FOLLOW YOUR HEART

Leaving for a road trip today…

Through the heart of Mexico.

First flying to Guadalajara…

Then renting a car...
And driving to a small town two hours away…

Where I’ll join friends at 11pm…

To celebrate El Grito—the cry for independence.

It's Mexico's holiday for when they conquered the Spanish.

A few days later.

I’ll attend a quinceanera...
A celebration for girls when they turn 15.

Next, to the town of San Miguel de Allende…

Which some of you may know…

Is the site of one the most famous…

Writer Retreats.

http://sanmiguelwritersconference.org/

Check it out for next February…

Some amazing speakers will be there.

Like Elizabeth Hay, Joyce Carol Oats, and others.
Next, on to Guanajuato…

To see the famous mummies…

From there, Puebla…

Know as the gastronomical city of Mexico.

Then up into the Sierra Madre Oriental...

A mountain range running parallel…

With the Gulf of Mexico.

I plan to see several ruins along the way…

Including the famous Olmec megalith heads…

Plus explore shops wherever they turn up…

Letting serendipity guide me to find treasures.

Then on home.

Feels weird that I just started my blog again…

Then I’m off on a 15 day road trip…

But I believe…

We are all on a spiritual journey…

And I’ve learned to follow my heart…

Wherever that takes me.

Hasta luego amigos.

Catch up with you…

On the flip side of the tortilla.

Always,

Em-Musing

P.S. I will post when I get back and hopefully
I'll have taken some great photos that I'll share

TRIPPING WITH THE MIND, FANTASTIC!

While in Paris…

I of course saw all the usual attractions.

As a writer though…

Some things just made me go, hmm?

Like why IS the Mona Lisa so treasured?

I think this painting is more interesting.

Or when the artist did this sculpture…

What was the backstory of this guy?

Or this woman?

Or what was on this woman's mind?

And seeing the bones of 6 million people…

Deep down in the catacombs…

Is just plain creepy.

And my mind came up with…

At least a dozen horror scenarios…

One being: what if there were zombie mold spores...

And they got on my skin because I touched a bone...

And then I became a zombie!

Trust me...

The whole time down there...

I swathed myself with hand sanitiser.

And when I saw this girl…

Walking towards a tunnel…

I just wanted to shout, 

“NO! DON’T GO!”

Then I found this haven…

Shakespeare and Company…

It’s a bookstore that opened in 1919…

By an American, Sylvia Beach…

And became a gathering place…

For writers such as: Ezra Pound, James Joyce…

And Hemmingway.

Sometimes Sylvia would let writers sleep there…

And loan out books to them for free.

I went back again, and again, and again.

And bought many books…

That even though I could get them in the States…

It wouldn’t feel the same as buying them here…

Like Hemmingway’s Moveable Feast for instance…

Which, well…, um…did make me go, hmm?

But Hemmingway did mention visiting Sylvia and…

Shakespeare and Company.

So?

Does your writer mind take you places...

Other minds don't go?

Where?

Always,

Em-Musing

CIN CIN UP

A few months ago…

I watched Midnight in Paris…
A Woody Allen movie…

About a struggling writer who goes to Paris…

And at midnight…

A vintage car picks him up…

And whisks him off to cafes and bars…

Where he meets Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald…

Picasso, T.S Elliot, Dali, and Gertrude Stein…
To name a few.

Imagine?

What that would be like?

And then this summer…

I DID go to Paris.

I rented an apartment for a month…

In the 6^th arrondissement on the Seine…

Close to where all those mentioned above…
Drank absinthe, wine, mojitos...
And other libations and kvetched.
I really believed with all my heart…
That by just being there…

I’d channel one of them.

I even went on...
A Midnight in Paris Tour.

Nicholas, the French tour guide

So I sat in front of my laptop…
Fingers poised…
Waiting for inspiration to strike. 
But...

Nada!

I pondered and pondered…

What was missing?

And then…

Ah HAH!!!!

THE BOOZE!!

And so I indulged..

Drinking half a bottle of flat champagne.
And VOILA!
My muse came out to play…

And I wrote a few chapters.

So tell me…

Have your words ever dried up…

And you used some kind of liquid elixir?

What was it?

And have you ever been to Paris?

Always,

Em-Musing

P.S. I wasn't a wine drinker until Paris; always got a headache.

And then I tried French Wine and Ooh la la! I'm now hooked.

What's your favourite who. 
And F.Y.I Cin Cin is pronounced Chin Chin and is an Italian toast.

on Malbec.