This last three weeks I have been striving to break out once more from my reclusive lifestyle. It’s hard. Right up until yesterday, although still focused on the past and the things I didn’t have and thought I wanted, I was doing better. Yesterday something occurred which almost forced me back into my home once more. I lost my bag and my Spanish dictionary. Two small, very unimportant things… One contained a personal letter which related very personal feelings – which I do not particularly want people here to know. I am still terrified this letter may yet fall into the wrong hands.

But as I started my usual “retreat to cave” process I took a step back. Did it really matter? The bag had nothing special, the dictionary was old and the letter was just a brief letter talking of my feelings about people in my past, a person in my present and my continued rants about learning Spanish. Instead of continuing to wrap myself in blankets in my cave I decided a change was in order.

Just when I needed it I found the motivating comment over at Gordon´s online abode.

Try something new. Try something different. Don’t give in to the fear.

So I´m stealing it and adopting it as my mantra too. I´ve been hitting the pool for some weeks now and am very pleased with the 6 kilo weight loss and health benefits seen during that time. I am making progress. My eating habits are under control. I do not drink alcohol and have cut out sugar almost entirely. I feel so much better for it.

The question is… what comes next? I feel the need for change. I have been moping over the past – reliving it, stressing over it, wishing it were different for so long now and its been impacting my present. I want to let it go and learn to embrace the present. Be a live for now and embrace the possibility of future kind of person.

As for the now, well, just lately all I have been able to see were the things I don´t have. I´ve spent so long wanting this person or that person in my life, desiring a child, wanting a different job… I haven’t done anything about any of it. Just allowed the experiences of my past and fear to hold me back.

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Its been a while since I took a photograph for SatScenes. I did not sleep well last night so, at dawn, went for a walk with my little JRT.

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I barely left the house today. I am playing catch up with all my current client projects so time is scarce. I did venture out late at night to get some air and calm myself with the sound of the sea. It was lovely, albeit a little chilly. But spring is definitely here!

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Superb lunch at Cafe Jamaica in Nerja was started with a Prawn Cocktail. Very tasty it was too!

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Fiestas are magical times in Nerja. Their attachments to fiestas and Carnivals, and the still remaining community spirit, is just one of many reasons I continue to love this country so very much. Today´s carnival was magical – great fun and something not to be missed. It is a pity those Brits I heard complaining about the money spent on the Carnival realise celebration is more important during times of depression, not less. I hope it is a tradition Spain never leaves behind…

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Today we ventured to Lidl and, whilst there, purchased the delightful Queso de Tetilla. A cheese always likely to promote a giggle in our juvenile household. The cheese is named “tetilla”, which means nipple, and clearly defines the traditional shape of this cheese, that is, a flattened pear-shaped cone with a small nipple on the top.

Incidentally it is a lovely delicate and soft cheese too. Gorgeous for having with crusty bread – although, personally, I like to bake it with eggs in the oven!

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One of the most wonderful things about winter in Spain is quite often, when one feels cold indoors, you can venture outside during the afternoon and make like a lizard. I felt a little pang of sadness as I looked at everyones snow scenes until I went out for my afternoon walk with the JRT. The sun was shining and it was almost warm enough to do a little light sunbathing. But there, up in the mountains surrounding Nerja, was the snow. How fabulous is Andalucia? Lovely and warm here in our Coastal town – snow in the mountains just behind us!

Beat that

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My first face to face encounter occurred only days into my arrival. I was out walking in the countryside near my home. Its magnificent walking country in the area – rugged and wild. I was walking down a path with a few trees – rare in this particular part of Andalucia. This is HOT country in the summer months. It was there I saw something dangling from a tree. From a distance it could have been anything, a brown bag or animal skin, but as I drew closer I realised it was a dog – a Podenco, a hunting dog. It was hanging mid-air from a tree; a thin rope in noose round its slender neck. It hadn’t been dead very long. I remember the sense of fear when I saw it and heard voices not far away. I called my little JRT to my side and, maybe needlessly, lifted him into my arms and ran back to the path. A little dramatic I realise now but seeing the dog there, and hearing the voices of the people who had done that nearby, really did make me question his safety. At that point I had no idea this was the standard practice huntsman took to “rid themselves” of their old hunting dogs.

The sight had upset me tremendously and I did a little research. The basic response then was “this is the way its always been done”. What good could I, a foreigner in the country, do? Absolutely nothing. I was a single voice. Sooner or later life moves on and I began to wonder if this maybe just a single, uncommon, incident. I hoped so. I was wrong.

A few weeks later I bore witness to the results of, what I am told was, a training exercise. Another dog having been tied with rope and dragged behind a vehicle. For what purpose I have no idea. What benefit could there be in such an exercise? The details of the sight I encountered I shall refrain from relating in graphic detail but if you are curious just try google images – there is plenty there. It was horrific.

Time once again passed and soon I decided life here simply was not for me. But, shortly before we left, I was to witness first hand the cruelty. This time a small black kitten who just happened to be in the path of a group of teenagers returning for a party. They seem to draw amusement from torturing the cat. I have never quite forgotten its screams but it was over before I could even get to the door. Its small body was left in the centre of the road. Mangled.

Since then I have encountered other acts of neglect and cruelty – often through ignorance. The dogs fed on scraps of bread and little else keeping them in a perpetual state of starvation, the dogs kept on balconies all day with inadequate food, water or exercise. The brutal beating of a dog because it had messed up the balcony (what else was it to do? it hadn’t been out in days…). The dogs just ditched in the middle of nowhere or drowned because their son or daughter had tired of their Christmas present or, rather unfortunately, because it was now an adult dog rather than a cute little puppy… This is the sort of cruelty that goes on across the world I appreciate. Its not isolated to rural Spain. Does this make it acceptable? No. Please, if you do care, join the cause.

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