Nov 2009--Last New York entry this year.

I leave for Costa Rica in 36 hours. The transition is always difficult. We are moving forward with relocating. Check out my website for the house and tell your friends. www.nosaraparadise.blogspot.com . It is also on www.viviun.com and will be on other for-sale-by-owner sites. We will register with realtors again but so far they have not found us any offers. We have to market directly to buyers—suggestions on marketing are welcome.

My NY life is packed—the highlight was Joe and Andres visit mid Sept and it was great to see my family and friends. Here are some short vignettes my life here.
--The night before Halloween, a pretty young girl with long blond hair scurries along 3rd avenue carrying a plastic bag and talking excitedly on her cell phone. As I watch her I think Oh my god, she is wearing a nightgown, I continue to watch her and see her fuzzy pink bedroom slippers. I look around and many people are in costume—mostly stand up ears and face make-up—in the streets and in the subway. And nobody seems to notice.
--“Wishful Drinking” with Carrie Fischer is an amazing one-woman play—what a comic mind she has and how comfortable she is with the audience
--As I talk with a bartender at Sweet Afton, the pub on the next block, a couple sits beside me—I find out that the guy is from Costa Rica. The bartender knows Alex Hall, NY CASK guru who took Joe and Andres around to the pubs.
--In my writing class, there are 6 of us and a writing teacher: a clinical psychologist from Argentina, a psychiatrist from Argentina, a lawyer from India, a 911 operator from Brooklyn, a Brooklyn high school teacher on sabbatical, a writer from New Zealand, the teacher from India and me. We read our pieces out loud--the class is like group therapy with a focus.
--I stand on a corner in my neighborhood and see throngs of people walking purposefully down the street. I wonder—where are they going—I join them for about a block thinking --is there a rally, a concert? The crowd breaks up and I realize they had had just gotten off the subway and were probably going home.
-As I read Chekov short stories on the subway, I notice a young woman, seated across the aisle who had just glanced at me. She is reading Chekov plays. Our books have the same picture on the cover. She comes over and we talk about Chekov for the duration of the ride.

I download songs for Joe and finish off odds and ends and get ready for my big trip into the land of being not doing. Please read the next entry--it is my article in November’s Healthcare Traveler. And checkout out our new alternate phone number on top of the blog.

Come visit while we are still in Paradise. …Stay in touch…Love Helena and Joe