A recent NPR story about the benefits of
experiences over acquisitions trumpeted an obvious fact that addicted travelers
have always understood: being and doing is better than getting and having. It’s the experiences, immersions, contacts
and memories that make us rich, not the tangible accumulations.
Interestingly,
according to the study, a generous portion of our enjoyment of an activity is
credited to the anticipation of it; looking forward to something is apparently
half the fun. I know this, which is why
in my Mid-West house there is a hard rule – we can’t talk about Mexico until
October.
October
is many things to us – the excitement of the new school year has become
routine, but not yet drudgery; fall crisps our mornings and wilts my begonias;
sweaters come out and shorts get stored; and the seasonal charter flights to
Puerto Vallarta go on sale. These things collide, making our annual March
retreat seem just tantalizingly at the tips of our reach, as though if I listen
hard I can hear the surf crash under our balcony. And if I put my hand out just
so under the palapa I can taste the salt on my tequila.
The
wishing is tough, and although the looking ahead is sweet, we can only stand it
so long, which is why there exists the Rule of October. To harbor such desire all year long would do
a disservice to my lush June flower planting fever, to the languid August
afternoons floating on the hot lake, to cicada drowned evenings on the deck,
when the fading September sun slants through the tall canna and crows pepper
the sky. It seems to diminish the
luxurious joy I have in my daily life if I immediately start wanting to be
somewhere other than my lovely home as soon as I return to it.
But
the need to wish ourselves there is strong, and helps to resign us to the
mornings to come, when I will certainly have to shovel before dawn to make
carpool. This glorious autumn will give
way to dark breakfasts and bare tree limbs, and then I will ache for the smell
of bougainvillea and the trill of the muffin man on the sidewalk. By January,
when the light gets so weak that noon barely makes a shadow on the snow angels
frozen crunchy in the yard, we will talk ourselves giddy at the dinner table,
planning dinners out on new courtyards and Madonna-bus excursions to foreign
neighborhoods.
October
is when we can begin again to relish the certainty that our friends will find
us on the beach and the mariachi will wake us from siesta. The fullness of daily life nudges over a bit
to make room for the frizzle of anticipation from knowing that Puerto Vallarta
is there waiting, welcoming, warm, and familiar. I can do November, February, all the mean
months between now and March. Because
now is October, and now I can dream.
