There She Goes…

Me: Guess who they let back into Mexico??!

My cousin Paul: I’m going to have to have a serious conversation with immigration

Before heading to Mexico for the month of May, I attended a conference in San Antonio, TX. The morning of Thursday, May 5th (how appropriate to be heading to Cabo for the American holiday of Cinco de Mayo), I awoke to an email from American Airlines about a flight change for my flight originally scheduled later that morning. Oh great, I thought; all I want to do is get to Cabo to meet up with my parents (who were already there for 5 days), to see mi Catalina, and sure, to see Paul and the rest of my family. Stupid American Air had me staying another day in Texas (that’s a firm hell no y’all) and leaving the following morning. So scrambling on adrenaline and no coffee, I found an alternate flight on United for later that day. NOTHING was going to stop me from getting to Mexico. Little did I know, making it to Mexico would be the least of my worries.

Alternate flight booked (praying to the United Gods that nothing would happen for this flight) I made my way to the airport for flight #1 to Houston. Another 5 hours hanging out in the Houston airport (even splurging for lounge access to stay away from crowds) and I finally boarded flight #2 to Cabo. Stressed, frazzled, just wanting to be in Cabo already, I landed at 8pm – 6 hours later than my original ETA but still en Cabo. Hungry and tired I waited for my parents to pick me up. And I waited some more. My aunt’s condo is only 20 minutes away from the local airport and I started to wonder if they forgot about me. But me?! How could they forget me. By the time the 3rd person came up to ask if I needed to book a ride, I called my Mom. Mija, mom said, your dad took a wrong turn. We’ll be there in another hour. Fending off ride offers from people I didn’t even think worked for actual car companies, I plopped myself down and waited. They finally arrived with lots of Sorry, sorry, we can’t see at night, we took a wrong turn, etc but just in time because even though I was smelly from all-day traveling & cranky, I’m still pretty cute. No wonder I kept getting offers for rides.

At the supermarkets in Mexico, you’re supposed to wipe your shoes on a disinfectant mat, put hand sanitizer on and have your temperature taken by the security guard standing at the entrance. However, the thermometer wasn’t working quite right so the lady waved me in. That probably would have been my second clue something wasn’t right. Friday afternoon we spent at the pool enjoying the water and catching up on reading. Little did we know, we were in for a wild ride. On Saturday morning, I woke up with the worst headache I’ve ever experienced. I suffer from migraines and know all too well what they feel like. This felt like NO OTHER HEADACHE I’ve ever experienced. I can’t quite explain it but the general feeling was that it would be much less painful to just have my head chopped off. I searched in the early morning light for my migraine medicine and realized I didn’t pack any! Prescription migraine medicine is not widely available in Mexico – I don’t know why but there are no curandera tricks that will help alleviate the pain. My mom’s aunt suffered terribly from migraines and mom says that my great-grandma used to thinly slice potatoes and place them on her forehead. A lot of our weird little cures when sick are things Abuelitas around the world know. But no, potatoes weren’t going to help with this one. So I asked my mom to give me a migraine prescription injection. The last time my mom gave me a medicinal shot, I was 12 and told her I hated her. We’ve avoided this same situation for over 20 years, but this time, I would have told her I hated her for not giving me the shot. Funny how life circles around.

The next morning, Friday, I awoke just like any other day. I was a little achy and my shoulders hurt but I chalked it up to a full day of stress/traveling and dragging around my luggage across 3 airports and 2 countries. No biggie, I’ll just head to the Comer supermarket & stock up on Emergen-c and take it easy. I am working and living down in Mexico for May – just like I’ve done a few times before. I logged on to my laptop and began a typical Friday workday. Dreaming of my favorite al pastor tacos, I couldn’t wait to logoff but my boss’ Amy-to-do list seemed never ending. Come on Boss, I’ve got tacos to eat! Uh oh, extreme irritability (clue #2). You’re probably thinking a to-do list on a Friday isn’t “extreme irritability” but I also may have considered telling our COO where he could shove it. So yeah, that’s extreme in my book. After work, we headed to Taqueria El Paisa for al pastor tacos, queso fundido & my first Mexican coke this trip. That stuff is literally crack cocaine…. it’s not just a clever name. Faces stuffed, we headed to the supermarket and I’m feeling flushed and irritable again. Surely, almost telling your COO to kick rocks wasn’t having that much of a lasting effect?

A few hours later, my head no longer screaming in agony, my body decided it wanted to join in on the fun too. And cue the chills. “I don’t think this is just run down from stress & traveling”, I told my parents. At that point, I consistently alternated between fever and chills, body aches and general blah. “Uh oh,” I thought, “I think I have covid.” But how? Where did I catch it? Having extreme foresight to have brought the free at-home covid tests (but not my migraine medicine) I knew I needed to take a test since my parents are I were sharing a 1-bedroom condo. And that little test confirmed my suspicion – I was positive for covid. No question, without a doubt, 1 dark line in the test window. My parents have each had their 4th dose of Moderna & I was scheduled to get mine but a few weeks prior to this trip, my new puppy accidentally nipped at my face which required 8 stitches. I don’t think I could have handled the stress of a covid booster plus recovering from facial lacerations so I didn’t get my booster before conferencing & traveling. By Sunday, night sweats had started so bad that I was changing out of pajamas at least twice a night and having to have a second set of sheets ready to change the bed when it got soaked. As a kid who frequently wet the bed, sadly, I’m familiar that middle-of-the-night drill. Each morning, it seemed I woke up with some new symptom to contend with; on Monday, it was a painful earache. And on Tuesday, it was the start of conjunctivitis in my left eye (that’s pink eye for the non-medical crowd).

By Tuesday afternoon, there wasn’t anything to do except find an urgent care to go to. The pink eye wouldn’t clear up on it’s own and the mucous began to cloud my vision. The never-ending chest congestion and phlegm were also troubling. I had no problem breathing, but know enough to seek treatment, especially the kind that involves prescription antibiotics. At urgent care, they officially confirmed the at-home test results and I was prescribed antibiotics for a bacterial infection (causing the chest congestion & earaches) and eye drops + eye ointment for the allergic conjunctivitis. That’s right, not only was my little solider-body fighting covid, I was also fighting a bacterial infection that caused allergic pink eye. A trifecta of “what the f$%k?!”

It is now ~10 days later since I first had symptoms and 2 days ago was the first time I felt strong enough to walk the 100 footsteps down to the beach. The sea air feels amazing for my chest and my lingering cough. I’m almost done with my prescribed course of medicine and I’m taking it easy. I missed an entire week of work & they missed me telling off Boss’ Boss – I probably would have lied and said, “covid made me do it.” Apparently, I was talking in my fever dreams and mumbling to myself and I have noticed that I can’t quite place the right word sometimes – which is torture for this writer because I am finally taking the time to write the next great American novel. I’m officially out of quarantine and can’t wait until I get to see my niece Catalina.

You’re probably wondering why this blog post isn’t something more like “don’t get covid” and why instead, it’s called “Oxxo is back.” And for that, I can explain. I have a bit of a fan club down here and since we normally don’t have a car, I walk to the local convenience store Oxxo (think Mexico’s version of 7-11) when I run out of beer. I’m a creature of habit and the security guards have started calling me Oxxo and make funny beer-chugging motions. They know me so well….so yes, ‘Oxxo’ is back. I’m not 100 but I’m out of the woods. Now, where’s the cerveza?

P.S. My parents ROCK. They took care of me at risk to their health & never once made me feel bad for being so diseased. “It’s what parents do,” my mom said. Thank you Mom & Dad – I llama you both mucho!