This will be my last post from Mazatlan for a while. This Saturday I am off to a small town in Washington state for approximately three months. I am looking forward to getting away from the heat and humidity of Mazatlan in the summer. When I lived in Guadalajara I never really understood why people came there or to Lake Chapala or to Ajijic for the summer. I moved to Mazatlan last summer and saw the majority of snowbirds heading back up north. To me Mazatlan is paradise, and I will miss the beach and the beautiful sunsets. But I do intend to return and spend next winter here.

I will be staying with a friend I met here in Mazatlan last summer. Although it will be a vacation from teaching, it will also be a working vacation for me. I am currently writing my next book, a work of fiction. My characters all live in Smalltown, USA. I will now have the opportunity to immerse myself into that type of culture which will greatly enhance my ability to portray their lives as they really are, and not just in the way I imagine them to be.

I will also be working part-time and you will have to read my future blog posts if you want to find out exactly what I’ll be doing. The only clue I will give you is that it will be something completely different from teaching English or writing. I haven’t even told my own children what I will be doing.

Now I must return to the tedious task of organizing my belongings and packing. It’s quite amazing what I have accumulated in the past fourteen months. A friend has graciously offered me space to store a suitcase so that I need not take everything with me. That is indeed a blessing.

Farewell for now from Mazatlan, and I will write again when I’m settled in Washington.