I have been spending a bit of time in airports lately, and each time I see one of these rolling carpets, the kind that brings travelers across long hallways effortlessly, I return to an image I concocted in my head years ago.

I had just spent an afternoon with a brightly young very old woman and as she had painted for me vignettes of her many years of life, I kept getting little bursts of shocks going through my brain. There she was, inhabiting a very much used body alongside a rebellious, bada** personality, with a collection of awe-inspiring memories to match.
That's when The Rolling carpet metaphor first came to me.

We are all on this Rolling Carpet. Some of us have just entered, some of us are likely almost at the end, and most of us have no idea where ours ends.

There is something about this image that brings me peace. Because WE ARE ALL on The Rolling Carpet. You, me, them.

I like that. I like it when we're all together in such ways. It brings me calm, a sense of community, and compassion, too. The separation melts a little.

It can take away the angst, the potential sense of unfairness. It invites love. It reminds us that it's not about "The young people and the old people." It's about where we might find ourselves on The Carpet this week.

Some days, when I notice that my boobs are no longer quite so perky and my neck is doing weird stuff, I feel compelled to take a look back at The Rolling Carpet and find myself in it, oh, twenty feet/twenty years behind. Yeah, I looked fresher I suppose. Maybe I moved faster too. But then, when I connect with how I felt, these twenty feet back, I immediately also connect with how I feel now. With how much better I know - and love - myself.

Mostly, how less of a care I give about what most people think.

Back then, I asked for permission quite a bit. Permission to be me. I wondered. I settled much more. And the big ugly one: not only did I forgive too fast, but I also occasionally apologized for other's transgressions. It was messy and really, not worth the couple of inches of boob levity.

I love The Rolling Carpet. I love the places it takes us. I love remembering my grandma telling me, having asked me what I was up to next weekend: "C'est de ton age, ma chérie." It's of your age, my darling.

I feel very lucky to still be riding The Carpet. I am aware that I don't know when I will be whisked off of it, hopefully gently.

Five years ago today, my mom stepped off of it. A few hours later, my sister and I found a note in her desk drawer. It said something like "This is the end of the road for me. I had a wonderful life." I am not surprised that she used these words just as she left us riding along without her.

And then I think about a baby girl who already has my heart and is preparing to step onto The Carpet, and all I want to say is THANK YOU.

Thank you to this Life for the privilege of riding it, thank you for those riding with me, and thank you for all the cool art on the walls along the way.

This story comes with a bit of a backstory.

It starts like this: Last June, on our way to a remote little beach, we popped a tire. The sun was hot, it hadn’t rained in months and everything had a layer of red dust on it. We moved the car under a tree and promptly learned that our jack didn’t lift the car high enough to remove the wheel. A small round of wood and some ingenuity came to the rescue and we were back on the road within 30 sweaty minutes, the spear tire temporarily humming along while the injured one was nested in the back. Since neither one had ever changed a tire before (seriously), it made for a great story ending to a night of thunderstorm car camping.

A few days later I took the car to the tire dearlership, an hour away from my home, and asked them to please patch the almost new tire, put it back on the car, and place the spare back in the trunk. I sat in their fancy-ish waiting room while they worked on it and as I left confirmed that all had been done. I drove away feeling good about my decision to have bought my tires from them, a reputable international company that offers a guarantee and the feel of American reliability. The rainy season was coming and I was glad to know that I was ready to tackle the river beds and rough roads that would be my daily fare for 3-4 months.

Fast forward to this week.

On our way to another town, the car feels a little funny. We both notice it and I make a mental note to bring it to the mechanic the next day. I think about what it could be and ask my mind to be gentle and please not make up stories. It kind of works until it becomes obvious that something is really not quite right. Thank goodness we have left the jungly part of the road and I am able to pull over, get out, and come face to face with a very, very mangled tire. Carlos has a bus to catch, I am simultaneously horrified at the look of this thing and relieved that “this was what was going on and not the engine having a fit.”

And now what?

We open the trunk, ready to perform our second-ever tire change, and notice that strangely enough, there is no spare waiting there for us. Instead, we are pretty sure that we are looking at the tire that popped three months ago - still with a hole in it.
I am quite confused and also aware that the bus is not going to wait. Plus, it’s hot as heck.
My mind goes into how-are-we-going-to-solve-this mode while Carlos’ goes into what-the-heck-happened mode.

I pick up the phone to call the closest llantera while Carlos puts some unpleasant mental pieces together.

“They never fixed the tire,” he tells me. Followed by “You have been driving with the spare for the last three months.” Over river beds and rough roads. No wonder the poor spare looks like this.

Woa.

Minutes later, Miguel the llantero arrives, confirms that we are indeed looking at a badly hurt spare, and also confirms that the “good” tire has a sizeable hole in it. Very much unpatched.

I am thinking about how lucky we are that this happened when it did, how it did. And I am in disbelief of whatever it is that happened, or rather did NOT happen while I was sitting in the fancy-ish tire dearlership waiting room. They lied to me. They told me that they did the work and did none of it. They sent me out onto the jungle road with a temporary tire and put my life in danger. I feel betrayed. Especially when I realize they took the time to pop the little Mitsubishi hubcap cover I handed them - onto the spare. Deception.

We sit under the shade of a tree and shake our heads. I’m hurt.

Meanwhile, Miguel takes the tire to his shop a couple of miles away and brings it back in record time. Pretty soon we are ready to go, patched tire on the car, mangled spare in the back, and on his advice, we follow Miguel to his office so he may write us a receipt which he feels we should present to the tire shop and get refunded.

A few minutes on the road and Carlos tells me that he smells rubber.

Oh dear.

But before I can start to go too far down the road of what-is-happening-to-us-now, pieces of what appear to be Miguel’s tire are flying towards us. From his car. From HIS tire-fixing car!

Oh yes. This is very much what is happening. Chunk after chunk of rubber shedding as though it had contracted some odd form of leprosy, possibly from … us?

I can’t believe what I am seeing and just as Miguel gets ready to pull up in front of his shop, his tire dramatically spews out a final, huge piece of rubber as though wanting to make a point.

We park, I walk to his car and see that his tire looks even worse than ours.

This is all so darn weird.

But Miguel is unphased. He laughs, says something about nails on the road, and walks into his shop to write us a bill. Me, I can barely talk. Also, the bus is definitely gone by now.
As we get ready to leave, Miguel hands Carlos the bill and we notice that it is written for almost three times the amount of money he charged us.

“This is what I would normally charge,” he says. “See if they’ll pay it.”

Just. Like. That.

No “Hey, what do you think if I pad the bill a little?” or … I don’t even know … some sort of checking in about entering into this … agreement. No, just business as usual. Let’s see if we can out-cheat the cheaters type of thing. I am both thankful for his loyalty and disturbed. Carlos hands him an extra 50 pesos, we pass his mangled tire on the way to our car and we are back on the road.

The bus is gone, we have the whole day in front of us and I need to get some words off my chest. So we drive the hour out of the jungle and into the city where I walk into the dealership and announce that I have some complaining to do.

They listen, they don’t seem shocked enough to my liking and ask me what I would like. I tell them.

Eventually, we drive away with a nice spare tire tucked into the trunk and a date to talk with the manager next week about refunding the bill.

I won’t hold my breathe and also, my karma/integrity mind says that really, a third of the bill would be just fine.

This life…

I had arrived at the airport and it was time to make my way to the city. I was glad to have downloaded the Uber app before leaving and once outside in the cooler-than-the-sauna-like-air-of-the-coast, I looked for a driver.

I am consistently enchanted by the way this works. How is it that there is pretty much always a driver a few minutes away from wherever I am? And how is it that I can actually see the little cartoon car get closer and closer to me? It feels like a bit of urban magic and it delights the heck out of me.

Waiting by the curb, I get a message from Dario letting me know that he is almost there - but I already knew that, thank you little cartoon car - and that when we meet, I need to get into the FRONT seat. Also, that if anyone asks, I am to say that I am his godmother.
Godmother.

Now that’s weird.

Thoughts of Sleeping Beauty come to my mind and I shoo them away.

Focus, Laura, focus. But still, godmother.

Once settled into the front seat and out of the airport, Dario explains to me that there is a law against Uber drivers picking up passengers from the airport. “We can bring them, but not pick them up,” he explains. “That’s reserved for the taxis.” He then goes on to explain that when he picks up people at the airport he is constantly dodging the police (throws his chin at the police car in the lane next to us for good measure) and that this is why he asked me to sit up front and just in case, pretend that I am his godmother. Which to me was a strange choice of relatives but what do I know?

Now we’re driving and it’s going to be a while and well, I am sitting in the front seat, like a good godmother would. I guess we’re going to have a conversation because what the heck do you do if you’re in the front seat?

I summon my inner extrovert - who was really looking forward to quiet time in the backseat - and ask him how long he has been driving for Uber.

“Just two weeks,” he said. “I had the car sitting there and so I thought I would make a little money once I clocked out of my regular job.”

We still have a long way to go and I know how to do this. “What is your other job?” I ask.
“I am a police officer” is his response.

I look at him. Surely he’s kidding. Didn’t he just tell me that he was regularly dodging the police cars? I am waiting for a smile, for a “Just kidding!” but nah. Eyes on the road. Serious as heck.

I ponder the irony. I try to say nothing.

I fail.

“So, are you saying that you spend half of your day being a policeman and half of your day avoiding policemen?”

It’s his turn to ponder. It takes him a moment or two.

Then he laughs and turns to me and bursts out: “I had never thought of that!” He thinks it’s hysterical. I can tell he’s going to be telling this joke over cervezas later on.


Me, I’m baffled.
The rest of the ride goes by smoothly and as I get out of the car, I am once again enchanted/shocked/awakened by this life south of the border.

Godmother, though?