The fruit lady has my number.

One of the things I like in Mexico -- and other countries we have visited in the past -- is buying fruits and vegetables from a stand, run by a family. I love wandering through the market, looking at all the unfamiliar things and asking questions.

"Is this for today or for tomorrow?" I ask in Spanish, wondering if it is ripe enough to eat immediately. The fruit vendors know when something is ripe. I load up my bags with papaya and little sweet bananas and pineapple and broccoli and cauliflower and carrots and potatoes and avocados and onions and tomatoes. And then I realize my bags are much too full and I have to stop buying things right now.

Then the fruit lady gives me a present.

I don't ask for a present. But after everything is loaded into my bags and I look like a burro headed home, she finds one perfectly ripe tangerine or apple and pops it into my bag.

"A gift," she says. I don't remember this ever happening in a grocery store.

And so, of course, even though there are dozens of fruit stands, I come back to her. She is always happy to see me. And every day, I tell her, "I want another papaya -- sweet and ugly!"

She laughs because this is a running joke of ours. No matter what else I buy, I always buy a papaya, and the best papayas are a little disreputable looking. They are dimpled and bumpy and have splotches here and there.

"Is this spoiled?" I wonder. No. It is perfect. I cut it in half and sometimes it is filled with seeds and sometimes there are no seeds. It seems to me there must be a logical explanation for this. But then sometimes there are only a couple of seeds, and this makes no sense at all.

However many seeds there are, I scoop them out before skinning it and chopping it up and putting it in the fridge. I have no idea if this is how experienced papaya eaters do it. Probably, an experienced papaya eater would say, "What the heck are you doing? That's not how it's done!"

But I know nothing about papayas. I don't remember ever eating a papaya before I was 40. On the rare occasion that I did, the papaya was in some sort of fruit salad. I remember it as being pale orange and rather bland. It was the part of the fruit salad that I ate first to get it over with. I had obviously never had a good papaya. Now that I have, I feel as if I have made this amazing discovery.

"Have you tried the papaya?" I say to unsuspecting gringos in the market. "It's amazing!"

Most of them have had papaya and I'm sure they think I'm a little ridiculous, a freelance papaya booster, roaming the market. But I don't care. I would feel terrible if anyone didn't know how wonderful they were. Someone recently told me they were good for me. I really don't know. They seem as if they must be. They are so deep orange and sweet.

It's a wonderful surprise to learn that I was all wrong about papayas and, of course, it makes me wonder what else I've still got all wrong. It's wonderful to find out how much I like this sweet and ugly fruit.

Now that I know, I am eating all the papayas I want. I am eating papayas every day -- to make up for lost time.

Till next time,

Carrie

Photos from the column can be found at CarrieClasson.com.

DISTRIBUTED BY ANDREWS MCMEEL SYNDICATION

It’s an odd experience watching someone fold your underwear.

I was thinking this yesterday as I was waiting for my laundry. When my husband, Peter, and I packed to go to Mexico, we knew there would be a wide range of temperatures. San Miguel de Allende is in the mountains, so the days can be quite hot, and the nights can be cold, and the weather changes a lot in November everywhere, so we had to be prepared for anything.

We do not have a washing machine in the little place we rent, so I walk a few blocks to the tiny neighborhood laundry and leave my clothes there.

The truth is I don’t need a lot of clothes. I joked during the pandemic that all I wore were pajamas at night and clothes that looked like pajamas during the day. This has not changed significantly. Ninety percent of the time, I am wearing the same uniform.

Yesterday, all the variations on my uniform were dirty, so I went to the laundry.

The laundry service holds two washing machines, two dryers and a constantly changing cast of one to three cheerful women who weigh the laundry, wash it, throw it in the dryer, carefully fold it on top of the two dryers and return it to my laundry bag for approximately three dollars.

If I leave it in the afternoon, I have to wait until the next day to pick it up. But since I don’t have that many clothes, I try to get there before noon. They will then tell me to return at three o’clock to pick it up. Three o’clock does not mean precisely three o’clock -- I know this by now -- so I come a little later. But even so, they were not quite finished when I arrived yesterday. So I stood on the sidewalk (There is no room for a customer in this tiny place!) and waited while my underwear was folded.

For the record, I don’t usually fold my underwear. I’m not sure if that makes me a savage, but I just don’t. It doesn’t wrinkle, and it doesn’t seem to stay folded, so I don’t see the point. But the two ladies at the laundry were carefully folding my undies, and there was nothing I could say to stop them. They also folded all of Peter’s socks and Peter’s underwear, and I stood by, helpless, not feeling I deserved -- or wanted -- quite this much customer service.

The laundry ladies were not in a hurry. They were chatting away, oblivious to the anxious gringo lady standing at the counter on the sidewalk, and I realized I had no reason to be anxious -- in either sense of the word. I was not in a hurry and certainly, when it comes to underwear, these ladies had seen it all. So I tried to relax while I waited for my laundry.

And, as I watched them, it occurred to me how little I really need. That small pile of clothes was everything Peter and I had worn for the last two weeks, and we had everything we needed. I thought of all the clothes I have at home and wondered how they earned their keep.

That is, perhaps, one of the greatest gifts this time in Mexico gives us. It’s good to be reminded that I have enough clothes and I have enough time. It’s good to be reminded that, most of the time, living simply is better. And it’s good to remember that it doesn’t really matter if someone sees my underwear.

Till next time,

Carrie

Photos from the column can be found at CarrieClasson.com.

DISTRIBUTED BY ANDREWS MCMEEL SYNDICATION FOR UFS

My husband, Peter, and I feel like social butterflies.

We certainly are not. But it feels as if we are, because we are staying in a new city and finding it is easier to make new friends than any time since we were children.

When Peter and I moved back to Minnesota to be closer to our family, we missed our old routines and the friends we used to spend time with. Moving to a new city did not bring with it a lot of new friends. Everyone already had friends. Peter and I saw a lot more of our families, which was wonderful. But except for the friends we still had from when we lived here as teenagers, we didn't see a lot of new people.

This is not the way it works when we are in Mexico.

"Can we have brunch with Karina and Rick on Friday?" I asked.

"We're going to dinner with Joel and Chene on Friday."

"I thought we could do brunch."

"We're having brunch with Raul and Nathan."

"Oh."

I realized I had something scheduled every day this week. This is not like me.

Somehow, spending time with people who are all new to this place -- leaving what is familiar and trying something new -- something about this pulls us together. I realized it's because we're all newcomers.

As newcomers, we're eager to share our newcomer energy, to hear where other newcomers have been and where they're going next. Almost all the newcomers I meet are making changes, going to new places, trying something new. And, because they are newcomers, they all are excited (and a little nervous) to tell others about it.

"I started painting during the pandemic," Rosalie told us. She claims she is not an experienced painter, yet all her work has been eagerly taken by friends who have it hanging in their homes.

"I'm working on a memoir."

"I've taken up yoga."

"I'd like to write a novel."

"I'm fostering a dog."

The thing we newcomers all share is the opportunity to look at this new place with fresh eyes and apply that fresh perspective to our lives. I am amazed how few people I meet are trying to replicate the lives they have in the U.S. or Canada. Instead, they are figuring out how to do things differently in this very different place -- where fireworks go off every night and occasionally at six in the morning, where roosters are constantly crowing, and dogs barking, and the streets are paved with cobblestones, and a lot of the shoes we brought do not work at all.

"Oh, my gosh! I nearly killed myself trying to walk in platform sandals last night!"

"I know. Platforms do not work!"

I love hearing stories about changing course, trying new things, getting off the beaten track.

Meanwhile, I keep working on my new project, getting my first novel ready to sell. My agent tells me we're almost ready. It will be a long process, she says, and there are no guarantees. I'm OK with that. I know I'm a newcomer to this as well.

Spending time with newcomers in Mexico has made me realize that most of us aren't attached to a particular outcome. We like what we are doing right now -- and we like doing it together.

"It's about enjoying life while we're living it -- and not worrying about when it's going to end," Karina, another newcomer, said over dinner last night.

I like that. And I think there might be time to squeeze in one more coffee this week.

Till next time,

Carrie

Photos from the column and a link to YouTube videos can be found at CarrieClasson.com.

DISTRIBUTED BY ANDREWS MCMEEL SYNDICATION FOR UFS