A Foot in Two Campos

 It's the end of May.  How much has changed in the past year. 

In May last year I was busy with my freelance work, preparing training courses to help charities in Devon and elsewhere to improve their fundraising skills by writing better funding applications, and training Trustees of charities working with prisoners and ex-offenders.  Diary full of commitments.

In May last year I was viewing properties in Spain, able to buy if I found just the right thing, but with no pressure so to do - I could do more visits to different areas until the right home came along.

In May last year I was driving up the A30 to Salisbury Hospital every day to see my mother.

Only a year ago.  A whole lifetime ago.

I never thought I'd retire.  I used to think "Even if I won the Lottery, I'd still work, helping charities achieve their objectives."  Turns out I didn't know myself as well as I thought I did.  Though perhaps I did - I still get requests to look at final draft funding applications or draft constitutions.  Sometimes I say yes, and do it pro bono.  Not always.  If there's time.  There often isn't - life after early retirement is full to over-flowing.  Never thought of me, retired.

I never thought I'd buy the second house I viewed.  Others go on a dozen house-hunting trips, first narrowing down the area, then viewing twenty or more houses.  I'd only been to Colmenar once before.  Liked it, hadn't yet fallen in love with it.  There was no rush to buy.  I'd saved up over the previous ten years, had a budget, could buy if I wanted but no pressure.  Mum had nudged me to go on a house-hunting trip.  Saw four, bought the second.  Never thought I'd buy on that first trip.  Never thought I'd find my new home.

Never thought mum would die.  We only went in for a chest X-ray.  "Bit of fluid on the lung" said the doctor, "we'll keep her in a couple of nights."  Three weeks later, transfer out of Salisbury Hospital to our little community hospital in Shaftesbury.  When I arrived, an hour after her, the nurses looked at me with kindness and with pity.  They knew. 

Never thought mum would die.  Early stages of Alzheimer's, she had.   And a bit of fluid on the lung.  We'd had our regular Sunday Scrabble game just a few weeks before.  But at the little hospital - they knew.  Twenty-two years after she gave up smoking, it got her.  We'd celebrated her giving up, aged 60, by walking the Dales Way.  Ilkley to Windermere - a lovely week.  So she never did have Alzheimer's.  The massive, creeping, secondary tumour in her brain was just squeezing out the memories.  Control, Alt, Delete.  One by one it pushed out random memories and slivers of personality. 

Never thought mum would die.  She was meant to come home after the X-ray, then after they drained the fluid.  But there was that look on the face of the nurses.  "Poor Tamara" their faces said.  I'm invited into the GP's office. He gives it the name.  The one nobody wants to hear.  Scarier than Alzheimer's.  Scarier than fluid on the lung.  Found so late, she only has a few days left.   All around Shaftesbury bunting is everywhere, all around the country royal fever is at its height.  Diamond Jubilee weekend.  "You've got a house, haven't you?  A home in Spain?" she asked me, urgently.  "Yes mum, a lovely house."  "Good," she said,  "You'll be fine."  Rare coherence.  It seemed to be important to her.

Never thought that mum would die.

Not ever.

It changes everything.  Everything is different now.

Most of it is good.  Very good.  Some of it can't ever be fixed.

© Tamara Essex 2013

Rural life in Shaftesbury, Dorset - the farming is milk, cheese and meat.  Rural life in Colmenar, Málaga - the farming is almonds, olives, lemons, oranges, sunflowers, avocados, and honey.

A good long stint in Colmenar enabled me to participate, discover and explore, near and far.  The Jerez horse-fair was an opportunity to stay a couple of nights at Vejer de la Frontera, a lovely town south of Jerez, ideally placed for the superb Cadiz beaches plus easy access to Jerez (where the hotels were fully-booked nine months ahead of the horse-fair). 

Closer to home, exploration around the Montes de Málaga has been an eye-opener.  You really wouldn't take the mountain road from Colmenar to Málaga if the intention was simply to get to Málaga - but for a slow meander through superb scenery, with lots of opportunities for woodland walking and spring flowers, it's an absolute cracker of a road.  The Venta del Pinar for probably the best coffee for miles, the Eco-Museo out in the tree-covered hills, then on to the Hotel Humaina half way to Málaga, a fabulous place to stop, meet friends, enjoy the gardens and the interesting old building five kilometres off the mountain road. 

La Semana de Cultura (culture week) in Colmenar was packed with large and small events, the art competition, a craft display, flamenco in the Casa Cultura, a theatre production, and an evening for the children to participate in 21st-century jousting, riding their bicycles as fast as possible and trying to hook a ribbon as they whizz past the rope, the ribbons streaming out like medieval knights' favours for the successful riders.  No prizes, just the glow of participation for all and the glory of achievement for some.

Then a flight to England.  Some time in Dorset.  Packed with sociable coffees and girlie lunches.  Planned walks in the Blackmore Vale curtailed by rain.  Hours at the cottage table working through the heaps of post and admin.  Trying to come off mailing lists is so much harder than getting onto them.  Really, I am not interested in a private viewing of fire-damaged furniture and cannot work out how they got my name.

Sorting the details of closing down my business – a crucial step towards moving to Spain.  HMRC (the tax department) turn out to be hugely helpful and manage to avoid patronising me.  My accountant is retiring due to ill-health but has offered to keep me on for my final accounts and self-employed tax submission this summer.

Two days in London.  The David Bowie exhibition at the V&A.  Good coffee at a Turkish kiosk where I could reassure two Man City fans about Manuel Pellegrini (to their surprise).  Drinks at the newly-revamped St Pancras Renaissance Hotel.  Dinner at Searcy’s at the St Pancras Grand.  Lovely to see old friends, but I really don't miss London.  A good place to visit, but it's a relief to leave behind the crowds and the pressure and the apparent lack of consideration.

Back to Dorset.  All around Shaftesbury the preparations are in full swing for the Shaftesbury Festival of Local Food, which I originally founded in 2005 and organised for the first five years.  Since I handed the reins over to Charlie Turnbull of Turnbull's Café & Delicatessen, the local food festival has grown, and now merged with the music and arts festival and moved from the first May Bank Holiday to the second one to be bigger and better than ever - www.shaftesburyfestival.co.uk. 

Signboards for the festival's edge-of-town car-parking and the Park'n'Ride are lost, searched for, and finally found in my shed.  I contribute at a meeting about an ill-thought-through piece of art in the town centre.  I see the recently re-elected County Councillor for Shaftesbury and congratulate him without sincerity - I voted by proxy but not for him.  Small, local issues that bind you to a place, make it home.  A home, not the only place to be called home. 

The visits to England are brief.  I worry that I expect my friends to adjust their timetables to fit in time with me.  They reassure me.  So far it seems to be working.  Two lives, quite different, yet very much the same.  In one, a town's culture week, a horse-fair, paella and flamenco dancers.  In the other a town's music and art festival, a food quiz, local cheese-tasting and the David Bowie V&A exhibition.  Both good.  It's all about the balance between the two, and that will come right with time.  Is slowly coming right.

© Tamara Essex 2013

This Week's Language Learning Point: 

Why accents are so important, even from the very beginning …..

Mi papá tiene 47 años = My father is 47 years old.

Mi papa tiene 47 anos = My potato has 47 anuses.

And some teachers tell you accents don’t matter?  Pffffff.

It's taken me 54 years, but I've finally learned how to chill. How to really, properly, chill. And it's in the hot tub.

When I set it up, about four weeks ago, I knew I was going to get good use out of it. It was never going to be one of those things that gets used for a fortnight then becomes an expensive white elephant banished to the loft or the garage with the exercise bike, the foot massager and the leaf-blower. I've used a hot tub regularly, and it's always been a favourite sociable activity with friends, chatting and sharing drinks, maybe with music.

In the second week I experimented with ways to wedge a magazine on the control panel, played about with some solar lights, and wondered about plugging in some music.

A chuckle, tonight, remembering a conversation with Alberto and Arturo in the bar in San Pedro.   Switching to English I managed get Arturo to say that he enjoys "getting into hot water" before I gave in and explained to him that in English it has two meanings. It was revenge, albeit directed at the wrong person, for my inter-cambio session when Jose had almost manipulated me into the classic English mistake of saying "Estoy caliente" until I spotted his mischievous eyes and caught the half-grin on his face before falling into his trap.

A hundred artists descended on Colmenar earlier this month.  From nothing, each created a finished painting within one single day.  The photographs here were all taken that day.

So.  It's the beginning.  We have a blank canvas.  All the options are available to us - we must make our choices.

First, where should we be?  There is time to consider, time to explore different places, the choice does not have to be made straight away.  We can start, get settled, then change our minds and move to a different location, searching for what feels right.  Though it must be said, constant discontentment, constant changing, may not leave time for fruitful output.  Eventually, a decision needs to be made.  Time to settle, and then live with our choice.

Secondly, what outlook do we want?  There are interesting corners to look into, shadows to peer into, trying to see what treasures are hidden in the gloom.  Contrasts, light and shade, chiaroscuro.  There are wide open spaces, great vistas.  There are close-up views, a detail to study, a chance to concentrate on extraordinary perfection and small imperfections.  Perhaps a combination - distance and detail in one, sunshine and shadow, the big view and the close-up.

We can stand in the same place, you and I, yet what we see is different.  What I see is only what I see, nothing more.  No inferences can be made.  What you see is what you see.

So now we are settled and ready for the task ahead.  The mind is prepared, we have what we need.  Deep breath, and begin.  We have chosen our viewpoint, we have chosen our palette.

A false start.  No problem.  It's early days, we can gloss over the mistake and start again with our blank canvas.  Except the canvas isn't blank any more, even though it looks it.  It is now covered with a thin veneer which acknowledges our earlier mistakes.  Our skin becomes thicker and incorporates but never hides the past.  The layers build up, each experience, each attempt, adding something to the finished article.

A re-think, more preparation, perhaps a slight shift to the side.  Start again.  Don't focus on what went wrong, make a fresh start. 

Confidence grows.  We can do this.  With that confidence our actions become more sweeping, more decisive.  We are clear on our overall direction and each step taken is a step towards our goal.  Oh!  Another mistake, but a small one.  Study it.  Look closely.  What remedial action is needed?  Not a disaster, no need to abandon everything, no need to start again.  Think.  Correct the error.  Cover it up if needed.   Absorb it.   A combination of these.  It's OK.  Concentrate.  Carry on.  The eye and the mind are dragged back to the mistake.  Stop it!  Not productive.  Move on.  Look at the bigger picture.

Yes, it's coming together.  We can be content with what we have done.  Tempting to keep adding, adjusting, tweaking.  But in the end, it's time to stop.  Time to say "That's it.  That's what I have done.  Judge me on this, this is me."

And so the judges gather, as they always will.  Comments are passed, sometimes favourable, sometimes not.  There are winners, there are losers.  Prizes are handed out.  Such is life.

Who will decide if we are winners?  Who will decide what the prize is?  In truth, it's not the judges.  It never is.  So who then?It's possibly those who actively took part alongside us.  Perhaps those close to us.  Probably just ourselves though.  Did we do our best?   Are we developing, continuously improving what we do?  Is that even necessary?   Are we content with the choices we made and what we made of our choices? 

In the end, contentment makes us winners, and regret makes us losers.  Our choice.

© Tamara Essex 2013

THIS WEEK’S LANGUAGE POINT:

I need to remember to use estuve to say I was somewhere in the past, rather than yo estaba which is the continuous tense.  Why can’t I remember estuve?  Is it because it’s irregular?  Estuve en Marbella la semana pasada.  I was in Marbella last week.  Estuvimos en el bar hasta muy tarde.  We were in the bar until very late.  

I headed west last week.  I didn't like it.

Not far west, I stayed within Málaga province.  I'd already been further west and loved Huelva and Cadiz provinces - stunning coastline with some brilliant secluded beaches.  And since choosing to settle in the Axarquía region I've obviously explored east of Málaga.  But I had reached my ripe old age without ever visiting Marbella.

The opportunity arose when I was invited to a multi-national networking event in San Pedro de Alcántara.  It was a chance to visit many places I'd heard of on the way.  I drove through Mijas-Costa but didn't like it.  I drove around Calahonda, Elviria and Rosario but didn't like them.  I drove through Nueva Andalucía but didn’t like it.  I didn’t get as far as Estepona.  West of Málaga seems to me to be an endless strip of over-developed resorts and urbanisations.

There was one brief respite when I spotted a stretch of sea backed by dunes and pine forests.  A pleasant walk through the naturaleza, half an hour on the beach, and then a drink at a beach bar cheered me up and offered a break from the endless urbanisations with their English bars.

At San Pedro de Alcántara I checked in, then found a quiet bar for a media-racion de calamaritos.  The networking event was fun.  People from 17 nations gathered, mingled, and separated inevitably into clusters.  Six of us (two Spanish, one Portuguese, one Mexican, one Russian/Finnish, and me as the token Brit) headed off to find food.  I love how an apparently unprepossessing backstreet bar can so often turn out to do the best food.  We got to El Candil de San Pedro around midnight, and didn't leave till 2.30, and in between Alfonso brought us plate after plate of delicious hot and cold tapas including ensaladilla rusa, tortilla de espárragos, jamon, ensaladilla de tomate, cebolla y melva, salchichon, queso viejo, frutas secas y nueces, and finally his grandmother's secret recipe for salmorejo, with her special addition of chunks of fresh orange.  With a juice, some water and a decent bottle of wine the bill between six of us came to a massive €41. 

Next day was the chance for that first ever visit to Puerto Banus and Marbella.  The first shock was having to PAY for street parking in Puerto Banus!  Half the cars had blacked-out windows, and despite the cloudy day most people were wearing sunshades.  There seemed to be two main groups of people - rich people in elegant clothes carrying miniature dogs, speaking German, Russian, Dutch and Italian, and several large gaggles of English girls in sprayed-on shorts and tight tops apparently visiting from The Only Way is Essex.  Of course the main point of Puerto Banus is the shops - oops sorry, I mean the boats.  It was nice to wander round the luxury yachts, especially because it appeared to be the week before some owners were due, so there was a lot of furious activity from muscled men stripped to the waist rubbing down woodwork, which was pleasantly diverting!   Several tanning shops surprised me – why would one pay?  The sun is widely available and free!  Fake tans in a fake setting.  To visit for an hour?  Fine.  And that was enough.

On to Marbella.  The locals the night before had advised me to skip the sea-front and head for the old town, which was attractive with pretty backstreets, squares and castle walls.  Accents were mostly English, American and French.  La Plaza de los Naranjos was a highlight, as was spotting a prettily-decorated motor-scooter with a matching owner!   Any town with quirky residents has an up-side!.  A pleasant town but no big deal, then a glance in an estate-agent's window reminded me that this is meant to be the jewel of the Costa del Sol.  A one-bedroomed flat with no sea views was €275,000.  Presumably for the address.  Up above the town I could see hints of some of the multi-million-euro mansions that apparently make Marbella so special.  Overall, I didn't really get it.

Half an hour later I reached the city of Málaga.  Stopped for a coffee, pleased to feel I was back in "my manor".  Driving north up the A-45 then east into the hills, I passed the sign to enter the Axarquía.  I felt a smile creep across my face.  I guess I'm just an East-of-Málaga sort of person.

THIS WEEK’S LANGUAGE POINT: 

In English we use the gerund (“-ing” form) after “thank you for”, as in “Thank you for calling me” and “Thank you for sending it to him”.  But in Spanish we use the infinitive, not the -ing form, so it’s “Gracias por llamarme” and “Gracias por enviarselo.”

© Tamara Essex 2013