Area Woman Blows Gasket (14 page)

In the inestimable words of the South African novelist J. M. Coetzee, you look into the eyes of one of these animals, the
rudely abandoned offspring of man's "best friend," and flinch at the plea, the profound, incontestable rebuke in their rheumy
hopeful faces: "We are too menny."

So, a bid for serenity turns into an incontestable mission that neither therapist nor queen need assign. When you escape a
commercial environment that aggressively lays court to the idea that it's all about you, you realize quite succinctly that
it is not about you, except insofar as you have the resources, the affluence, and the education to be of help.

In our last weeks in Mexico, I quit my newspaper column in Canada, stopped following the news, and turned my full attention
to the ground beneath my feet. We had several stray dogs vaccinated and found homes for three cats, which in Mexico was no
easy feat, given their pathetic abundance. We handed most of our possessions to Abondia and Mario and their children, and
made preparations to bring three more cats home with us on the plane. We donated money, we sponsored a foster child, and I
taught Clara to make fun of a commercial we saw, in which a group of fashion-conscious Barbies chirp: "We live to go shopping!"

Ambrose resold the Chrysler Shadow, which in Toronto would have been rejected as worthless, for God forbid anyone should restore
a car that can be tossed and replaced. But he found a man with a cement sofa, whose small child traipsed through the living
room during the sale with a dead lizard attached to a string. And this man understood that you don't just toss cars out because
they've lost their novelty value and their mufflers. You don't just keep gobbling up the world like greedy freaks with no
sense of tomorrow.

A final night in Tepoztlan. The rainy season crashes down upon us now; it pours and thunders and shakes the very walls of
our house, sending Kevin to tremble under the bed. Each morning the pool is full of drowned spiders and scorpions and worms,
grasshoppers and flying ants and walking sticks and beetles. Flooded carnage. What Geoffrey once threw in that so mortified
me is nothing compared to what nature can clog drains with. Who knew? There are moths about with fur, and fireflies and mosquitoes
and millipedes as long as my foot. The rain is a deluge, a wondrous, theatrical cleansing that makes a mockery of control.

As I write a final journal entry, a daddy longlegs soft-shoes down the wall beside me, and the cicadas and crickets keep up
their continuous chorus. Our phone is out again and the car is broken down. I had to gather up Geoffrey and Clara and their
end-of-school artwork, just abandon the car for its new owner to fetch and repair, marching my youngsters up the cobblestone
street to one of the town's main thoroughfares in order to catch a taxi, whose driver I now knew by name.

We left two kittens behind at the school in a
canasta;
one went home with the cook, the other with a little girl in
primera.
I wonder how they will fare, the bewildered little sweeties, and where they will sleep. The other three will, at least, have
one another and us, as they undertake their strange adventure on Aero Mexico and land in a world of unimaginable animal luxury.

Funny. This final night. The stress of our departure is almost nonexistent compared with our arrival. No racing mind; no irritability
or anxiety. Suitcases packed, and what ever happens happens. Striking. I have genuinely slowed myself down, looked around
me, grown purposeful and thus relaxed.

Mahana, mahana,
as the Mexicans say. Every day has its essential tasks.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Heartfelt thanks to the following people, for their mentorship and faith:

Dianne deFenoyl, formerly of the
National Post,
for whom many of these pieces were originally written.

Glen Nishimura at
USA Today,
who goads me to keep making sense of the news, in spite of frequent episodes on my part of wretching like a cat.

Patricia Hluchy at
Maclean's,
who was my champion and became my friend.

Anne Collins at Random House Canada, whose loyalty is the highest compliment a writer could be paid. (Thanks also to Kendall,
Craig, Marion, Frances.)

Lucia Macro at William Morrow, who took a chance on me, for which I will always be grateful.

Gillian Blake at Bloomsbury USA, who invited me into a house that feels like home.

Paula Balzer and Sarah Lazin, the agents who edit, and manage, and nourish, and provide comfy beds. Without them, frankly:
what career? For inspiration, feedback, love, and laffs thanks to:

Landon, Geoff, Hilary, Katharine, Anne, and Michael Pearson; also Keri, Mark, Doug, Dot & Whay, Patsy, and the Mackenzie and
Pearson clans.

To my brilliantly funny friends, whose sly wit would have given the Algonquin Round Table a run for its money, thank you:
Kenton Zavits, Pdc Bienstock, Michael DeCarlo, Karen Zagor, Eric Reguly, Paula Bowley, Blair Robins, Dave Eddie, Pam Seatle,
Pier Bryden, Elaine Evans, Sheila Whyte, Clayton Kennedy, Daphne Ballon, Steve and Jeff Butler, Claire Welland, Shannon Black,
Russell Monk, Doug Bell, David Hannah, Bill Rogers, Janet Allon, John Allore, Robert Labossiere, Patrick Graham, and Jessica
Macdonald, to name but a few. I've been blessed.

Gratitude to my collaborators at the
National Post,
Natasha Hassan, Theresa Butcher, Sheila McKevenue, Dianna Symonds, and Gerald Owen in particular.

Muchos abrazos, tambien, a mis amigos en Mexico, incluyendo mi madrina, Margaret Del Rio;Arturo Marquez; Sylvia; y Pip.

And finally, to my little pack, with whom I trundle hither and yon across the landscape, generally making a mess: Clara, Geoffrey,
and Ambrose, with a special hug to Nanny Verdlyn.

A NOTE ON THE AUTHOR

Patricia Pearson is a frequent contributor to
USA Today
and the author of the novel
Playing House.
Her work has appeared in the
New York Times,
the
New York Observer,
the
Guardian,
and
Redbook,
among other publications, and she has won three Canadian National Magazine Awards, as well as the Arthur Ellis Award in 1997
for best nonfiction crime book,
When She Was Bad.
She recently moved from Toronto to the boreal forest outside Montreal with her husband and two children.

A NOTE ON THE TYPE

The text of this book is set in Bembo, which was first used in 1495 by the Venetian printer Aldus Manutius for Cardinal Bembo's
De Aetna.
The original types were cut for Manutius by Francesco Griffo. Bembo was one of the types used by Claude Garamond (1480-1561)
as a model for his Romain de L'Universite, and so it was a forerunner of what became the standard European type for the following
two centuries. Its modern form follows the original types and was designed for Monotype in 1929.