyst. How what we focus on blossoms. How it's not about what happens--but what we think about (and do with) what happens.

Funny how I thought retiring after spending my whole life in schools would be 2013's "big event." But then my mentor, friend and "other mother" died. I was blessed to witness her profoundly graceful transition.

And then months later--when I myself was perched on the edge of dying during my seizure--she visited me. She told me that the veil between this world and the next is thinner than we think. She said if we look closely, we can penetrate the mystery's deepest beauty. She said never to be afraid of death. There's nothing to fear. Even from the next realm, she continued to teach me.

Even though I've been witness to the death of many beloveds--including my parents--the thought of my own death seemed theoretical. But 2013 brought me this gift: a deep, bodily knowledge that I'm transitory in this form. That everything changes. That I will die.

So what to do with this gift? Breathe in the precious moments and love fiercely! I was already on this path in August when my brain tumor was discovered. Months before, Dave and I had packed up everything we owned and traveled to Australia, Southern California, Boston, Cape Cod.

And then the experience of brain surgery and healing--enveloped in vast love and support from family and friends--intensified my desire to live my most authentic life. I launched Operation: Seize the Day!

Living your truth is not for wimps. It involves taking risks: emotionally, physically, financially. It involves being comfortable with spontaneity, with unknowing.

It requires loosing the moorings. When I let go of my job, my house, my neighborhood, my town--indeed, my identity as a Santa Cruzian writing professor--I plunged into a free-float.

I decided to embrace the fertile void.

I decided to reside in a rich space of unknowing.

In this space, I watched my monkey mind. It scrambled around like a kid desperate for a parent's attention: Hey! What are you doing? You're no longer a teacher, you're not a parent, you're not anything! What are you contributing? Aren't you being aimless and irresponsible?

When that happened, I'd gently turn toward my larger self, the sky mind, the god-voice in me who is always deeply present when I open my heart. It always says:  No need to worry, no need to fear. You're valuable, just like everyone else, because you exist. And the more you're YOU, living your truth, the more you inspire. Don't set out to have an effect--just be it. Trust that the fertile void will reveal your answers.

Because we no longer had a house, I was curious what my experience with "home" would be. My deepest realization so far: my home for this lifetime is my body. If I want to be truly alive, I must unconditionally love this marvelous, self-healing spacesuit.

Especially after having my skull cracked open and resealed with glue and staples, I can feel myself reaching new levels of bodily appreciation. While I don't have this love-thy-body-thing totally in the bag, I find it easier and easier to release criticism of my body. To relax into myself and feel life from the inside out. As a result, I'm experiencing new levels of sensory bliss (as well as relief from my occasional claustrophobia).

And wow was that infinite intelligence right-on when it said to trust that answers will appear. In late August, a thought popped into my head:

I want to live within walking distance of swimmable water.

That thought wasn't a conscious creation of my construction. It was a fully formed object like a stone, a heartbeat, a breath.

I have always loved water. I'm a spiritual mermaid, a former synchronized swimmer, a snorkeler, a lover of boats and kayaks and plunging into seas and lakes.

When I pondered my "swimmable water" revelation, I found myself wrangling with it: Did this mean when we decide to settle down again that I'd want a swimming pool? Did I need to join a gym with a pool? Was it a call to buy a place in our beloved Hawaii? But we'd have to win the lottery to afford a Hawaii pad within walking distance of the beach!

I decided to let it go. To trust. To allow the answer to appear as easily as the desire did.

All I have to say is this: releasing to the universe is magic!

Organically, the perfect opportunity arose: to buy an outrageously affordable casita in El Pescadero Mexico (near Todos Santos in Baja California Sur). Yes, it's walking distance to a lovely, swimmable beach. And it's in a small resort that has a swimming pool and a jacuzzi. Water, water everywhere!

The icing on the cake is that some close friends have bought the place next to ours. Built-in community.

We don't know if this will be our temporary or permanent residence. We don't have the details nailed down. We are trusting our guts. We want to ride the wave of the unfolding.

As 2013 comes to a close, we are back in California after a trip to Hong Kong, India and Sri Lanka. I'm looking forward to processing that transformative adventure while I focus on writing in the new year.

It looks like we will be headed to Mexico in May. Before that--for the first four months of 2014--we will live in Tahoe. We are thrilled we can host family and friends there who have opened their homes and lives to us.

In a cozy house sheltered from the Sierra cold, I intend to write the first draft of my memoir about transformation. During that time, this blog will be on hiatus, and I will be less of a presence on Facebook.

I will also improve my skiing and yoga, practice my Spanish, work online with my writing clients, judge a book contest, and allow whatever else rolls my way to perfectly unfold.

Happy New Year to all of you. May you breathe in your precious moments and love fiercely.

The Heart of Home

Kit and cop

The other morning, I awoke to the hissing sound of compression brakes. I thought, What's a semi doing on this tiny street? The private street, which provides access to five small houses, is a tight squeeze. I imagined a stuck semi, unable to back out.

Peeking out the window my stomach jumped: A fire engine and a cop car. Paramedics were headed to Kit and Mark's house.

Dave and I threw on our clothes, anxiously imagining all kinds of possible scenarios. Immediately we saw Kit, who filled us in.

Kit had discovered a disheveled woman in her guest house. The woman had matted hair and dirty clothes. The room reeked of alcohol and urine. Most alarmingly, her face looked like it had been beaten.

Kit asked the woman her name. Irene. Then she asked what had happened to her. Irene wasn't very coherent but Kit discerned that she lives in her car. Kit knew that Irene wasn't in any shape to continue on this way. So she called the paramedics.

What's most fascinating to me about this story is this: Irene must have known, at some level, that it was time for her to get help. She couldn't take her car anymore and sought out a bed. And the bed was in the home of Kit, a psychiatric nurse. Who better to know the best next step?

Before the paramedics wheeled her away, Irene bemoaned the fact that she had to leave the guest house. "What's a house," she said, "if not to live in?"

community

That struck a chord with me. We gave up our house in Santa Cruz more than four months ago to travel. Then came the left-turn we hadn't expected, my seizure and brain surgery. Percolating in my mind and heart is this very question: What is home?

I've come more deeply to understand how home is oneself. It's one's body--this amazing spacesuit--in which our essence dwells.

Yet I've also come to see how home is a soulful creation of people and experience. Home is where, in coming together, we love and feel loved.

So, paradoxically, home is both an intensely private place and a communal one.

In the past few weeks, we've experienced so much community: from spontaneous and planned parties, to neighborly chats on the beach and in each other's yards.

When we were in front of the house the morning the paramedics came, several other neighbors appeared to make sure everything was okay. Just their presence said a lot. Perhaps that's what home is: presence. Being present for each other. Being present for the self.

That night, Kit, Doreen, Dave and I shared a meal. Kit held up her glass: "To Irene."

We all pictured Irene healthy. Healed. Home.

Home is the heart.

Embrace Your Space

Our 'hood for a month.

It's the life of a traveling duo. Yesterday we packed up again. But this move didn't involve a plane, a boat, or even a car. We just schlepped our suitcases next door.

For two weeks we stayed in Doreen's adorable house. My sister's next-door-neighbor, Doreen, graciously allowed us to hang out in her pad while she traveled to Australia. She returns today and we hope we did her house justice: filling it with fun energy, cleaning every corner, and leaving her a couple of household gifts.

Thank you, Doreen.

And now the tables have turned. We are living in my sister's house and will be Doreen's neighbors for two weeks. My sister and her husband took off early yesterday morning to the tip of Baja. Their truck was packed to the brim with an ATV, surfboards, their dog, supplies for several weeks, and gifts for amigos (clothes and candy and Coors).

We don't stay with my sister when we visit because their house is small. It sits in what is fondly known as the "surf slum" of Leucadia. It's just a couple of blocks from the beach amidst other small houses.

There are no towering apartment buildings shadowing the sunny yards. You can regularly hear inklings of neighbors' conversations and music.

Fortunately, I like their musical choices. We were serenaded by the Grateful Dead yesterday at dusk! And I find the distant chatting comforting. Everyone here knows each other. It's like, as a kid, hearing your parents talking downstairs when you're snuggled in bed.

Last night as I sat in my sister's living room listening to "Sugaree" drift in through the window, I thought about how by most American standards, this house is tiny. But it has everything you need: furniture to relax and read on, a kitchen table to eat and play Rummikube on, a bed to rejuvenate in, a stove and fridge to feed everyone, a computer desk to email on, a backyard to BBQ with neighbors, and a vegetable garden to nourish family and friends.

For eating and game-playing.

The more I focused on the bounty of this house, the bigger it appeared. It literally seemed to grow before my eyes. I felt like Alice or Gulliver. The rich patterns in the rug emerged. The little statues and masks on the wall became animated. The painting of an American Indian in a canoe at sunset vibrated. Thick with impasto, this painting used to hang on the wall of the house where my sister and I grew up. As I stared, it vibrated with history.

Who needs drugs to see a new reality? Reality is, as they say, what we make it.

There's one "reality" that claims success = big. Big house. Lots of stuff. Multiple cars. It claims that progress is moving into an even bigger house, perhaps with more property around you. Or having multiple houses filled with even more things. It claims that we all should strive for such progress.

While that may bring joy to some people, many unthinkingly buy into this "reality." And the next thing they know, they feel buried.

I once heard this: We shouldn't have more stuff than we can comfortably manage.

Of course, how much we can manage widely varies from person to person. Some people like to live out of a backpack, while others can comfortably manage a whole staff who manages all their stuff.

(Sometimes I find it a challenge to manage the stuff in the one suitcase I'm living out of! But that's usually during a resistant moment, when I can't easily find something. When I take a breath, that item magically appears at my fingertips.)

At age 19, I lived in one of my favorite spaces ever. It was a basic bedroom in a tract house shared with other college students. I loved being in that room, its white walls adorned with posters of my favorite bands, its bookshelves filled with stories of lives I intimately experienced. In that space, I felt a rich sense of being on my own, of inhabiting a private, un-interruptable world.

Another favorite was my apartment in Yokohama, Japan. A studio with a futon mattress on the floor. I loved it even though my knees hit the wall when I sat on the toilet.

I grew up in a big house. Split level, five bedrooms, redwood decks, swimming pool and jacuzzi. Mostly, I loved that too.

Dave and I may decide at some point we'd like a large house to be our reality. Or maybe we'll want something small like this, near friendly neighbors. Or medium-sized, on a remote piece of land away from civilization.

Whatever we decide upon, it won't be a choice on auto-pilot, unthinkingly buying into whatever reality is out there. We will consciously make our own reality. Small-scale is a perspective. As is vastness.

For now we get the privilege of trying on different lives as we inhabit various worlds. And now I know this: I can truly experience the uniqueness of wherever we are--the bounty of it--if I open my eyes and embrace the space.

Written in this tiny, vast living room.

"Only Connect." - E. M. Forster

Home for now.

We are staying in a house of a woman we've never met. Talk about generosity of strangers. Doreen's house is a charming bungalow two blocks from the beach. She's my sister's next-door-neighbor in Leucadia, a little slice of paradise just north of San Diego.

Being here is one of the many sweet coincidences--or serendipities or synchronicities, call them what you will--that have peppered our journey. Dave and I had planned to come here in October to stay at my sister Ann's house while she and her husband surfed and siesta-ed at the tip of Baja.

But--and here's where the details get fun--while Dave and I were in Australia, Doreen and Kit (another neighbor) went to see the Ellen show. And there they won a trip to...Australia!

As a result, Doreen and Kit traveled to Australia shortly after Dave and I had been Down Under. And Doreen offered us her house.

A short walk from the house.

Now we get to spend a couple of weeks next door to family. Doreen happens to return the day after Ann and Bruce take off for Mexico. So we will just pack up and move next door.

Getting here was another matter. Our drive from L.A. to San Diego was fraught with traffic. Silly us, we'd thought the freeways wouldn't be packed on a Saturday mid-day. But we'd neglected the little detail that this is the land of the always-packed freeways.

Combined with the fact that we'd driven from Northern California to L.A. the previous day, we were a bit bedraggled when we hit Leucadia. Imagine how we'd have felt if our lives weren't filled with such generosity.

Uncle Gort

In L.A., we'd spent a night with Nancy and Andy. We've been there so much in the past few months it feels like we should call Gort (the huge robot in the front yard) "Uncle Gort." Nancy had stocked the house with some of our favorite things: yogurt, fruit, coconut milk. We also had a sweet, teary moment when she thanked me for not dying. No wonder she's been my best friend since high school. (For a picture of us at a Doobie Brothers concert in 1980, click here.)

Scarlet and Ann

When we hit Leucadia, my sister treated us to one of my favorite all-time meals: her famous beer-can chicken. Oddly, you impale a chicken on a partly-filled can of beer and BBQ it. I bet this insanely delicious way to cook a chicken originated in trailer parks. Thank god for drunken innovators.

The next day was another BBQ with extended family: Bruce's nephew Bryce, his wife Amber, and their two Uber-adorable children.

Mother and daughter adorables (Ava and Amber)

Sisters

In a short few days, the theme of this trip has become communal gathering around food and drink--oh, and dogs. The next day, Dave and I felt sufficiently rested and settled into Doreen's pad so we made dinner. The tribe this time included Ann, Bruce, their son Beau, and Judith, a family friend. Dave made his blue-ribbon ribs, the smell of which tortured the dogs.

Digging in.

Bex being tortured.

Kit (the other Australia trip winner) lives just a house over with her husband Mark. They met up with Doreen in Australia and returned the other day. Although still a little jet-lagged they threw a party last night in their lovely yard, a field filled with fragrant lavender and fringed with grape vines.

At dusk, we enjoyed the company of the tan, flip-flopped, friendly group. In keeping with coincidences, one of the party guests was Sharon, an Australian. Another was a hilarious, frenetic story-teller named Guy. He was leaving the next day for Europe. He bought a round-trip ticket to London but had no specific plans. It sounds like he's going to show up at the door-step of friends in England, France and Sweden.

In the past I would have lived vicariously through him. Now we're living just like him. Guy is our kind of guy.

His huge slug of a pitbull--the adorable Ivan--roamed the field with the two other guest dogs. The three canines wove around our legs then burst out in a full run, butting bodies like bumper cars.

When the the sky darkened, Kit lit candles. A large screen was set up to show slides from their Australian adventure. And there was Doreen. Dave and I marveled at the fact that she stood in some of the same places we'd just traveled through two months ago. We've never met. We are separated by thousands of miles. But we are living in her home and surrounded by her friends.

It was as though there, under the stars, all of life magically converged. My sister laughed. A dog yipped. Dave's hand touched mine. I was at peace.