Punished by God, clearly

I've taken a day-and-a-half of relaxation this weekend. God has repaid me with pain. Thanks, God. More on this in a moment.

Saturday was Mother's Day here in Mexico. That's right, they've got their own date for Mother's Day--it's the 10th! So after working through the morning, I shuffled over to the Cordero's to whisk Azucena off to a restaurant to celebrate. We'd tricked her into thinking we were getting a pizza so she wouldn't have to cook. Though, I'm sure she guessed something was up when we nudged here into wearing a new dress in which to eat pizza. We has reservations at the upscale Vasco, a restaurant that sits on the second floor of a corner building in the Zócalo. From our balcony-side table we could view the entire, tree-peppered town square.

The temperatures here have been soaring--it's in the mid- to upper-90s every afternoon--a time better avoided by staying in the coolness and shade of concrete-built homes. The restaurant kindly handed out fans to the ladies. (Sorry guys! You'll just have to sweat) Once we'd eaten our fill, and peeled our thighs off of the leather chairs, we each shuttled back to our homes to basically not move at all. I think this is why the word languor was invented.

The following day I woke early to get a few hours of work in before casting off the rest of the day to leisure. Also, got a call in to my mom for American Mother's Day. Azucena drives by later to pick me up, as we and the boys head out to the Deportivo for some sun (ugh) and pool time (yay!). I'm running a bit late, trying to stuff towel and suntan lotion into my backpack. Luck thing, though. As Azucena and I head out of my neighborhood, just as we get to the intersection, a huge accident crumbles before our eyes. If we'd been a bit earlier, it would have been us, most likely. A truck, whizzing far too fast down this major street, tries to make the light, only to find he is crossing through a red, and smashing into a tiny yellow Volkswagen. After the two collide in a boom of glass and metal, the truck, not able to stop right away, bumps into a median, turns, wobbles, and then crashes into a concrete wall. Horrible. I toss my cell phone at Azucena and tell her to call the emergency number here and hop out to see if the people in the truck need help. A crowd forms around both cars--and I am across a major street--so I don't get much further than seeing that they are attended to, when I return to our car. As we pull out, we already hear the sirens approaching. Luckily no one seemed to be critically injured. Man, it's hard to shake it off when you see something like that.

Later, we stretch out at the pool, hoping to sun away the earlier accident. Mau and Alejandro play squash, while Azucena and I do laps. The heat is so intense, that the club is actually empty--Azucena and I have the pool almost entirely to ourselves. Perhaps people have opted for the air conditioned salons at the movie multiplex.

As I'm stretched out reading a magazine, taking in the rays, a bug lands on my nose. I try to swat it away--unaware that it's actually a wasp. So my swat turns into a gesture of aggression, from the wasp's point-of-view; and thus, he stings me. I can't remember the last time, if ever, that I was stung by a bee or a wasp. My mind flashes to my uncle, allergic to bee stings, who was grumpily laid up in a hospital for a night, swollen, tubes and such feeding him antibiotics. Am I allergic? Shit, I hope not. And frankly, this sting is a lot more painful than I would have imagined. The wasp won't let go of my nose. I start to kind of quietly scream, if that's possible. Finally the wasp relents and flits onto the seat of the chair I'm in. That's when I really freak out because this thing doesn't look like anything I've seen before. It's fat and round like a bee. But it has these little red balls in it's feet. I'm thinking this is one of those Mexican Death Bees (do these exist?). Oh god, I'm gonna die.

Azucena jogs over when she hears my low-level panic. The stinger is still in my nose--so she extracts it with her nails. The sensation is somewhere between my nose is totally numb, and extreme throbbing pain. Azucena runs off to ask for some kind of ointment; meanwhile I am imagining my nose is huge, like a 3-inch bulbous protrusion. It's uncanny the desire to LOOK at what hurts. So I rush into the locker room to get to a mirror. It's really not so bad to look at. My nose is read, a bit swollen, a small dot of blood where the stinger was dislodged. The Deportivo people give me some hydrogen peroxide to clean the wound, if it can even be called that when it's this small (though, it still hurts like a b@tch!). A family friend of the Cordero's, who is a doctor, happens to be at the pool, too. He tells me to get some ice and lemon to ease the pain. But warns that I should monitor if my tongue starts to swell, or I lose feeling anywhere, to come get him.

I'm fine. I ice it. I clean it out. I laugh a lot, 'cause there's something very funny about a wasp selecting something as nominal as a nose to sting (what are the odds of it landing there?). I also feel a bit melancholy that this fat guy chose to sting me, and eventually die, rather than just get off my nose. Where's the survival instinct there?

The ice makes the mark look mostly minuscule, though red. However, as I awake this morning, the mark has grown, kind of bruised and angry looking to me, even though it's still small. I'm trying to ice it--hoping that will calm it down. And I don't know if it's the ice, or what--but doesn't my nose look HUGE today???