Two Floors and a Plan

Gimme some colors to play with!

As I sit down to write this, sweat is pouring down my face. Last year, I found it odd, and I fought it. Wiped it a lot, talked about it a lot and wondered if that was normal. This year, it feels sweetly familiar  and I just let it drip, send love to my big tall metal fan and carry on. Then I remember that it is not even June so not to get too impressed with myself.

So, yes. It's getting hot.

Which means that in the we-don't-know-how-near future, one day the sky will open and gallons of water will fall. The jungle will almost instantaneously turn green and it's possible that I will cry at the magnificence of the earth taking its first drink in 6 months.

Unless the skylights are not covered on my roof and then I will just ... cry.

Anyhoo.

I am still not ready to let my breath out all the way and recount the last twelve days but I will say this: we now have a crew of two. Jorge and his son-in-law Luis. The fact that a man named Luis and a man named a Jorge are building me a house shows what a good sense of humor Life has, that is not lost on me.

A crew of two. For a while there, it was tense. Oh boy. In the end, I may never know what really happened but I can tell you that 1) Jorge seems hurt and 2) it has taken a lot of Morning Pages to get me through the last few days as I contemplated the possibility of not finishing the house, even though Jorge assured me that would never happen. "No way. I'm here till the end" he said. And then we both cried a little. Again. What the heck?

Ok, till the end. But here we are almost mid-May and we were supposed to be done. We are about 70% of the way. I need to be in the US in July.

What are we going to do?  I wailed in my notebook.

Again, Morning Pages and meditation came to my rescue and as of today, I believe we have a plan which, if implemented (and I am going to be so close to the whole thing that it just very well might) will have us finished in 3-4 weeks.

We will have gone a little over budget, a little over time, a little over-stressed. But I believe we are going to get it done.

And it's going to be beautiful.

Last night I decided that even though a guy friend who is half American and half Mexican gently explained to me that I can feel intimidating to a Mexican man, I decided to be okay with whatever that meant and just make sure Casa Salma got done. Calmly, with love. And focus.

To me, that meant a schedule and a spreadsheet.

Late last night, I created a beautiful-to-me spreadsheet including each and every little task that has to happen to get us to the finish line. Then I sprinkled these between today and June 4. Added a couple of workers. Made a schedule.

This morning, Jorge and I sat on bags of cement and went over the whole thing.

Today, we have a concrete floor in the bedroom and the bathroom. Next week they will both get colored.

On Sunday, a group of guys is going to pour the roof.
And even though I will be gone for this, on a pre-planned two-day trip, we will reconvene Monday and keep at it.

Onward.