It was cold in the mountains. I've stripped down now that I'm back--I swear that the temperature zipped up 20 degrees as soon as I hit the North Carolina border.

I watched the video of Jess's wedding. She laughed all the way through except when she was crying, but even then, actually, she was laughing. Sometimes she whispered to Mario while she laughed, sometimes she turned to the audience and winked while she laughed, sometimes she looked up at the twinkling lights strewn across the ceiling of the ruins where they married, laughing. Mario fidgeted and played with his glasses and looked down and shuffled his feet. Mario, short and plain and Jess, a fairy tale princess. At least in my fairy tale she'd be the princess.

Jess has got the mad love for Mario. She's not a gushy person and she also pretty well likes everyone she meets indiscriminately. She's so even-tempered and happy and lovely. But when she talks about Mario, damn. She suddenly becomes pensive and fretful and giddy and expansive all at once. They've been together for about 4 or 5 years and she still gets like that. Mad love. I want it. When Sue was here we talked about this. She and Jeremy, her husband to be, don't have it. She says they have companionship and for her that's enough. To this, I say no. Not ever again. I want the knock you down kind of love. I want the kind of love where, when he walks into a room, the walls disappear and the air feels alive, contracting and expanding infinitely and forever. Where, even though you didn't know you were waiting for him, you find yourself letting out the breath you were holding the moment he first looks at you. In such matters I do not wish to be disillusioned. I embrace my naivet�.

Mario is a writer. By day he works as a righteous lawyer. He's been exiled, in the past, from Guatemala because of the work he does. Jess, rightly so, often fears for his life. He gets death threats regularly and is watched by the CIA who do not particularly care for him. By night he writes his fingers to the bone. Jess says he works from the minute he walks in the door until 1 or 2 in the morning. Then he gets up at 6 or 7 to write for an hour or two before work as well. I'm impressed and not a little jealous of his monomania. She says he's finished two books already this year. One is a non-fiction book about human rights abuses in Guatemala. The other is a novel. He also writes stories and poems. She told me of her plans for getting them published outside of their country, ideally in Mexico or the U.S. I will run alerts far and wide the moment his books hit the shelves.

Interesting age facts about Jess's family:
Jess's dad: age 60. His girlfriend: age 37
Jess's brother: age 30. His wife: age 37
Jess: age 27. Her husband: age 37

Pretty funny. I now must go lie on my bed because I am suddenly having an attack of the vapors. It must be all the actual food I ate during the last 24 hours.

Basho survived his first night alone with aplomb thanks to his lovely caregivers. Rave on Frances and Bathsheba.

It's good to be home.