Hola!

Yes, they let us back across the border, imagine that...

Just a quick hey y'all to the one or two people that would be concerned if we had been incarcerated at the airport. The proverbial good time was had by all, the scuba diving was quite good, the ruins were epic, the sand sandy and the sun sunny- all in all an excellent trip. Just wanted to share a quick story that really struck me.

On the morning of the inauguration the boys had booked some windsurfing lessons, as the Hurricane really was dying to go, and Tuesday was more or less our one relax and chill day. Miss Thing and I were no way in hell going to miss the swearing in and had assumed it would be CNN in the room. Hell no! Here I was in Mexico, at a resort mostly frequented by nice folks from Europe and South America and they showed it in it's entirety on the big ass wide screen in the lobby bar and also live at the theater on a full sized cinema screen. I opted for the bar. Sue me, I was on vacation people...

So here we sit, in a bar in Mexico watching an American President taking the oath of office. Which in and of itself was somewhat surreal, I can assure you. Things were just getting started and the lovely bartender, who by then knew me well- probably due to my propensity to tip heavily, hands me a bottle of champagne and two glasses. I guess I must have given him a slightly startled look and he just smiled and said "Congratulations!"

As President Obama put his hand on the bible the place literally stopped. Waiters, bartenders, bellmen, tourists- damn near everyone was rooted in place. I admit, I teared up when the oath was taken and my heart felt so much lighter and hopeful. And then a very strange thing happened. All of these people erupted in spontanious cheers and clapping. People started congratulating the few Americans there, smiling, hugging and laughing. Complete strangers, most of whom were not my fellow countrymen, were celebrating this moment. I must say, it really does give me hope for the future, something I have been sorely lacking these last few years.

Here's to hope my friends! It's going to be a tough row to hoe and perhaps people might have finally realized it's going to take all of us to get through it.

Now I really need to go start on the laundry and go to the grocery- back to reality.