The Walls Have Ears

Buen dia!

Here are several of the glass pieces I have been working on. I am now really working feverishly, trying to get matching pendants and earrings done for a number of ladies who will be going NOB soon, back to their other homes and lives.

I have not actually given you the information as to why I am suddenly caught up in this manic frenzy.





I was sick, just about all of last week.

Terrible back and stomach pains and cramps laid me flat out on the bed, with Cookies by my side and Senor waiting on me. Advil barely took care of the problem. So last Wednesday, I took my self to the IMSS clinic, where I became 'Number Twenty-two' in a long line of Mexican men and women and cranky babies. I saw at least five Mexican women I recognized.

And I waited and waited and waited.

When I finally got to the counter I was helped by the nice guy who loves to practice his English. We talked about many things and then finally about my condition.

He suggested that I return at noon and gestured to the waiting room where about fifty people were sitting. They will all be gone by noon. He wrote something in my booklet and I went home.

When I returned, there were only a few women rocking babies in their arms and talking.
The doctor called my name and I went into the small room. He spoke very good English, he might have been twenty-five.

Based on information I gave him from a January diagnosis in Tucson, and the locations of all my problems, he determined that the January diagnosis had most likely turned into both kidneys becoming infected. I do not think the Tucson doctor gave you enough medication, he said.

He has very soulful, deep and intelligent eyes. They made me confess to him.............i have high blood pressure and have not taken any medicine in over a year and a half. I don't think he believed me. He took my blood pressure.........you have high blood pressure, he said.............yes, i know, i said.....................very, very high, you know..................yea, probably very, very high, i said.................you can't leave the clinic without taking medicine for your blood pressure, he said...........okay, okay, i said.

He left me alone. When he came back to the little room he was carrying an armload of free medicine and a print out sheet of what they were and when to take them. I made sure I could read and understand it all. He said I needed to go and give the nurse a urine sample. Across the hall, I knocked on the nurse's door. A baby rocking lady told me she was gone. The receptionist said I would have to return the following Wednesday and bring the sample with me in a little plastic cup. Did I need a cup. No, I have a cup. I took myself home where I fell on the bed completely depressed.

After my first pill, I felt better. But I cancelled all my coffee dates and a couple of luncheons because I was not sure what to expect with all these pills.

And even though I felt better, I did not feel like cooking, walking, gardening or cutting glass.
By Tuesday, I felt well enough to drive myself to the Mercado. Three different Mexican ladies passed me and asked how I was, fine, I said each time. One rubbed her back and I knew she knew. And she had not even been in the clinic.

A Mexican women told me once, we Mexicanos, we know everything the Americanos do. Everything? i asked......... Everything! she replied. We know where you shop, what you buy, what you wear, where you go, who you go with, who you telephone, Everything!

Yesterday morning I took myself and my little plastic cup inside a small brown bag to the clinic. There must have been a hundred people in the clinic, waiting to see the nurse and waiting to see the doctors. I saw quite a few people I knew. A Mexican man asked me how I was feeling. He looked at my brown bag and smiled. I feel fine, I said and I asked how his family is feeling, fine, he said..

I said Buenos dias to as many of the people as I could and when I got a position in a line of about thirty, I noticed many of the women kept glancing at the floor near me. Then, while covering their mouths with their hands, they grinned at each other and giggled. A woman that I can easily converse with in Spanish came quickly over to me, you don't need to wait in the line she told me, just go up to the nurse and give her the bag. I did that and left the clinic as quickly as I could.

After History Club this morning I rode new old bike to the Plaza. It felt good to be out in town and I waved to a few people I know. At the Plaza I feel like I blend in, like I can sit and watch and become part of the green iron bench.

After awhile a woman I know who works in one of the offices nearby came and sat beside me.

Ahhh, haaaaaaaaa!.....she exclaimed..........your shoes, they match today!


When I got home yesterday from the clinic, I remembered all of the ladies looking at the floor around me and this was what they saw.



I asked my friend how she knew about this. She had not been at the clinic yesterday.
Oh, we Mexicanos, we know Everything about you Americanos!!!

Then she smiled and said quietly................ las paredes tienen oidos, the walls have ears.........

Apparently I do not blend in quite as well as I think I do.

Siesta!!!!!!!!!!!!!! linda lou