Tempus Fugit

One minute we were celebrating New Year's Eve with beloved friends, the next minute it was Valentine's Day! If the level of action during the first month of 2011 is any indication, we're heading for an exciting year.

My brilliant nieces never cease to amaze me - I went to Chicago in mid-January to witness the great work of the Magical Starlight Theater team, when my talented niece Morgan danced, sang and beamed her beautiful way through six (count 'em, six - all in one weekend!) performances of the stage version of Disney's Aladdin. It was enchanting, full of beautiful voices and astonishing stagecraft. But sweetest of all to witness was the closeness of the troupe of actors and the excitement of the congratulatory crowds after the show. Morgan even got to give autographs! Weather was 25 degrees and sunny, though my little sis did have to shovel some snow. Luckily, I missed the blizzard that devastated the city the following week.

Devastating, though, was the news I got when I got home. Dick and I drove in to Tucson Medical Center for what we thought was a routine test for some heart flutters he'd been having. As I sat reading a travel book in the waiting room, Dick's doctor called me to the phone, said he had discovered a "nasty arrhythmia" and that if it was his heart, he'd have a defibrillator/pacemaker implanted. I gulped and said, "OK" - Dick was under anaesthesia - and that was that. This amazing little device keeps his heart from going too fast, or too slow - so we now call him the Bionic Man. He spent only one night in the hospital and is now playing tennis again. He's serving really great all of a sudden - maybe I need to get one of those things, too!

Then there was a trip to Boca, a meeting of the Bisbee Community Tennis Association at our house... and yesterday was pretty much a perfect day.

In the morning, we drove out to Whitewater Wildlife Preserve to witness the migration of the Sand Hill Cranes. Each year between January and March they pause their migration in this area, eating rice and corn left in the fields near Elfrida and Willcox, and enjoying the beautiful wetlands at Whitewater. The birds are very punctual - we had learned when Jim and Sara took us out here last year that they show up exactly at 11:30 AM each day.

Arriving early, we enjoyed sharing the beautiful weather with the friendly group of people gathered - from the serious birders making notes in their books and muttering to each other to voyeurs like us who enjoy the occasional reminder of nature's power and beauty. At approximately 11:29, we began to see tiny black dots in the distant sky... the dots grew and grew, as did the noise level, as thousands of cranes descended in flocks, their giant wings making "whoosh-whoosh" sounds in the crystal air, the birds gracefully landing among the hundreds already assembled, fluttering and squawking almost as excitedly as our little group of humans. These photos cannot capture the enormity of the sight, or the magic of the moment... but it's in our hearts (even bionic ones) forever.

We finally tore ourselves away from the birds and got home in time to prepare ourselves for the evening's festivities. Becaue I am devoted to the Bisbee Library, and especially to James, my writing teacher, I volunteered to serve at last night's Bisbee Chocolate Festival - our annual Library fundraiser. Local restaurants, as well as most of the culinarily-gifted ladies of Bisbee, have been dipping berries, baking brownies, mixing up ganache and whipping up truffles for the past week, and the results were overwhelming - and tasty!

My fellow servers and I handed out the goodies from giant Valentine-strewn tables on two floors of our handsome old Copper Queen Library, and I barely noticed that I was on my feet for two hours. Age and gender had no bearing on the enjoyment - everyone from kids to young couples on a valentine date to elderly gentlemen were in a kind of chocolate induced trance while trying to decide how to use the five (only five?!) Chocolate Tickets they received with their admission, while a lively Irish band played downstairs. And I didn't eat a thing - my heart was busy feasting on all those sweet faces.

Dick and his pals, who had been shooting pool and doing guy stuff, picked me up at festival's end, and we enjoyed the perfect ending to a perfect day... the West Texas Millionaires playing an impromptu concert after a wedding downtown... don't try to top this - can't be done!

My Schizophrenic Life

So we went through a year and a half of being either "homeless and jobless" (my husband's version) or "nomadic and free" (my version), depending on who you ask. In May, we settled in Bisbee (no longer homeless) and in October, I was awarded a consulting contract with my former employer in Florida (no longer jobless). Yay - money in the bank! Yay - I get to work with people I really like!

This very positive development has me feeling a bit schizophrenic, though. No two places in the world could be more opposite than Bisbee, Arizona and Boca Raton, Florida. Dick has always called Bisbee "the anti-Boca"... and now I am splitting my life between the two.

One day I'm listening to tropical birds and enjoying the lush blanket of hot humid air at sea level - the next day I'm in the high and dry desert, feeling an autumnal nip in the air.

One day I'm sitting in a board room reviewing multi-million dollar budgets, the next day I'm at the Bisbee Woman's Club, where we have to vote on whether it's more cost-effective to let the power company pay us $30 for the Club's used refrigerator or try to sell it on craigslist.

One day I'm debating the virtues of various creative agencies for our 2011 TV spot, the next I'm reviewing the steps to take to get the USTA to give us a grant to re-surface the Vista Park tennis courts.

One day I'm forced to eat airport food and room service, the next day I'm perusing the fresh goat cheese (directly from our favorite goat, Bambi) at the Bisbee Farmer's Market.

One day I'm idling my rental car among Ferraris and Lamborghinis as palm trees wave in the scented breeze, the next I'm feeling very small in my Mini Cooper amongst the 4x4s and giant pickup trucks on the rutted, dusty roads of Cochise County.

What to do? For the moment, just sit back and enjoy the ride...

Trial By Fire

Okay, I'm getting a bit dramatic here, but it was a dramatic event! We attended the Pit Fire Festival out at Cochise College on Wednesday night with our friends Jeff and Liz. As usual for Bisbee, the crowd was an interesting mix of cowboy hats and body piercings... the ceramics department from the college built a huge (I mean football field huge)bonfire of pallettes over their ceramics, and then the object of the evening was to set this monster on fire, to fire their pots and provide a spectacular blazing headache for the Bisbee Fire Department.

There was a silent auction of some remarkable ceramic works - I bought a piece of Mata Ortiz pottery from Mexico - and the culinary arts students fed the entire crowd with free food! As you can imagine, there was quite a line, and we feasted on truly delicious chili, clam and shrimp chowder, sandwiches, fruit veggies and out of this galaxy delicious chocolate mint cookies. There was a festive show with local bands and ethnic dances - then as the sun was setting, the college rodeo team galloped around the fire pit bearing the American and Arizona flags - an enormous cloud of dust turning pink and purple in the sunset as they tore down the field... goose bumps, for sure.

Before they started the fire, a pyrotechnic dance troop did an amazing fire dance featuring scantily clad girls and giant devil dogs on stilts, all juggling fire batons to feverish drumming... and then - at the signal -pit fire was set alight with a whoosh - the sparks flew in the air, the wood crackled and the whole world took on an orange glow, under the midnight blue, cloud streaked sky... a full moon looked like the glowing end of a cosmic cigarette, dropping sparks and ashes all around.

Imagine what this looked like the following morning... billowing clouds of taupe colored ash on the ground, colorful pots sticking out of the ash like newly sprouted plants. The whole evening was either an amazing tribal ritual, or proof that people will go to great lengths to entertain themselves in a small town. I prefer to think the former.

Busy in Bisbee!

I was very cranky last week because we had made plans to go away and I was going to miss two writing classes, two USTA league matches, a lunch in Naco with friends and the Pie Baking Contest at the Farmer's Market. As it turned out, the week's birthday trip was absolutely wonderful and the best thing we could have done, but the fact remains... we are busy here! When my far away friends ask, "But what do you DO there?" - I hardly know where to begin...

So I'll begin on the weekend before vacation, which was the weekend of the Bisbee Bloomers Garden Tour. Sara and I had volunteered to be Suzi's slaves for the Bisbee Bloomers party at her house on Friday night, the evening soiree before the weekend's garden tours. All the ladies in the Bloomers, as well as people whose gardens were on the tour were invited. Since I was the bartender, I had the primo spot in the carport, next to the new desert mural Suzi had just painted on her carport wall... between the lovely wine I was pouring and the high level of interest in the mural, I got to meet just about everybody!

On Saturday's tour, the gardens we saw were astonishing... most of them tucked back behind unassuming walls and fences, so that walking into these hidden edens literally could make you gasp in surprise - so much beauty, so much care lavished on these lush islands of color, sound and aroma... I wanted to live in every one of them! Several of the garden owners offered refreshments, and some even employed musicians, including our friend Jack, who played his guitar in his very own shady bower.

This weekend was also the Plein Aire Painting weekend, so many of the painters went to the gardens for inspiration... I suspect their work will show up in local galleries shortly.

The best thing about the Garden Tour is that the money raised goes to supply Doggie Poop Bags at stations all around town, which probably explains why, although everyone in Bisbee seems to own at least two dogs, you very seldom see the unlovely evidence of their well-fed existence on the local streets and sidewalks. Thanks, ladies!

As for last week's vacation... that's worth a whole 'nother story... stay tuned!

Labor Day Labors

Labor Day has always been one of my favorite holidays, because I never, ever, ever labor on that day. It's a lazy, end-of-summer, don't-do-anything-unless-you-want-to kind of holiday - with my apologies to the American workforce, who definitely deserve some recognition, especially in light of the great reduction in their number. However, there are cool drinks, warm friends and the US Open to consider - makes LD second only to Thanksgiving in the pantheon of excellent holidays.

This year's Labor Day weekend started with a vintage car show on the Vista. Hundreds of (well, at least a hundred) vintage cars in cherry condition, proud owners sitting in folding chairs in the shade, accepting accolades from passers-by. Our favorites, of course, were the 1964 Mini Cooper woody station wagon, made in Italy (who knew?) and lovingly restored by our friend Bill, pictured here with his wife Shari and their pug, Maude - as well as Jim's awesome Triumph motorcycle, on which Dick has spent some happy hours.

Sunday's Brewery Gulch Daze celebration was, as expected, weird, Bisbee-esque and great fun. Brewery Gulch is named for - how clever of you to guess it - the old Brewery, which still stands proudly as the site of the Stock Exchange bar. There was a pet parade, which we shouldn't have missed but did (it was at the hour appointed for tennis at the park), an art car parade (which we didn't miss - check out the photos), lots of great grub, from BBQ to chiles rellenos, henna-painting booths, a kids' art show, and much much more. Dick narrowly escaped being run down by a hot-dog shaped car - what a way to go...

The final event was a meeting of The Breakfast Club - a breakfast potluck with a group of friends who were our first introduction to Bisbee, when we joined them at Jim and Sara's back in January. Little did we know how our lives would become entwined, all because we're suckers for a homemade breakfast buffet. Yes, the universe is random, as we always suspected.

Shootout at the OK Corral

In order to get to Bisbee on Highway 80, you drive directly through Tombstone, Arizona, which bills itself as "the town too tough to die" and features some pretty weird stuff, like the Comedy Gunfights that happen every day at the historic OK Corral. I always think, "What would that be like? Making your living as a pretend Wyatt Earp or Doc Holliday in a comedy gunfight? What the hell is funny about a gunfight?" Only in America, right? Between the comedy gunfights and the Mad Miner's Mini-Golf, I've pretty much avoided spending much time in Tombstone.

However, guns are part of the culture here. At the tennis club in Sierra Vista where I play my league matches, the sign on the door to the clubhouse bar reads "Absolutely No Weapons Allowed". I always thought my forehand was my weapon, but I think they mean the cold, hard, metal kind with bullets. And, every Sunday morning when we play on our local Bisbee courts, we can hear the guys at the shooting range blasting away up on the mountain, which causes our friend Steve to mutter "fuckin' Mexicans.."

Last Friday night about 10:30, Dick and I were reading in bed (oh, the wild life of the semi-retired...)when we heard gunshots, five or six in rapid succession, coming from the direction of the road to Douglas. After an interval of about five minutes, we heard police sirens and car horns honking and what seemed to be a high speed chase around the town, sirens and horns blaring. This went on for at least 15 horrifying minutes before it faded off into the distance. "Man, somebody must have done something really bad," we said, and had a little trouble getting to sleep.

The next morning our friend Jim, the Bisbee High tennis coach, came out to watch us play. Since he's lived here most of his life, and coached at Bisbee High for 28 years, I figured he might have a clue as to what went on the night before with the guns, sirens, car horns, etc. "Oh, yeah," he said. "That was so cool - our football team beat Douglas last night for the first time in 20 years - we have a 140-year rivalry, the second-longest in American high school football history! What a celebration we had!"

I didn't ask him which rivalry was the first-longest... still a city girl.

The Story of Mr. Stripey... with a Spicy Ending

Our high desert climate is uniquely great... cool and dry in the winter and absolutely glorious in the summer. Summer temperatures are moderate by Arizona standards, and daily rains keep our little oasis green and blooming all summer long. At night we snooze with the windows open and comforters up; by day, intense sun is moderated by the storms that race across the desert, showing off huge cotton ball thunderheads, booming with thunder and lightning.

Because of this upside-down climatic state, we got away with not planting tomatoes until mid-June this year. The last thing I did during my shopping frenzy at the nursery was to pick up little tomato seedling with the whimsical tag "Mr. Stripey" - who could resist? And as the other tomato plants burst forth with a flurry of yellow blossoms and verdant leafiness throughout June and July, Mr. Stripey was stubborn - he would bloom and then give up, bloom and then give up. We even googled Mr. Stripey and got some disappointing news - "very little fruit - not much flavor" said the reviews from other disgruntled gardeners. So we didn't pay much attention when one blossom finally turned into a tiny green Mr. Stripey - "very little fruit, not much flavor" we'd say, with a fatalistic shake of our heads.

Then one day we noticed that he was growing, got a little bigger, and then grew, and grew, and grew, and GREW into the giant orange and green striped Godzilla of all heirloom tomatoes. Even more astonishing, several other potential Mr. Stripeys have popped out, while the more normal fruit on the other vines has ripened and been gobbled up in pasta sauce, sandwiches, salads. Wouldn't you know it - Mr. Stripey turned out to be the King Tomato of the lot - now we say things like "I remember him when he was just a little guy..." Just goes to show you - sometimes you need to pay some extra attention to the quiet ones, and don't believe everything you google... they just might turn out to be big winners! I'd show you a pic of Mr. Stripey but he was sliced up last night and served with just a dash of aged balsamic. Delicious.

Now for the spicy part: Dick and I both created entries for the Salsa Competition last Saturday at the Farmer's Market. We tested our creations on Jim and Sara, who suggested some astute flavor enhancements. We perfected the recipes and made up the final batches for the Big Day. Mine - Crazy Cathy's Wild & Wacky Watermelon Salsa - was a refreshing and unusual mix - very tasty, but I didn't expect to win with a "non-traditional" entry - not in this very Mexican town! But Dick's recipe - Screamin' Dick's Hellfire Roasted Tomato Salsa - was as good as it gets. Tomatoes and chiles, roasted on the grill, lots of garlic and onion, with just enough lime to make your taste buds tingle... in my book, it was salsa perfection.

We were on the tennis courts on Farmer's Market day when the smell of fresh chiles being roasted at the market wafted across the courts. We could see people walking, zombie-like, toward that intoxicating smell - as if we were in Guyana and Jim had just mixed up a new batch of Kool-Aid. We finished our set and ran home to grab our entries and take them to the market... then we whiled away time chatting with friends and political candidates doing their last bit of glad-handing before Tuesday's election, all the while looking nervously toward the salsa booth, where the judges were tasting salsas with grim and critical expressions, clipboards in hand. Dick was so anxious that he stood behind the judges, trying to hear what they were saying. A photo of this showed up (embarrassingly) in the Monday paper. "Who's that guy in the baseball cap and Cuba tee-shirt, looking over the judge's shoulders in that photo on the front page?" "Um... never saw him before in my life..."

Long story short - the winner was a standard salsa that could have come off the shelves at Safeway - not that we're bitter. When you fall off the horse, you have to climb right back on - so we're working on our recipes for the Chili Competition.

Animal Dreams

As any of you who are patient enough to have read this blog for a while may remember, we fell in love with a goat that we named "Gaston" last winter. We were in France with our friends the Fabians, walking around the village in the crisp, frosty air, when we came upon Gaston, with his sweet little yellow eyes, bleating "Why am I the only creature stuck out in this arctic freeze besides the American idiots?"... or some French equivalent. We fed him, took his picture, talked to him, and generally made asses of ourselves - I'm sure the village ladies were peeking out behind their curtains, shaking their heads and rolling their eyes in Gallic amusement.

As if that wasn't exciting enough - there's an update! When the Fabians returned to Le Gue de la Chaine this summer, they went to visit Gaston and - voila - the farmer who owns Gaston was cleaning up the pen. They struck up a conversation and found out that Gaston's real name is "Popeye" - very macho, don't you think? While deep in conversation, Margaret (Madame Fabian) had a brilliant idea - could she lease Gaston from the farmer for a few days to mow down some weeds? Of course, said the farmer, secretly thinking how he couldn't wait to tell his wife how many euros he charged this lady from California so Gaston, er, Popeye could eat some lovely new cuisine.

Well... everybody was pleased with this plan, except Gaston/Popeye, who refused to eat the long grass, and instead bleated his head off and ate a hole in the neighbor's hedge, which now has to be paid for. Can't help but think something was lost in translation.

On a more somber note, we lost a wonderful friend this week. Jim and Sara's bulldog, Omar, was not what you'd call handsome - unless you were a lady bulldog, I guess. But he had an excess of charisma... extreme life force... especially when he catapulted all 65 muscular pounds of himself onto your lap when you were distracted by something else. Dick likened this leap to a fire hydrant being thrown onto his balls, not a good thing for a guy. Omie used to try to get my attention by doing what he perceived as bounding around playfully, which was more like a canine version of "white men can't jump"... but he tried, he really did. Then if I still didn't pay attention to him, he'd steal his brother Dylan's tennis ball and run off with it, shaking his head and growling... and if that still didn't get me, he'd eat a few rocks... got a rise out of me every time.

When we waved goodbye as Jim and Sara drove off on vacation in June, we never dreamed that we wouldn't see Omie again. When we got the news that he'd been run over and killed, the whole neighborhood mourned. "I need my Omie fix!" said our tennis friend Mike. "He was such a funny little fart..." sniffed Suzi. The only non-mourner was Vicky the cat, who showed her face in the back yard for the first time in several months. All in all, it's very sad - we'll miss him - but we know there are probably plenty of warm laps, slobbery tennis balls and really tasty rocks in doggie heaven.

High Desert Summer

As I sit here, the cool breezes waft out of the canyons, raising the window curtains and softly shaking the perfume from the jasmine just outside. My friend Sara told me that Bisbee was paradise in the summer, but having spent my high school and college years in Arizona, I was dubious to say the least. Summer? In Arizona? Paradise? Growing up in the Phoenix area, summer was closer to that other final destination... the really really hot one. But it's true - we have glorious, sunny tennis mornings here, and then, just when the A/C is about to kick in - the perfumed breezes start, and they bring the rain.

Local legends add to the color, too... at my writing class the other day I learned about Marge, the former Phelps-Dodge secretary who was awarded a job as librarian at the Copper Queen Library when the mine closed. She was a cranky old curmudgeon who knew nothing about libraries, hated hippies, and would come knocking on your door in person if you had an overdue book. Luckily for us, Marge finally retired and my lovely friend Donna, of the sweet smile and Library Science degree, has brought the library into the 21st century... book groups, writing classes, kids' programs - all free to us lucky Bisbonians.

Dick's friend Mel came for a visit last week, and we took him on a tour of the mine and other historical venues, while catching up on his latest adventures. The wackiest moment of the week came when he and Dick were accosted during their photo safari to Old Bisbee by two traveling rabbis. These Lubavitcher proselytizers proceeded to give each of the guys a second Bar Mitzvah, right there on the street. Only in Bisbee...maybe the Republicans are right, this IS a dangerous place!

Speaking of dangerous, our tennis friend Naco George (so named because he lives right on the border in Naco, Arizona, just a few miles away) was awakened by a loud, repetitive twanging sound a few nights ago. He looked out his window and discovered that some enterprising Mejicanos were sling-shotting packages of dope across the border, right over his back yard... he went back to bed, hoping this was just a bad dream... when the local gang that couldn't shoot straight came to the rescue, guns blazing, they succeeded only in making noise... the hombres, armed with slingshots, ran giggling off into the night.

Fantasyland? Adventureland? Tomorrowland? Or Frontierland? You decide. I'm having a margarita.

An All American Celebration!

A celebration is pretty much just what the doctor ordered these days - a cure for what ails us... for the malaise, the fretting over the future, the sinking feeling as we watch economic indicators continue going down, down, down... and yet. And yet, there's so much to celebrate about this country - and the world.

Right smack in the middle of the American Independence Day festivities, we have two international sporting events that lift us up: at Wimbledon, Rafael Nadal once again proves that grace is a physical, mental and spiritual attribute, and the footballers from even the tiniest countries are transcendant in the World Cup, vuvuzelas and all!

Here in our little town of Bisbee, this is one of the biggest weekends of the year. The sense of community, ever present, is even more obvious now. Pride in our history, appreciation of the natural beauty that surrounds us, and joy that comes from our art and our kids - all are featured in the weekend's events.

Our friend Kathy came from the Bay Area to spend the weekend, and from the minute she met us down in Old Bisbee, it was a non-stop Bisbonian adventure. The kids have a Soap Box Derby on the morning of the 4th, so on the 3rd the local art community, not to be out-done, had a showing of "art cars" that were soap box racers of a different stripe (and polka dot, and plaid)... one car shaped like a sardine can, one a cupcake, a Coke can, a statue, a boat... all displayed downtown while serving bratwurst and beer, the first of many potentially lethal but sinfully delicious feasts of the weekend.

On our Saturday hike in Ramsey Canyon, a Nature Conservancy project, we experienced wild turkeys, leopard frogs, trogans and never-ending views. That night, we walked to a baseball game at Warren Stadium - the oldest continuously operating ball park in the U.S. What could be more American? Well, maybe the fact that in addition to watching the Bisbee Copper Kings annihilate their opponents, we got an autograph from Babe Ruth's grand-daughter, who was here to celebrate the 4th, in a park where her grand-dad once played his powerful game.

Sunday's parade included, once again, the soap box derby cars and the Copper Kings, but also the "Peace is Patriotic" ladies - god bless them - Veterans, Boy Scouts, candidates for office, marching bands, floats, and even a special mini-parade of old farm and mining equipment. In the afternoon, we went back to an era when men were men and they all worked in the copper mines - we attended Bisbee's 110th Annual Mucking and Drilling Competition, where the miners demonstrate their skills. As we watched in awe, Big Matt drilled a 13" deep hole in solid rock by pounding a hand drill with a hammer... this is what the drillers used to do all day - drill holes for the dynamite that was used to blast out the rock. To give some perspective on how hard this is, an amateur tried to do it and managed to make a 1/2" hole in the same amount of time.

Our friend Suzi (or Her Grace, as she preferred to be called this weekend) gave a wonderful 4th of July party in her garden, which is just below the hill where the firemen stand to send off the fireworks. We sat in lawn chairs, open-mouthed, staring straight up at the sky until we got stiff necks, watching the bombs bursting in air, ooh-ing and ah-ing on cue - red, white, blue, purple, orange, green, and NOISY! The citizens of the town (including us) raised the money for the fireworks, since the City announced that they were too broke to pony up - and it was so worth it. Since fireworks are legal in our neighboring states of Sonora and New Mexico, many amateur pyromaniacs were at it as well... most of the dogs in town were close to a nervous breakdown by the time it was over. Many people had picnics out in our park, called the Vista, and had been there since morning when they hunkered down for the parade, so by 10 PM the town was on the edge of chaos...

Monday morning, while it seemed the entire town was asleep, we walked through silent Old Bisbee, listening to the ghosts of the tough old miners, madames and ranchers, who seemed to say, "Great party! Now buck up and get back to work... times are hard, but we've seen harder...git goin'!"

Domestic Adventures

Domestic adventures... after spending 14 months "walking the earth", as they say in Pulp Fiction, we are bona fide citizens of Bisbee, Arizona. Some have queried our decision-making process, but we have a quiet and comfortable life here - cool mornings and evenings on the front porch, enjoying the garden and the little black neighbor cat who always comes by for head scratching, purring... cooking my way through my friend Barbara Fenzl's "Southwest The Beautiful" cookbook, in my sweet new kitchen - I've always wanted an herb window! Reading and watching the French Open, me luxuriating on my beloved purple couch and Dick, of course, in his leather recliner.

Best of all is tennis at public courts in the Vista, the local park a block from our house. Tennis has enriched our lives by keeping our elderly bodies on the run, but even more importantly it has been a common denominator that we've been able to use time and time again, on almost every continent, to forge new friendships, to challenge our concept of ourselves, to teach us about gritting it out through difficult situations. We recently lost a dear friend who was an early tennis mentor, which made me stop to think about the magnificent gift she gave me when she encouraged me to play. Thanks, Brenda - wish you could visit us in our new town and see how tennis, once again, has made us feel at home.

Back to the Future in BZB

Our friends in the San Francisco Bay area and South Florida are probably thinking that Dick and Cathy have finally lost it... living in a tiny, funky little town on the Mexican border on a barely paved street... what could anyone possibly do there? This weekend was a rousing example of how to make your own fun - and it was a rip-snorter! (God - we've only been here a month and I sound like Gabby Hayes... oy.)

On Saturday morning, we walked over to the Farmer's Market - past the charming houses on the Vista, which is our main drag in this area of Bisbee, called Warren. Houses were built for the executives of the Phelps Dodge copper mine that once thrived here, and all originated from the first 20 years of the 20th century - they're all bungalows of varying sizes and styles. It was Fiber Weekend at the Farmer's Market - and no, this isn't about eating your bran - it was about how to make things from yarn, starting with shearing an animal and moving on from there. We saw angora rabbits, alpacas, and even a live sheep shearing exhibition - fun for us, less so for the sheep - and then we watched local ladies spin the yarn and knit it into totally cool stuff. Other highlights of the market are the tamale guy, who summers in Palo Alto and makes tamales that would be the pride of any Mexican abuela... and the produce farmers who come here on Saturdays from Patagonia, a short drive away, and bring corn, tomatos, lettuces and herbs that are definitely ready for prime time, though it's only May.

But the BIG moment of the weekend came on Saturday night at "Bisbee Idol" - a fundraiser for the local homeless shelter that's modeled after "American Idol". The locals came out in droves to perform and to vote for their faves. The winner of the best Male Performer was a tubby, grey-haired guy who called himself "Fish Rap" - performing an original rap number that left the audience rolling in the aisles. Best Female performer was not a surprise, as she's a standout from local musicals and dramas who sang "Don't Rain on My Parade" - if you closed your eyes, you'd swear it was Barbra herself on the stage. And our favorite was the female cross-dresser who sang "New York New York" dressed as Frank Sinatra, but voting was unfortunately hindered by the fact that no one knew whether to vote for her/him as Best Female or Male... bummer. My heart went out to Bobo, an adorable pixie-like 60-something woman who sang "Memories" from the musical Cats... the emcee said (sotto voce), "please vote for Bobo because her cat just died..." and people hooted from the audience at 90-year-old judge Millicent, who was a bit fermischt from time to time... people were yelling "Turn your mike up, Millie, we can't hear a thing you're saying!"

So real, so small town, so funny - it makes me believe in humanity again, at least for a night...