Leavin'...

... on a midnight plane to Portland...

Yeah. Busily packing, trying to figure out if it'll all fit (somehow), if I need to get another piece of luggage (oh please no), or if, as a friend suggested last night, I just leave some stuff here. Well, the kid has two pairs of jeans that he's waaaaay outgrown - they may stay. But I don't think that's enough to let us get away with it.

I'm afraid it'll have to be luggage.

Anyway - last day. Our flight is after dark tonight, and yeah - we do get into Stumptown after midnight. Not sure what's on the agenda for today - kid would love to take a boat trip in Chapultepec Park, but I'm not sure we can pull that off. Maybe.

I realized this morning that for the first time in a long time, I don't know when I'm coming back. For a couple of years now, I've had at least a sense of a month when I'll be back in Mexico, and since last summer, I've known when the next trip would be (December, February, June...). Now - no clue.

Bringing the kid here for 3.5 weeks was partly a test - how would we manage? Well - being a single parent in Mexico isn't necessarily a lot harder than being a single parent in the US, and in some respects it's been easier, if artificially so. It'd certainly force my "ragged individualistic" self (thanks, Prof. C) to rely on others a whole lot more. But y'know, that's a lesson I can work on in Portland, too.

So - no easy answers. For now, it's a matter of taking the first question - do I need to get luggage? My fiscally-minded self says "no way" - but y'know, it may well be the path of least resistance, and today, when I'm sad about leaving the country & dreading going back to the cube farm, taking the easy road is tempting. So... we'll see.