Here's how you do it

I've talked to a number of friends lately who are teetering on the brink of their dreams. It's like an outbreak or something. Everyone's looking to mutiny, make a jailbreak from the mundane. What does it take to make it happen, get through the confusion, stop feeling so awful? they ask.

It takes an unswerving commitment to dig into your heart and then follow what's there. No matter what.

Be fearless. You must not let your doubts and fears stop you. Money, time, security, grief, loneliness, your past: these are excuses. See them for what they are. Illusions. Trust me. They are just illusions to be blown away like smoke, no matter how big they seem. I KNOW this.

So you've been scared before. Bankrupt before. Hurt before. Someone stomped your heart. Someone trapped you, ignored you, beat you down. Broke you. You feel like you fucked up. You did fuck up. Me, too. So what? So what? Do it anyway.

How do you figure out what you want? Ask yourself: What brings me bliss?

Start moving in the direction of your dreams and trust me, you'll be supported. I KNOW this, too.

Who am I? A woman that will never stop. I want to keep traveling, tasting, exploring the world, people, adventures, all the range of emotions and senses. I make my own rules. I will have a home base next to the ocean but I will always be on the move somehow. I'm a writer and will always be. I'm going to go to massage school one day. I have so much to share and I will do it, blissfully and without reserve. I am ready - despite my fears! - to have a fiercely / gently passionate relationship with a fellow traveler who takes one look at me and can say,

WOW. I want some more of you. As much as possible. Starting right now. Been waiting for this all my life, baby.

Oh, yum.

I will follow this path even at the risk of death because it's the only way I can live.

Valentine's Day 2011

Happy Valentine's Day: here's wishing you unfettered joy and pleasure no matter where you are, who you're with, or what you're doing.

I started this blog on February 14, 2010, to chronicle my writing journey. It's taken me from North Carolina, to Maine (where I launched the blog), to Mexico, back to Maine...and completing that circle, back to North Carolina once again. Phew.

Thank you for reading...

Hello, me

So things didn't turn out as planned. Here's what I came away with. It hit me - not that I didn't know it, but it really sunk in, you know? - that I was staying in the exact hotel room where two years before, I had decided to quit my job and start writing, looking down at the same waves, out at the same palm trees, and up at the same stars. 2009 me was so yearning, so broken. And 2010 me thought:

Knowing what I know now, will I still pull her through?

Yes. The answer is yes.

And that, for me, may have been the whole reason I was back in Vallarta for that short, painful, and poignant time.

las olas (the waves)

Sleeping and waking to the sound of the ocean. Why am I back in Mexico? Well, why wouldn't a writer and lover be?

graciasgraciasgracias

I am seeing how much I have changed - from frazzled confusion to wild art - this past year, even in the few months since I left Mexico.

I am here for sabor: taste, experience, senses.

And I am here to surprise myself.

Cosmic seduction

A few weeks ago I posed the question what happens when I let the cosmos have its way with me?

I go back to Mexico, of course.

By the way, the gorgeous mural above says remember who you are.

Mexico

I am going back to Mexico as soon as I can.

Extraño Mexico (I miss Mexico)

This guy seems to be looking for warmer shores. Or perhaps just a tasty fish. As for me, I miss Mexico so much I feel it in my bones, on my skin, in my feet. I want to pack a bag and get on the plane tonight.

My friends in Puerto Vallarta tell me this is the rainiest rainy season in 50 years, with multiple torrential downpours per day, washed out roads and bridges, flooding. I can only imagine the jungle there now: conflagration of green!

I'll wait til things dry out a bit. And until I finish my current journey (Book Numero Uno).

But if I shut my eyes, I taste the avocados. Smell lime. I see the sun dropping into the ocean. I hear banda music blaring from a pickup truck late at night. My feet in flip-flops familiar with the cobblestone streets. The people who somehow look at me and know me, immediately.

Miss Mexico as much as a lover. More than.

OHHHHHHHH.

A return

I'm back in Maine, which is now blooming and alive.

But my very first morning back in the US looked like this:

I believe the hotel room above - result of a delayed flight on the way home - was the polar opposite of Mexico. Just look at it! Ascetic, corporate, muted inoffensive colors.

SIGH and SIGH again.

My heart is alternating between the emotion of the two photos: happy blossom and gray fog. I miss Mexico ferociously, with every fiber. Yet, I need to be home right now. The book demands it. So for the moment, I content myself with a gentle transition sweetened with lobster rolls and blueberry sodas...

Any words of wisdom from my posse out there?

Ultimo dia en Mexico

Last day in Mexico. Everything took on a new sheen, down to the 3am techno music wake up call and dusty streets.

My mind said how can you leave Mexico? My heart answered you don't leave Mexico. It stays in you forever, no matter where you go.

My Mexican friends only said cuando regresas? When are you coming back? For them it was a given that I was only leaving for a little while.

I started this blog to chronicle the journey from Maine to Mexico. Today I realized that somewhere along the way, I'd already placed a period after Maine. Winter in Maine. Period.

And yet, God had placed a comma. Maine, the place where I'll go through the editing process.

I feel quite comfortable with the continuation of From Icy to Spicy because while I will be departing Vallarta, I've become one spicy woman.

So stay tuned.

Adios, Mexico

I have finished my book. 12 months, 7 beds, 2 countries, 1 dream realized.

And I am leaving Mexico. As a friend said though, I´ve been bitten (literally!). I will return someday.

Gracias, Mexico, por todos...

Goat's milk caramel lollipops

... do I need to say anything more? Oh. My. God. DELICIOUS! Haute cuisine flavor for a Cheetos price.

Viva

Hermit

Why didn't I see it before? In the process of writing this book, I've purposely put myself in situations that are isolating, all while feeling terribly lonely.

Maine in winter. Enough said. I lived in a coastal town that is basically closed from October through May. I hear they are still - still! - wearing sweaters there.

Puerto Vallarta in summer. I had visions of shaking off the dust and embracing life again. I'm realizing now that the weather here is conducive to staying inside. And as people keep telling me, it's not even begun to get hot yet: just wait til the rains start in June. As it gets hotter, I will spend more time in my apartment with the glorious view. People have also said that Vallarta really comes alive from November to March (and not now, when I am here). To be fair, as far as liveliness goes, Mexico is at the opposite end of the spectrum from Maine.

Fuck.

Am I just incredibly smart, creating spaces to force me to face myself and write...or what? I don't know how to feel.

Shooting star

Last night I talked to a new friend from neon-pink sunset until the stars came out and beyond. We lay on the sand, looking up at the sky and out of nowhere this marvelous laughter. All night, this laughter cascading parading serenading out of me.

me encanta mexico
i love mexico

A last thought

I've let go of detailed intentions for my trip. Maybe it will be one week - and that would be great. Maybe it will be three months - that would be great too. No more trying to structure magic.

My desires are:

To be warm.
To laugh.
To surrender & receive.

Blank canvas

Back when I went into my office job each day, I just knew. I knew, for the most part, what awaited me. The bad included unreasonable executives, sitting in a cubicle, body aches, the commute, panic. The good included yoga, seeing a friend, or wine and food at an expensive bistro. Or maybe just lots of wine at said bistro. The ache of frustrated dreams plagued me, as did loneliness, but a comfortable predictability reigned.

What about once I venture to Mexico? A great unknown. I can feel it but I don't know it. A sage might ask, well, Kelly, what do you want from your time in Mexico?

That I do know. Adventure. A big book deal, and soon. And love. The love of my life.

I feel a pushy urge for the trip to be monumental, in exchange for all the emotional currency I've laid down. I want certainty! I changed my entire life for this book. Threw off the shackles of comfort for not knowing.

Knowing everything would take away the magic of surprise, whispers the sage.

Sueño

It means dream.I am trusting my deepest instincts, which are telling me in no uncertain terms to go to Mexico right now. I just don't think I'd be pushed towards something that would hurt me. That kind of fearlessness is how this artist has to live her life.

"I just can't live my dream and be myself...because something bad will happen!!!"

No, no, no.

I am writing the story as I go along and the next chapters are all about sun, sand, sass, senses, surrender, sexuality, spring, summer...sueño. Notice how the sound of "S" is like the ocean?

I know I will be safe and welcomed wherever I roam.

Happy Spring Equinox, all!

Riding the wheel

During a tarot reading, the Wheel of Fortune came up for my time in Mexico. Once I heard the meaning, I had to smile. And every time I think of it, I smile yet again.

Jane Lyle's The Secret Tarot says that the Wheel of Fortune card signifies "change, movement, and unexpected twists of fate." It is a transcendent (one of my favorite words!) card representing both the end and beginning of something.

Aeclectic Tarot goes even further, painting a glorious picture of what awaits, based on the appearance of this card: "Call it karmic payback for all the good things they've done in life - destiny or just luck - but whatever lotteries are out there, large or small, they've just won one."

Gracias.

¡Hola, mis amigas y amigos!

I am rewilding myself.

That is, I am returning to a natural state, the sexy juicy bold brave raw loving savoring celebrating curious cosmic circumstance I would inhabit without the interference of the humdrum and ho-hum. Just like a jaguar dancing through jungle foliage.

Let’s take a look at Kelly in her habitat. Here she is, strolling down the street in some tropical locale, clothed in a pink t-shirt and a floaty bit of skirt, her smile a stupor of joy. Here she is, sitting on a verdant veranda, journal in hand. See her playing in the waves. See her eating guacamole. See her finally finishing her memoir and shaking her hips in front of her laptop…

To get back to my worldly wildness, first I have to get out of Maine!

I am heading to Mexico.

Last February I traveled to Puerto Vallarta on a last-minute vacation whim, drenching myself in ocean and sunset. In May, I left a decade-long corporate career. During the summer, I bounced from friend to friend and wrote like my life depended on it. Which it did, I think. Against a backdrop of flaming fall foliage, I road tripped to Maine.

And then it got cold.

And then it got colder.

Who knew they made fleece pants?

Damn. Is that my big hibernation ass in the mirror? Junk in the trunk!

One day as I gazed out at cars drifting by on Route 1, I knew my winter writing retreat was over. It was time to put up or shut up. I’d quit a job – a career – to do this. Time to put myself out there and go back to Mexico. Puerto Vallarta and I have some unfinished, enchanted business.

Happy Valentine’s Day, me!

I consider my book a love letter. Penning a memoir ties you up and teaches you to love life. All of it. The pain and the laughs, the watery peaks and troughs, the lobster rolls and slippery sidewalks, the breakdowns and shakeups and breakups, the fucking, the loving, the sweet sweaty pleasure of who you really are when you forget yourself.

I’ve already fought my way to the top. Now, I shall surrender my way to the top. This will be easy to do with the spicy, lime-scented breezes of Mexico under my wings.

Come with me.