Chats With Witchy - Chapter 1: Day 7

Chapter 1: Day 7

It’s day 7 in our hotel in Cancun.

It sounds pretty sexy. The Riviera Maya. The tropics.

I’m sure it conjures images of turquoise ocean and white pristine beaches, nightlife, and shopping for artisanal items in Mexican markets.

But that’s not my life right now.

Other than grabbing tacos at the nearby restaurant, and making a trip to a store for cat litter, I’ve only left the hotel once. We wandered to a shopping mall so both of us could remind ourselves that we are, in fact, in Mexico, not just in a random room.

As I look around, I see my cat, Oslo, laying on the dingy, white, fake fur carpet we brought from home. We bought it for him eight or so years ago when he was a kitten. It’s where he sleeps, plays, eats his treats. And last night, it’s where he threw up. I think he’s adjusting to Mexican food.

We knew we had to bring the carpet to give the cats a sense of normalcy. We also brought a tattered paper bag he likes to sleep on, all of their toys- random strings, fish and mice stuffed with catnip, their tunnels, their food bowls and water cups. All of their precious things. Their luggage was bigger than ours. And it seems to have worked, to a degree. But right now, Oslo is staring out the window, bored. I’ve given him belly rubs and treats and lots of “you’re such a good boy”s, but I’m sure he’s looking at the shitty view of the cement parking structure and thinking, ‘I had to come six hours on a plane for this? Not worth it, people.’

Our three-year-old cat, Sophie, runs to hide under the blankets every time there is a noise in the hotel hallway. The only home she has ever known is the one we left in Canada. She seems afraid of everything. Whenever we turn on the air conditioning, which is often, she stares up at it with concerned eyes, and comes closer to one of us to protect her from this strange, humming monster. I often wonder if this trip has broken our sweet, innocent Sophie. But then she plays, chasing a crumpled up paper ball we brought from home, and I relax. For entertainment, she has taken to scratching in the four, yes four, litter boxes scattered throughout the room, throwing litter all over the floor. She likes to hunker down like she’s hiding then scoot out of the box when she’s noticed, taking half the litter with it. It seems to be her favourite thing.

That’s as close to being at the beach as I’ve gotten since arriving a week ago.

My husband, Ozz, sits at the desk, headphones on, pecking away at the keys on his iPad, humming as he does when he’s focused. His humming has become the soundtrack of this room. I find it reassuring because I know what it means. Somewhere beneath the problem he’s listening for something deeper than logic. He’s trying to find a way through this. He’s been doing that all week.

The situation?

We are in the middle of moving from Canada to Mexico. We came with enough money to leave Canada, but not enough, yet, to move into the home we’ve rented in Mérida.

We had found the perfect place. A colonial home in Centro. Close enough to walk to everything. High ceilings, colourful pasta floors, a refreshing pool in the backyard surrounded by vegetation, a perfect place to escape the sweltering heat.

We explained to the cats that it had an “outside, inside”, an open air courtyard in the heart of the house where they could go out and chase lizards and bugs without being able to escape, and with no way for anything to get in. It was one of my favorite features. I often imagined lying in our bed at night listening to the cats chase each other in the courtyard, in the fresh evening air. Oslo and Sophie are going to be very pleased with this arrangement, even if they didn’t know it yet. Sophie had never been outside. She was pure house cat. This expansion of her world was going to blow her mind.

But the best part of the home was the reception area. I had already claimed it as mine. It was separate from the rest of the house making it perfect to be my store, The Glitterwitch Galleria. It had a larger room with pink and green hand painted floor tiles. The walls were painted in a matching shade of green that fell somewhere between avocado and mint. It had antique double doors that opened into the courtyard. They were painted a soft, timeworn ivory with rows of little glass panes. It was weird how much I loved those little panes of glass. The house was furnished and one of my favourite pieces was a heavy round wooden table that was the first thing you saw when you walked into the reception area. It matched perfectly an antique cabinet I was bringing from Canada. I had imagined both of them displaying my jewelry, perhaps on pieces of driftwood, with little fairy lights to highlight the glimmer of rhinestones and beads.

I had imagined looking out from this room as I set up displays and seeing the cats in the courtyard lying in the sun. Sometimes I imagined my art displayed on the walls of courtyard and my customers viewing it, glasses of wine in their hands as they browsed for a perfect piece to take home.

The smaller room off of the reception area would be my studio where I would make my creations. I knew where my desk would be, where my supplies would be stored. I had already been living there, and creating there, in my mind for weeks. And soon, just two deposits away, that dream would be my reality.

When you are a foreigner, Mexico requires first month’s rent plus two deposits to secure a property. We made the first deposit before we left Canada, negotiating a two year contract. The plan was straightforward. Ozz had several things in motion that we fully expected to mature by the time we arrived. The remaining two deposits would be covered. We were certain of it.

Ozz had spent the months leading up to our departure building toward exactly that. He was working every possible angle. We expected at least one of them to mature in time.

We had no idea how much time it would actually take.

We chose this. The house, deposit, the contract, the leap across a border with two cats and not quite enough money. We chose all of it. Eyes open.

We knew there would be a gap between where we were and where we were going. We just didn’t know exactly what that gap would look like.

This is what it looks like.

Every day starts the same. We wake up somewhere between 5 and 6 am, and the countdown clock begins.

Checkout is at one.

My first thought is usually some version of, ‘Will this be the day we find the six thousand dollars we need for those two deposits in time to check out? Or will it be another night in this cramped hotel room?’

Then we get up. We put on the clothes we have been wearing all week. I had not planned to be this long without laundry. We joke that we are slowly becoming hotel goblins. We came here fresh and clean. We wanted to create a good first impression. Now my favorite yoga pants have a rip in the knee and my tank top is getting looser and looser every day. At some point I quit worrying about things like makeup or wearing a bra.

We give the cats their cuddles, maintaining our familiar routine; I give Oslo a bum rub on his carpet then scratch Sophie on the head and tell her how beautiful she is while she smiles at me and quietly sings . Ozz rubs Sophie’s belly then carries Oslo around. We have convinced ourselves that the more we keep things the same, the less impactful this will be.

Then we hand feed them their “licky things”, squeezable treats we brought with us from Canada, their number one favorite thing. Then food. Ozz washes their dishes in the bathroom sink every morning and then it’s my job to feed them. Before we left we had carefully labelled which bowl and glass belonged to which cat. But somewhere along the way, they gave up being territorial. Now they eat from each other’s dishes, drink from each other’s cups and share litter boxes. We think they are trauma bonding.

The litter boxes are the next task. Cleaning up Sophie’s version of the beach. Ozz would use a plastic glass taken from breakfast the day before as a scooper and I would get down on my hands and knees, using a hand towel as a broom and my door key as a dust pan to collect the scattered bits of litter.

Then we say goodbye to the cats, tell them we will be back soon and step out into the hot, humid hallway to make our way to breakfast in the dining room. Scrambled eggs with something new in them every day. Today it was peas and carrots. A side of refried beans and, if it’s a good day, salsa verde. We make coffee, thicker and stronger than it was at home. I miss my caramel k-cups. The coffee maker here spits coffee out on one side and then water out the other. We had been here so long by now, we knew exactly where to place the paper cup to catch both of them. You could tell who the newbies were- They were the ones who burnt their hands trying to move the cup midstream.

Then back to the room. Him working at the small desk, me sitting on the bed behind him, both of us focused on our iPads . One cat, on the rug, staring out the hotel window at the parking structure or taking his bath. The other safely hidden under the sheets. I often wondered if they missed the old morning routine, the “cat tv” we would create for them in Canada, scattering seeds outside on the patio so they could watch birds and squirrels out the patio doors. Sometimes, as a treat, we’d open the doors slightly so they could sniff them. They would spend hours there sometimes going into full cat mode and jumping at the door, forgetting there was glass preventing them from hunting. Like us, they are experiencing a new way of being. Unlike us, they never saw it coming.

For hours, we work. For me it’s creating content for potential hypnotherapy students, promoting my course with the hopes of bringing in some money to pay for another few days at the hotel. Writing blog posts about my approach to hypnotherapy to attract new clients. When out of ideas, I would play games on my iPad to quiet my anxious mind.

For him it’s the follow-ups. The reaching out. The propositions. We are both working hard to create the conversations that will, someday, hopefully today, free us from this space.

We pause at some point to get tacos at the nearby restaurant. I hungrily eat things I can’t recognize and can’t pronounce. We watch English YouTube videos to wind down. I still have to learn Spanish.

And at the end of each day we go to bed, snuggled in each other’s arms. One cat sleeping on the paper bag that smells like his Canadian home. The other in her tunnel. And as I drift off my mind flip flops. Part of me adds up how many more days at the hotel we can afford. The next checkout just a handful of hours away.

But another part of me—the quieter part—is strangely calm.

It knows I was brought here for a reason.

I just haven’t fully discovered it yet.