DITL CDMX Version

I woke up as I do most days, with coffee in bed with M. Usually he makes it. We are back in the Nuevo Leon apartment, which I am very grateful for because it has a lot more space. However it has a lot more noise, as it is on a busy street and Mexico City is a very loud place. The first thing I heard today was the scrap truck and a lot of horns. 

Today was a special day because it was Laurel's birthday. We were able to find a Feliz Cumpleanos banner, and hung it up in the living room. The boys gave Laurel their birthday present, which was a set of very nice alcohol markers and some special paper. M and I gave her a new watch and a gift certificate to have her nails done. M packed his bags to run to work, and the kids and I had a slow start morning with school in pajamas and a breakfast made of what we could scrounge from the fridge. We had papaya, pineapple, toast and yogurt. Marko started off his school by watching some videos from Khan Academy and taking a unit test. He is working on Middle School physics right now. Max and I read a section of the Cricket magazine ( in English ) in which we read four news stories and had to decide which one was made up. Max is in fourth grade now, so a lot of his reading is done independently. I do try to listen to him read out loud several times a week to make sure that his fluency and reading comprehension are developing. We spent a lot of time reading these stories back and forth and then discussing what parts of them seem to believable. In the end we did not guess right though.

Laurel is working on writing a novel, as she does every November. Even though nanowrimo is no longer operational she continues this tradition. I think this is the fourth year she has produced somewhere between 20,000 and 30,000 words in a month. We usually add this fiction writing component and take away math. (We call it No Math November, because aliteration makes every routine or ritual more beloved.) However Laurel has been really struggling to get through Algebra 1. It's gone on a few years now, and both of us have decided that she has to do a little bit of math every day to try to get this wrapped up by the end of the year. 

The kids are also focusing on learning to speak Spanish. We got a solid jump start on this study by enrolling any Spanish language school during the first 4 weeks of our trip here. Now we meet a tutor on Saturdays, and during the week they practice using Duolingo, the Ella verbs app, and listen to Spanish language YouTube and spotify. They write sentences telling about what they've done, and of course practice in situ around the city. This morning we went out on an errand to pick up cupcakes for Laurel's birthday, and on the way back saw a vendor with a basket on a bicycle. The kids knew that this was called tacos de canasta, because we watched a documentary about the different types of tacos. This type has a very distinctive blue plastic bag that lines the basket. Marko is eager to try any kind of new food on the street, so he took responsibility for that transaction. Everyone agreed that the tacos were tasty, and also they are extremely affordable. Three tacos for 24 pesos, which is about $1.25 US dollar. 

After the errand we returned home for some more school work, playing video games online with friends, eating some snacks, and waiting for M to get home from the office. Normally he comes home around 5:00 or 6:00 in the evening but today he came home early so we could go together to the Cat Cafe which was Laurel's special request for her birthday outing. This turned out to be a delightful and relaxing excursion, which also gave us the opportunity to practice some more Spanish. I complimented another customer on her cute cat themed glasses. And we chatted with the staff about the cats that were up for adoption. 

After the Cat Cafe, M took the kids to the park where there is both a playground and some workout equipment, and I came home to rest, because my energy reserves are very low these days. 

Unfortunately during this trip my blood work has been trending in a negative direction in terms of disease progression. (I was diagnosed with smoldering multiple myeloma earlier this year, which is a precursor stage of multiple myeloma. It requires no treatment, but frequent monitoring because you don't want to let the disease progress too far before beginning treatment.) My main symptom is fatigue, and it has been very tricky to handle this while we're in Mexico City and the kids don't have the independence to move around the city by themselves as they do in Pittsburgh. And there are so many cool things here that we are not doing, I feel guilty about staying home so much.

We have found a nice group of homeschoolers, and go to parkour classes, art classes, and museum outings several times a week, but there's nothing I can drop the kids off at.

Another notable event of the day, is that I saw my first fender bender traffic accident involving two cars. We have seen several moto and bicycle accidents where people skid out and fall down, but this was the first time I actually saw a car hit another car. This is notable after our years living on Braddock Avenue, where high speed crashes in which multiple vehicles were totaled happened with an alarming frequency. So despite the traffic being completely bonkers in this city, maybe people are better drivers here. Another thing I really like about the streets here, is that most of them are one way. So when you are walking around as a pedestrian you really only have to cross one direction of traffic at a time and then there will be a traffic island or something to stand on while you wait to cross the other side.

Overall we are having a pretty relaxing and unschooly time of it here. Generally I am pretty satisfied with what the kids choose to work on in a day, and as long as I find a private space to meet with each kid one on one I can provide the accountability piece that is really important, mostly for my comfort. There are seemingly unlimited opportunities to observe and participate in all kinds of culture here and we will probably be thinking about what we've learned during this trip for many years to come. 

I said that I wanted to come here to learn Spanish and to meet some Mexicans and have some real conversations about topics that matter to me...for instance education policy, art, poverty, literacy, Venezuela and other headline related issues, perceptions of the US, and what it's like to grow up in this country. I've been very lucky to meet some people who have enthusiastically shared their opinions with me, but it shows up in unexpected places, and it's honestly really hard and humbling to have these conversations in Spanish.

So my advice (to myself and to everyone) remains.... remember that you are on time for what the universe has in store for you. Take it slow and pay attention. You already know what to do.