I made it!

After the hassles of getting to Southern California from Seattle, the flight from Los Angeles to Durban was a breeze. Nothing unusual, no delays, cancellations or anything else. It was long though, and boring. But I was fortunate to get four seats across on the 14.5 hour flight from New York to Johannesburg. I managed that when I checked in online, and found there was the option to change my seat – so checked and found the flight very lightly booked, changed the seat to an empty row and lucked out.

The acacia tree loaded with weavers nests

So here I sit on the verandah at Mick and Debbie’s house; warm, a bit overcast, the weavers are making a hell of a noise building all their nests and am enjoying a good cup of coffee.

It has taken a couple of days to recover from the jet lag – helped along with several 5-hour energy drinks that I brought with me. When I arrived in Durban, Debbie picked me up and although I can always picture the countryside in my mind, seeing it again reinforces how beautiful this country is. Even the drive from the airport, with the rolling hills, trees and open spaces is awe-inspiring.

Their house is just as I remember it from three years ago, except my room which they redid and it is wonderful! I unpacked and kept moving during the afternoon so I would sleep that night. Saturday we went into town to get a converter for my water machine. Found exactly what I needed so now back on the Kangen, thank goodness!

I brought my little GSM phone so went to get a sim car – South Africa has the most bizarre system of getting a phone! I am fortunate in that Mick signed an affadavit for me, saying I was staying with him. But anyone coming into the country has to go to the police to “qualify” to get a phone. Can you just picture people arriving at the airport after a long flight, wanting to get a pay-as-you-go phone while they are here and having to immediately go to the police station? I tried just using my U.S. passport, but it didn’t work!

Debbie wanted to change carriers and she had to supply three months bank statements, utility bills, and an affadavit saying she lives at the house because they have a P.O. Box for their mail! How the hell do the squatters manage to geta phone? They certainly don’t have bank accounts and addresses!

Debbie changed her mind and decided not to change carriers – too many hoops to jump through!

Then went to the grocery store and was in sticker shock! Still am. I cannot believe how much the prices have gone up in the three years since I was here last. They are almost as high as in the States! Definitely not an inexpensive place to live any more, which is a real shame.

Today is a lazy day. Mick and Deb went to Durban to meet her parents who are on the Queen Mary but I decided I needed another down day to regroup, so catching up on emails etc and just kicking back. Next week, I hope to sort out some kind of transportation but not rushing into anything. I will check with Country Life and find out if I can submit articles to them and perhaps get that going again. I loved that job!

Me, Cody and Oliver at Travel Town

Everything is packed and ready to go.

After the last rather rugged trip down to SoCal from Washington, I am hoping for a very uneventful trip. My flight leaves LAX at 9pm, connect to the SAA flight in New York and arrive Durban 11:15 am or so on Friday. Time to put the old brain in neutral and enjoy the ride.

There are five books on my iPad and scrabble and card games, plus there will be movies on board so that should be enough entertainment, as long as the batteries don’t give out on me.

It’s been fun down here with the boys and Mel. The little ones are growing so fast, I just want to be sure Cody and Mel use FaceTime so I can watch them grow. Heaven only knows when I will be back. We had such fun at Travel Town, and I would just love to be able to keep doing things like that with them.

Leaving this time just doesn’t seem real. It is almost like someone else going, even though I have made all the arrangements, done the packing etc. I suppose once I am sitting on the veranda at Mick and Debbies, things will feel better.

Now I just have to get through the next couple of days and get my feet back on South African soil, drive on the wrong side of the road, get over being a “Yank” and get the old Sarf Effrican accent back.

Spent the night in a tacky motel near Seatac airport. Guess I was lucky as this was pretty much the last room in all Seattle, I think.

From the sounds outside, this very early morning, it might mean that things are thawing out a bit. Cars are sounding really squishy and wet – a good sound but until I am in the air and heading south, am not believing anything.

It all started on Wednesday when this weather front moved in and Alaska air recommended changing my flight as they anticipated flight  delays. My flight was to leave at 6 pm for Burbank so changed it to Thursday and booked the airport shuttle as well to pick me up at the top of the road, instead of having Chris battle icy roads  and conditions.

Delaying departure one day actually took some of the load off and I managed to get everything done and sorted. Chris put chains on his car so we could actually get out of the driveway and to the shuttle pickup point.

Thursday morning, snowing like crazy, 24F and nasty but we got to the pickup point and waited, engine running, heater on. Finally it arrived, and after an uneventful two hour drive, arrived at the airport. Because I was so early, I had to sit around for a while, with TV crews taking pictures of the flight boards showing masses of canceled flights. By this time, I am having severe misgivings and wondering if my flight will actually leave. When I checked my bags in, the guy said, “looks like they might be late,” not they aren’t going. So eternally hopeful, went to get something to eat and of course, in the middle of chatting to Susan on my iPad, the alert comes through that the flight is canceled!

Damn!

Susan, bless her buttons, immediately got online and found me just about the last available room in Seattle (more on that in a bit) while I tried to get hold of the airline to rebook. Eventually, after an interminable wait, I was able to reach them. “Is there another airport you can fly in to?” and I said anywhere in Southern California! “We have one seat left of the first flight out tomorrow morning to Los Angeles.” “SOLD.”

The motel has got to be the tackiest I have ever stayed in! And it smelled of something like Lysol! Ick! There was a tiny wall heater that basically did no good at all. There was no reading lamp, just a dim overhead light. No plugs to charge my computer. The bed had one thin blanket and one of those satin quilted covers that have no warmth in them. I managed to scrounge another blanket from the office, but with no robe or any clothes other than what I was wearing, decided to simply take my shoes off and sleep in what I had on. It was noisy all night long, with people walking back and forth and a main road barely fifty feet from my door.

I woke up at around 3:30 and eventually got up an hour later and decided to go to the office to wait for the shuttle at 5:30, as it was warmer in there. Although it didn’t feel much warmer, the ice appeared to be melting a bit and then we heard a plane overhead, the first one! I was jazzed!

I hadn’t received any alerts and the board at the airport showed “On Time.” I checked in to find out if my bags would be making it onto my flight, but no one knew so I got on the plane not knowing if the bags were going to LAX or to the original Burbank destination. We finally left an hour late – after de-icing and loading stand-by passengers on and juggling seats.

Ryan was there to pick me up and we check for my baggage. “It’s in Burbank.” OK, that works, I drop Ryan off at work and head to Burbank. “Oh no, we don’t have your bags. They might come in on this evening’s flight as there are a lot of bags waiting to be shipped from Seattle.”

Another “Damn.”

By now I would have killed for a toothbrush (the motel wasn’t the kind that had little cards saying, “If you’ve forgotten anything, we will be happy to supply it.”) so stopped at Target and bought a pair of pants, a shirt, panties, toothbrush etc and headed to Ryan’s, ready for a shower and a relax!

Tomorrow it might rain, but I think we will meet Cody and family at Travel Town. If it rains, we’ll figure something else out. Now I need to get on the freeway and go fetch Ryan from work. Love that LA traffic!

This is why my flight is changed

Car sold – check

Money in the bank – check

Loan mod papers signed and notarized – check

Kangen machine packed – check

Tickets are booked – checked

Winter storm – check – oh damn!

Today is/was departure day from here and wouldn’t you know it, a huge winter storm, the first (very late) storm of the season blew in last night. Seatac airport is not closed, but they have brought in extra blankets, food etc in case it shuts down and people are stranded.

So…

I was able to change my ticket, courtesy Alaska Air, til tomorrow when the storm will have blown through. Same time, different day. I was even able to change it with no fare increase which is a blessing as I bought one of their special $40 fares during a sale and they honored that. Great airline, good customer service! And I got almost the last seat!

The shuttle service I planned to use to the airport is arranging for a pickup tomorrow but it will be earlier than this one today, which is ok – I’ll just sit at the airport and wait. Better than getting snowed in here again.

Packing is a bitch; of course I have too much stuff but now I have an extra day to pare it down a bit. Glad I poured a few gallons of Kangen water into a big jug last night and there is food in the house so just hunker down for the day.

And the saga continues!

I don’t do waiting very well. I get frustrated, angry, pissed off, you name it. And when the waiting just seems to never end, I draw a line in the sand.

That’s what I had to do last week. The investors/CFO/powers that be in the organization have been dragging their heels (from my perspective) with no concrete decisions coming out of what seem like endless meetings. The word is later today, tomorrow, next week.

Finally, I thought at the beginning of last week, it can’t – or more specifically – I can’t go on like this, so I decided that Friday was my cutoff point. My finances had dwindled to minus nothing (is a double negative a positive?) and I was ready to tear my hair out. Thursday news was positive, the board meeting was supposedly showing some progress and we would hear something that day! Whoo hoo!

Friday 13th… I ask is there any news? No, not til Monday. I didn’t go nuclear. I just thought, OK that’s it. I’m outta here.

So I listed my car on craigslist (and might have it sold) told the bosses that I am packing up and leaving for South Africa. But I will continue to work with them, on a limited basis until I am paid. But I cannot afford to live here on no money. No one can.

Today, I showed the car to people who are very interested. I also took it to a dealer who will take it on consignment if it hasn’t sold by the time I leave on Wednesday. Chris will handle the sale for me from there.

All my boxes – the ones I packed to leave in September – are stored up in the loft so my photos and slides will be safe. Now all I have to do is weed through my clothes and pack up what I am taking and get on the Alaska flight to SoCal on Wednesday. I haven’t booked the SA flight yet as I don’t know how long I will stay in California, but Mick is ready to pick me up from the new Durban airport when I get there.

My Kangen water machine goes with me! Can’t live without it! I will need a converter when I get there though. 110v – 220v.

I don’t think I have ever been in such a squeezed spot in my life. Or maybe I have, when I was younger, and could handle it a lot better than I am this time around. But I sure as hell didn’t plan on this stress and angst at my age! I always thought I would be settled and comfortable and not worrying about where my next dollar was coming from.

So I will continue to work for ecology, just keeping things going and hope – actually that is Hope with a capital H – that the funding comes through and I keep working. But if it doesn’t, then I will have to reassess. And even if it does happen, I am planning on Country Life to see if I can work with them again. It would be so much fun to re-do the Zululand trips – 10 years later!

It’s not all bad, it’s just a readjustment all over again. It seems that I just get my head on in one direction and then everything turns around and I have to make changes! Sheesh… or eish… I don’t want to have to keep doing that any more! I want peace, consistency, warmth .. btw, it is going to be raining and snowing here for the next 10 days! Can Wednesday please hurry up?

Oliver, the race car driver

Well, here it goes again.

Just when I think I am on a steady, stable track, the rug gets pulled out from under me and I’m stuck in limbo again.

For the last two months, the “funding” has been pending, no paychecks etc. But we all keep being optimistic, keeping the site up and running ( I don’t have anything to do with actually keeping the site going, thank goodness) creating and posting content.

Next week, next week, the damn investors keep saying, and now it is again, next week, but that is will actually be next year, and I am wondering if that was his intention all along. New year, new funding. Anyhow, we are supposed to know, one way or the other next week.

But it all leaves me in a real quandary. My plan had been to go south to Mexico, to La Manzanilla, a small town two hours south of Puerto Vallarta. Drive my car down, find an inexpensive house to rent close to the beach and live there – at least for a while. It’s close enough, and tickets reasonable enough, that I would be able to go back forth to California to see everyone. Now, with no income except my minimal SS, looks like I will go back to South Africa and stay with Mick and Debbie for a couple of months until I figure out what to do. If, of course, they will have me!

The loan modification is coming together, the last of the three required payments went today. Then the real documents are sent out and have no idea how long that will take. Chris will be renting the house from me so I don’t have to worry about that but still, everything is just so unstable and iffy.

Who would have thought, that at my advancing years!!!! I would be in this spot. All the fairy tales of youth went up in smoke a long time ago, but this last go around, with the prospect of actually doing what I do, and doing it around something I love was a godsend, and I put a lot of faith in it. Probably too much.

The good side of things is I had bought my tickets to Southern California for Christmas so was still able to go down and spend time with the family. The little boys are growing so fast and are SO cute! Ryan and Les gave me – and Cody and Mel – iPads so we can talk back and forth on Facetime! The iPad is just amazing and every time I get to use new technology like this, I love technology even more! Now I just have to get Mel and Cody to use it so I can keep in touch with the little ones.

Anyway, “they” say you are never given more than you handle, so I guess I just handle it and hope for the best.

Proud Mum and Son

It felt like I had hardly been gone a few days when I landed down in SoCal last week. I was so glad to leave here, with winter coming on fast. As I lifted up out of Seatac, it was pouring and gray and miserable and all I could think of was SUN.

This time I rented a car and that worked out great. Picked it up from Budget and as it was rush hour, took Burbank Blvd instead of the 101 to Ryan. So good to see him and the others. He had got home a little before me but we spent some time chatting before I hit the sack. It takes so long to get from here to there; a whole day.

Red's house in Topanga Canyon

The following day I went to meet this friend of a friend who lives in Topanga Canyon. She is battling to keep her house, sort of like I did to keep this one. Red (her name) has a really sweet spot on what looks like a couple of acres. She’s lived there for more than 20 years and everything she has is wrapped up in the property. She is very chatty and has had an interesting life. Anyway, we sat outside and had tea under the oak trees. It’s the California scrub oak but so pretty.

Before I met up with her, I drove around the canyons, trying to get a feel for it. I had really liked it that first time Ryan and I went to the Inn of the Seven Rays and that’s when I first considered the idea of moving back down there. The roads are VERY windy, switchbacks, but fortunately there aren’t too many cars. I wanted to find out if it might be too isolated there seeing as I am a real hermit in some ways. But I think that having met Red, it would be OK as she could introduce me to to people a bit. There is a lot going on in the community, yoga, theater etc., so I would have make the effort to get out more – way more than I do here.

So I think it would work if I decide to move back to SoCal.

On Friday I headed up to Apple Valley and Mel, Karen and I got things ready for the graduation party. Oliver and Everett are the cutest little boys – of course I am biased, but really, they are good looking boys. Cody got off early on his last day, somewhat relieved but knowing that he had to lead the graduation the next day and make a speech which he had been working on for a while.

Cody giving the Academy speech

Graduation day dawned clear and cold and Cody left early to do a run through of the event. We showed up around 9:30 – Karen and Bob had kindly offered to stay with the little ones as neither they – or anyone in the audience – would have appreciated two restless, noisy boys. The ceremony went off without a hitch – bagpipes and all. When Cody appeared leading the squad I had tears streaming, much to Ryan’s amusement! And his speech went off without a flub, um, ah – just right out there! I – and the rest of the family – was terribly impressed. He has matured and it seems like he has found his niche. It is still long row to hoe – 800 hours of fire service before he can actually get his firefighter certificate. But being the Class Leader has its benefits – the fire captains and chiefs in the area know who he is and how well he has done, so he will most likely be the first to get hired (fingers crossed, thumbs held).

The Party was a blast, lots of little kidlets running around, making noise and eating too much sugar.

Which translated into a crabby Oliver the next day, when it actually rained in the desert. Cody was supremely hung over and had a long nap with Oliver.

In between all the fun and festivities, I tried to work, with some success. But the cognac that Bob produced at the party had a lingering effect on me on Sunday, so we all spent a quiet day.

With a meeting planned in Carpinteria for noon on Monday, I planned an early departure, but woke to thick fog! And I didn’t want to be driving in that so waited a while until it lifted. It’s about a 3.5 hour drive and I took the back road, to the north of the mountains through the desert. When I can, I avoid the freeways. It was a gorgeous drive, cold, clear and sunny with minimal traffic. The mountains had a frosting of snow. I only made one wrong move which actually proved to be an OK one.

Betsy was heading north at the same time, driving up the coast and we managed to arrive within 10 minutes of each other, which I thought was pretty good! The meeting went off well, though with no formal agenda and a couple of prima donnas among the crew, it went on a bit too long, but all good stuff. Jane is a kick in the pants, as is Bob, her husband. Two hippie throwbacks – love it!

By the time I got back to Ryan’s that night, I was exhausted. Five hours of driving in one day and a meeting was a lot. My last day there I spent working getting out the Thanks article for the site but ended up going to dinner at the favorite curry place just down the street. Finally Les was home early enough to go with us.

I packed up, had a good night’s sleep, dropped the car off and ended the whirlwind trip back in Seattle in the pouring rain and stop and go traffic!

Help! Get me outta here!

It’s a good thing!

And now I get to take a few days and head to California for Cody’s graduation on Saturday! I am SO proud of him. It’s been a long, hard 10 week slog, up and at the academy by 5 am each day, not home until 7. But he just has three days left and then I think he will sleep for a month!

I’m flying down tomorrow and will spend the evening with Ryan, maybe go out to Topanga Canyon during the day to see if it still feels as good as it did last time, and possibly meet up with a friend of a friend who lives there.

Friday I will head up early to Apple Valley, stop at Trader Joe’s on the way for stuff for the Grad party on Saturday.

It makes such a difference to me to be able to go back and forth to see the young ones. It was so isolating when I was unable to do that. And I have my tickets bought for Christmas next month.

Winter is here; it was below freezing this morning, but just knowing that I don’t have to be here a hundred percent of the time makes a huge difference. I certainly don’t like the cold and damp and gray, but I think I can survive this winter by getting away every month. And then when my loan modification is fixed in place, I can consider moving permanently with the house here rented out. I can tell people, “I have a beach cottage in Washington!”

Maryann and Ray's house

What a treat that was!

Betsy and Maryann stayed up late last night and took care of the wine Betsy didn’t want to carry home in her suitcase, and I went to bed early. So when Ray was ready to go on the boat, Maryann was not feeling up to it and so it was just us two.

The boat is an older Cobra, a go fast boat, with a very comfortable ride. Ray is quite the tour guide, and knows what seems like everybody on the river! He gave me a running commentary as we went by houses and islands. What a fantastic area this is! If it was a little warmer in the winter, it would definitely be a place to consider moving to. But the idea of having someone ice sailing in front of my house in the winter is not appealing.

The glass house

The trees were just starting to turn, I could see the reds and golds starting – probably in 10 days or so, it will be brilliant. But that didn’t take away from the beauty of the area. Everywhere you look, there are coves, bays and inlets. Houses line the shore, ranging from MacMansions to shacks, with everything in between. And boats! Everywhere! So unlike the Puget Sound and Hood Canal where you hardly ever see boats out sailing. Here, there were small boats, big boats, power and sail. The boats really get used, which is what is supposed to happen.

Gibson Island Yacht Club

There is a ritzy, guard-gated island called Gibson Island that we drove around. Beautiful protected harbor, lots of boats on moorings. Then we headed out into the Chesapeake to see a lighthouse that one of Ray’s friends bought. It is a way to preserve the old structures. Private parties or in some cases, Maritime Museums, buy the lighthouses and restore them or convert to B&B’s or apartments. Then the Coast Guard maintains the navigation lights and equipments. The one this guy bought is called a Caisson. It would be a fun place to spend a weekend. Self-contained, with solar panels etc.

B&B Lighthouse

I was getting a bit nervous, wondering if I would make it to the airport in time. But he “floored” it and we blasted back to the house. Going through security was quick and I had plenty of time, boarded, sat back and enjoyed an uneventful flight.

Ryan was right there and it was wonderful to see him!