One Good Birthday Choice and One Bad One

12-22-10

   Today is Amanda and Belinda’s 43^rd birthday.  I gave Belinda a brand new Canon digital camera before we left for this vacation.  I let her pick it out for herself from Best Buy, so I know she is happy with it.  It’s another Canon (her last camera, the one the children dropped and broke at Grand Lake was also a Canon), a slick black one that’s not too small or too big.  She likes those.  I am proud of myself.  She used it again today, and she told me she got some clear pictures of the kids parasailing.  Danielle’s pictures, she said, are the best because Danielle went last and the practice she had taking pictures of the others helped.

   I am sitting on the balcony again.  This is becoming my favorite spot for writing on this cruise.  It’s private, it’s cooler...
and the waves from the ship’s forward motion make relaxing sounds that are perfect for writing.  The moonlight is back, but it is hidden partially by the clouds again.  It is a full moon.  Two nights ago, we were able to see a lunar eclipse, well, at least a partial one before we went to bed.   

   *Danielle just crashed my party.  She said she wants to catch the people who change the days of the week on the elevator floors tonight.  She is trying to find the Lambert girls to go with her.  She left the curtains partially open, and the light from the room is invasive. 

   Okay, I went back inside, brushed my teeth, went back out and closed the curtains again.  Ahhhhh, nice.

   So, I played Estrella del Mar today in Mazatlan, my one golf round during this cruise.  It was not a good idea to play on Belinda’s birthday.  I would not choose to do it this way ever again.  It was just weird and wrong to be away from my wife for so long on her special day.  I’d like to write that it was worth it, that the round was fantastic, and that I shot a low score.  I can’t do that, though, and here’s why.

   First, the ride in the shuttle was eye opening and depressing.  I rode in the front passenger seat since I was alone.  Pablo was our driver, a nice, gray-haired, small, experienced and safe driver who was polite, informative, and at one point, humorous.  He has lived in Mazatlan for fifty years, and he was proud of the Pacifico Clara Brewery, the military base, and the Café Marina factory, but I was gobsmacked by the large amounts of, well, here’s the short list: trash, graffiti, crumbling buildings, slums, dangerous scooter and motorcycle drivers, rusty bicycles and other various metal scraps left here and there, abandoned/wild dogs, and overall degradation and lack of upkeep.  My mood went from shocked to sad as the miles went by.  It was about a thirty minute drive.

   At one spot, I did see a small group of people picking up trash along the highway, but that was only one of numerous areas where the trash was abundant.  I also saw one area where one splotch of graffiti was painted over, but once again the ratio was consistently a little to a lot. 

  The contrast was significant when we reached the golf course.  We drove from a wasteland into an oasis.  The road going in was lined with bricks like cobblestones, but more orderly, and it was lined with coconut palm trees.  Okay, it’s late.  I am going to bed.  More next time…