The Tranquil Vibes of Mazatlan, Mexico

I lived with Stephanie in Playa del Carmen, Mexico in 2014. It was her first time living abroad, and she was going through some hard stuff, so she just took the leap after seeing a post I had made on Facebook about needing a roommate. She is originally from Spokane, Washington, but came down to Mazatlan, Mexico, a town on the west coast of the mainland, to get married last Wednesday.

I showed up on Tuesday to a huge crowd—90 people came to her destination wedding, which is A LOT (and that just goes to show how loved both she and her then-fiance-now-husband are). Everyone was hanging out by the pool, which was right on the sea.

(sunset from my balcony on the first night)

It was only my second time ever in Mazatlan, the first time was a quick one-night stay on a road trip to somewhere else. Still, I remembers the huge rocks that jutted out of the water, the boardwalk, aka Malecon, which lined the beach in old town, and the quaint little town center, a place with cobbled and narrow roads, old Spanish style architecture, and a breeze that smelled of fresh sea air. In fact, the whole town had that scent of sea constantly in the air. It was moderate jungle temperatures, even getting down into the 50s F (around 13-14 C) at night, though the days were sunny and warm for swimming.

(long stretches of beach, my favvvvv)

After a long first night catching up with my old roommate (who was much less stressed than most soon-to-be brides I’ve been around) and meeting her family, a night which included huge platters of seafood and endless margaritas, I finally went back to my room to find the bride’s sister, on of my hotel roomies still up. Were went out onto the 7th floor balcony of our room and talked for at least an hour, listening to small waves softly crashing into the shore. It was much needed catch-up time for the two of us. Tiffany, Stephanie’s sister, is the reason I knew Steph in the first place.

In the morning, Tif and Steph’s uncle Tom came knocking on our door pretty early, around 9am (early for people who had stayed up late, anyway), and said he had a great idea. I was half-asleep, but he said he had some time to fill in the ceremony he was performing at the wedding in the evening, and would I like to recite a poem. Even as hungover as I was, it seemed like a beautiful gift to give them, so I grunted an agreement and went back to sleep for a bit.

The night before, the family started treating me like a small celebrity because my friends were telling them about my project Skin on Sundays. Everyone wanted a poem written on them, and they just kept telling me how amazing of an idea it was—so original and such incredible art. Most of them are from the state of Washington, either Seattle or Spokane, a state that is notorious for being art appreciators. Still, I was surprised by their enthusiasm, and even more surprised by the invitation to be a part of the wedding ceremony. Surprised, and super flattered.

After breakfast on the beach and a short nap on a pool recliner in the sun, I snuck back up to my balcony where I could try to put myself in the headspace to write the kind of poem i would read in front of 90 people at a wedding, a poem specially dedicated to Stephanie and her new husband. My mind mostly went to a really hard experience the couple went through in 2017. Tony, the groom, who is in his early 40s, one night had a brain aneurism, leading to a stroke, leading to a long hospital visit and an even longer recovery of trying to learn to walk and talk and just be himself again. Steph told me they were dealing with medical malpractice that led to Tony’s condition worsening on top of Tony’s recovery. Plus she herself was beyond stressed in handling the situation, becoming the primary caretaker of her fiancé, a man who has been so independent for his whole life that relying on someone to take care of him took a toll. It was a toll on him and a toll on Steph, as you might imagine.

That is all I could think about when I was up there on the balcony, trying to write a poem for them. I didn’t want to directly bring up the situation in a sort of narrative poem, not at all. However, I did want to consider the kinds of things that get a couple through such tough times like that. And that is when I thought about how much intimate behavior can sooth even the crabbiest souls during tension.

I finished the poem about 90 minutes before the wedding, and was ready to go. I cleaned up, put on my dress, and went down to the beach. I even had someone record the reading on my phone, but perhaps I asked the wrong person. All he got was a blurry still shot of my feet. This was a 30-something-year-old-guy, but I guess he must have been too drunk to press play on my phone. Ah well. I’ll still share the poem with you here, written with pen on paper.

(writing poetry with this view)

The reception was on a terrace overlooking the beach, and the sunset was unreal (no filters necessary).

I actually locked down one Skin on Sundays episode, which turned into me writing separate poems for a couple. It was Steph’s dad and her stepmom, who were a supersweet pair and so, so, so in love (it was obvious). Her dad Jeff kept talking about how beautiful his wife’s back was, and how he is going to frame the photo and put it up on his wall.

I ended up meeting up with them in the morning, and we had the whole thing done by noon. I wrote their poems on them on the lounge chairs by the pool, then we went down to the beach to take the photos, and the light was perfect. I barely even had to know much about my camera to get fantastic shots, just because the lighting was so perfect. And then they went and brought me back a delicious beet, apple, and ginger juice to help me get my nutrients back from the bit of drinking the two nights before had involved.

Mostly I spent the day having micheladas by the pool, other than writing poetry on people. Around sunset though, Steph was my canvas for the poem I had written and recited at the wedding, and I am so thrilled with how it turned out. She used to get upset because in Playa del Carmen, she could never find a bikini top that fit her because her boobs are fabulously gigantic, so that was a clear choice for where to write the poem. Also, because it was long, I needed a place with lots of space :) I’ll give you all a sneak preview here, though I won’t be posting it on my site until tomorrow. It's not the one I took on my Nikon, but it's just the one I have quickly ready right now to show what kind of pic I took :)

When I think of how lucky I am to have such wonderful people around me all the time, even people I have just met, sometimes I almost cry. Steph’s whole family treated me like a prized friend, not at all like a stranger, even the ones that had never met me before (which was everyone besides Steph and Tiffany). Which brings me to my next point.

I was sharing a room with Tiffany, her grandma, and Tif’s daughter Sienna, who is 6. They had extra room so they just let me crash for free (wow, staying in a seaside hotel with a balcony facing the ocean on the 7th floor). Even still, some might think staying with kid and a grandma would change the vibe, but not in their family. Grandma spent most of 2017 traveling Latin America and Africa. Her husband died early in the year, and she just took it as a sign to seize the freaking day. Her energy was so great to have around. And well, Sienna is possibly the most compassionate and thoughtful 6-year-old I’ve ever hung with. Every time I asked her a question about herself, she returned one about me, and she really took some time to think about so much of what she said.

If anything, the vibe of our awesome suite was improved by having such a diverse group mixed together.

My flight left the next day at 1pm, so I took my last chance to soak up the sea, which I love eternally all the way to my core, by getting up at 7am and going for a long stroll. The night before, Sienna asked me if I would wake her up, and I did, and we went. We had a magically walk. The beach was nearly empty, the sun was casting all sorts of rays and the mountains created some ridiculously beautiful shadows.

(our shadows)

(Tif, Sienna, and I)

The sea just calms me, empties out all the worry, and lets me breathe so easily. We walked for a couple hours, and upon returning to the hotel, uncle Tom invited Sienna and I to breakfast (around 9am). My last fresh shrimp quesadillas in Mazatlan, at least for now (fyi, I had been eating them for breakfast for a couple of days—I just could not get enough).

Mexico has a lot of beaches. The Caribbean side has the ones that are turquoise and fairly calm. There are even days that the water is so flat and still, like a pool. The west coast is a bit different. The surf is rougher, attracting a lot of surfers, and the water is not generally turquoise. Still, its beauty has its own particular charm, in part coming from the culture of west-coast Mexico. Everyone is so kind, so welcoming, so chill. Relaxing is hard not to do because of the energy the radiates from the place. Mazatlan is no exception. There are some tourists, of course, but it is not overrun with partiers like much of the Yucatan peninsula is, so its a different kind of trip. And those hikes, and those mountains. Seriously, its a world that brings tranquility from the outside with its sea and palms and slow-paced culture, all the way to the inside of our selves.

What a wonderful refreshing week I spent at Steph’s wedding. So happy I could make it.