The Agony and the Ecstasy

I've been on a Carnival Ecstasy Fun Ship for the past several days, having neither money nor inclination to computer it up very much. Therefore, at the risk of great self-indulgence, I offer...journal excerpts!

Nov. 28
Plane #1, leg #4. The longest and most crowded LA to Houston. So I'm guessing 3 more hours, crying baby and the old guy has colonized the armrest. He is sporting a blue cotton onesy. Baby probably is too.

I wonder about the difference between work and ease. I wonder about the miniscule changes that slowly change our bodies and the mountains.

***

Here I am at the Baymont, crashing in on Sue and Flor, who is a fantastically, archetypally cool and outspoken Persian Manhattenite- descended from royals, unsurprisingly. She wears a brand of French perfume called Grain de Soleil, and she definitely rocks the room. The wedding party is fabulously diverse. My little head was swimming from all the stimulating swirl of Farsi, French and Flemmish.

Nov. 29
Jasmine is a married woman. The lead-up was quite tragic. Alex, Lisa and I wanted to hang out with Jas in her dressing room and help her get ready, but we were roundly rejected by Sue, who literally shut the door in our faces. Why did all those other people get to be in there while her old friends and sister were sent away? It was not like the Estee Lauder commercials and it was not fair! I felt especially bad for poor Ale, who is perhaps having trouble with the whole cruise thing and Jasmine's further removal.

The ceremony was simple and fast, but those kids belong together, so who needs more than that?

Nov. 30
The evening star, sickle moon, and the smell of industrial air freshener wafting out into the open air. The sea is impossibly lovely with its shifting skin. There are pockets of space on this boat without slot machines and disco, with the sound of the water breaking on the side. I think there's so much to learn just from watching how the water moves. I so enjoy the creaking and sighing of the boat from my little cabin.

Dec. 1
Our Cozumel snorkeling adventure! A stingray, swarms of lovely fish with huge eyes, dazzling irridescent freckles on scales like black velvet. Curious fish, cute and near. Brain corals, fan corals, sprawling flat russet organisms with breathers like organic smokestacks. A tiny, transparent jellyfish friend with a roundish, whimsical body and tiny cilia-type movers. Jasmine hypothermic, Koen's brother predictably unimpressed. I was!

I just ascended to the upper deck to enjoy the gloaming with a cup of coffee. The wind blew my skirt straight up, and of course I'm wearing my one and only pair of shocking pink drawers. Spilled coffee the hell all over myself. As luck would have it, I am all in beige tonight. Time to hit the steam room.

Dec. 2
Bus to Uxmal. Excellent history lesson from our guide, then he promoted a tourist book.

What must they think of us? We are herded like docile draft animals. We are constantly eating! Last night after dinner, it was announced that the Mexican buffet would be served on the Lido deck in one hour. (I did have a gander at the architecturally stacked cream cakes with strawberries and lacy red caramel sheets rising up flamelike. The watermelon sculptures. But that feast was only for the eyes of stuffed me.) But what must they think? I have met not one American who works on the boat. How can we really take so much and have no pause or shame? Sure, it's a relaxing cruise where folks can let it all hang out, which is wonderful, but the slovenly excess is embarrassing.

***
Chaak- #1 in Uxmal til Toltecs supplanted him with Quetzalcoatl
King entered inner chamber through mouth
Tlaloc- god of rain w/moustache
Ik- god of wind- spiral design
huge storm depicted on gov. palace w/king in center controlling
Chaak- diamonds = lightening
Venus (star) = war
Venus is morning star at harvest time, when king went with army to collect taxes...or else.
Toltecs- 11th cent.

***
Uxmal. So beautiful! I wonder how the Mixteca feel about their ancestry, two sparring elements. Hard enough having two parents; one can only imagine having two cultural heritages, one having all but destroyed the other.

***
Port of Progresso. Charming little mariachi ensemble, but they are playing Miami Sound Machine covers. Alas. Still, this seems to be a relatively unjaded bunch of Mexicans. The tour boat comes on Tuesday, and they sell to us, but I think it's only once a week. I got some weird stuff for my friends, although did not find a charm like the one Carlos sold to me for a kiss.

Dec. 3
A storm-tossed night at sea. I'm still a little shakey from last night's dancing and fun (I joined a soul train and everything), and this is most unhelpful. Could hardly touch my dinner as it rocked before me. The only knot of our party that I could find was watching an awful comedian, so I'm here turning green in my cabin. ...que la houle incline en silence.

Dec. 4
I think I've imprinted on Jasmine's family. I miss them so much it aches, and who knows if or when I'll see them again. I am drowning my sorrow in an airport latte to the strains of hoarse young men singing ultra-tender love songs with hawanging accoustic guitar, reassuring and monogamous.

***
At last, the plane to Seattle. Bovine Texans to shovey Kansas City to grouchy, paranoid Seattlites. Not my people. No.

Cornily enough, the ship trip opened my mind. I learned about being an outsider and the arrogance of majority. About fitting in and accepting the culture of that majority while maintaining a richness of self and making a kind of cloth out of it all. I learned about relaxing and enjoying a ride you can't control. Of course, I was just an interloper, but I tried to pay attention.