January 5, 2019 - 114 - "Mexican Casa Renovation 4: Progress (?) Report"

     We came down to San Miguel for a short visit.  I had five days off of work and there were lots of projects we wanted to check on and some business we needed to take care of.

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      Walking in the door yesterday was a little depressing.

      When we came down last (about 2 1/2 months ago) we got the house all fixed up and beautiful:

Getting ready for guests.

     And now we don't:

How it looks now

     Yep.  That's the same room.  And the second one is the 'after'...or I suppose, really, the 'during'...again.  

     You can only tell it's the same room by looking at the ceiling.  The patterns of skylights and ceiling fan are practically the only 'tell'.

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     We're doing the work in phases.  Phase I was:  Get the house in good enough shape so that the kids could come down and enjoy San Miguel and experience the Day of the Dead celebrations.

     I'm thrilled to say we did manage to do all of that, which felt like a major victory.  We were still cleaning, arranging furniture, and putting out flowers and rugs... as the kids were texting that they were driving down our street.

     Phase II was originally going to be part of Phase I, but it involved getting all sorts of permissions to do some pretty dramatic work on the house.  And permissos (permits) take some doing.

     We're in the middle of a city designated as a Mexican National 'Pueblo Magico' (Magic City...or what we'd call an Historic Landmark.  We're also smack in the middle of the Centro Historico district.  And...the whole place has been designated by UNESCO  as a World Heritage Site.)  All this adds up to it taking an act of congress (or whatever the Mexican phrase for major governmental involvement) to get permission to do anything.

    I'll explain more about what our plans are another time.  We've been working on the house all day and I am beat.  But I did say I'd post daily...and there's not much of today left.

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    Two things I know for sure:

         In the end this work and struggle will all be worth it.   We've been laughing a lot about what our ideal life looks like...and wondering if,  maybe, we actually enjoy this sort of challenge.

         Today we're beginning to see the progress amidst the apparent ruins.  But, for sure, this feeling is in stark contrast to our arrival, when it felt like we'd stepped backwards about a mile.

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"Living through a home renovation is like living in the wild...you do whatever it takes to survive."

-Unknown

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