2nd Week Roundup

Emily and I arrived in Raxó two weeks ago tonight, and are by now now set in a routine that is starting to feel very much like home (if still new and foreign, both literally and figuratively).

Barring any unforeseen complications, this coming week we will take care of my DNI (national identity card), and Emily's foreign equivalent, and will be all set with that paperwork.  Beyond that, we've taken care of most priorities and purchased most one-time things that we anticipate needing while here, and have approached each day lately with the same kind of goals and urgency as we did while living together in Buffalo.  The main difference has been, of course, that we now have a luxury of free time and limited-responsibility that we have not really ever known.  While Emily started her Spanish language classes this week (and has been doing well, trying hard, and maintaining great enthusiasm), she is bound to nobody but herself to go.  Similarly, I have no outward responsibility to anyone or anything, a kind of freedom that can border on the frightening.

To combat this, Emily and I have been very diligent about keeping to a routine that avoids the temptation of being in "vacation mode"; I wake up with her every morning at around 7:15, and as she leaves to take the bus for school (at around 7:50), I get ready to start my morning, which consists of a small breakfast, some exercise, a shower, and then sitting down to write.  Emily gets home slightly before 3 PM, and from there we have been granting ourselves the freedom to spend the rest of the evening as we like.

I've found the routine very helpful so far--a productive and edifying discipline.  This week I've been focusing on finishing the supplemental material writings I need for my applications, assignments that have been maddeningly frustrating for me, but still not without legitimate merit.  I am periodically still very stressed about the prospect of completing and submitting these applications, and I don't think I'll be able to truly relax until I get them all in (which I am hoping to do by around mid-October).

Things have relaxed and quieted down a lot here in the second week as compared to the first.  My family, by and large, seems to have trusted that Emily and I can fend for ourselves, and haven't felt the need to check in or worry about us.  The summer season is pretty much officially over now--it seems to have happened, unannounced, the middle of this week--and though the weather is still lovely there is an unmistakably different vibe in the air here.  Raxó, the tiny town we live in, benefits a lot from tourism in the summer months (mainly from Spaniards from other parts of the country, but occasionally from other Europeans as well), and many of its businesses sustain themselves solely through that.  On account of the fact that we live directly on top of the beach, our awareness of those changes have been heightened: today, despite lovely weather (the aforementioned weather forecast was wrong), barely anyone graced the beach at midday; when Emily and I got coffee and ice cream at the bar below us in mid-evening, the proprietor of the usually-buzzing (now-empty) establishment told us they would be open only on weekends until next Spring.  Though I've heard a lot about the differences in Raxó in the off-season, I've never been here other than during summer, and I am very intrigued to experience the town in this new light.

Still, not much has changed in the grand scheme of things.  In spite of all that I've just mentioned, life this week maintained the same jovial spontaneity and focus on simple pleasures that I've always known here.  Walking home from the grocery store this evening, Lalo spotted us from within a bar and called us in, demanding we share a glass of wine with him.  Manolo is having us over for a special asado (barbecued/roasted meats) lunch tomorrow, already the fourth meal we've shared with him.  Tina is having us over for lunch on Sunday, during which she will also teach Emily some special recipes.  This weekend also marks a special Catholic holy celebration here, Virgen de la Saleta and Virgen del Carmen (which seems to be, as I've gathered, simply more classic examples of Catholics celebrating chicks who don't put out), and though I am uninterested in the religious aspects of the of it I may venture to the church to explore it from a sociological perspective.

Well, that's all that's on my mind for now.  Check back later, ¡chau!