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What do a senator, a Ferry mogul, and a stand-up comic have in common? Me. Oddly enough, me. This week I had yet another unexpected VIP experience.

Our friend, Nelson (good Spanish name, no?) invited us to go see a rising star comic in a local club. But we arrived to find that the club owner had failed to properly advertise the date, so the 4 of us were the only ones in the audience. Nelson, though, had met the comic, Luis Miguel (Luismi) so he struck up a conversation.

Next thing I know, Luismi is at our table, chuckling at his recently acquired “star” status. “Hmm… I do stand-up comedy, but I’ve never done ‘table comedy’ before.” He smiles and pullls up a bar stool.

I brace myself. Trying to follow rapid-fire Spanish in a noisy place is no small challenge. Trying to understand jokes — in Spanish — that frequently hinge on cultural references is pretty much impossible.

“I love the gestures that girls make when they’re brushing a guy off.” Luismi says. Then he whips off an impressive simulation of a hip-hop American girl doing that walk-like-an-egyptian head bobble and popping her wrist around to form a solid “STOP” gesture. In perfect English, and with a scarily accurate tough girl accent he says “Uh-uh…. Talk to the HAND!” Everybody at the table about fell over laughing. So much for missing the cultural jokes.

Everyone joined in an animated conversation, swapping stories and jokes and asking Luismi about his rise to stardom. It was fascinating and fun. And I got so lost in what everyone was saying that I totally forgot that I was in a typically-uncomfortable situation where I didn’t understand what was going on.

After a couple of hours of sit-down comedy Luismi announced that he was hungry, and had we eaten? So we went with him to a little pizza place next door to the club and whiled away even more hours, enjoying our own private star. When it was finally time to say goodnight Luismi insisted on buying our dinner. And in true Spanish fashion, I think I neglected to say “thanks.”

So, Thank You, Luismi! Your “Yankee” fan will follow your career and send you good vibes. You deserve the success that you’re experiencing. Un abrazo, Denise

P.S. Luismi, I’ll pay good money if you’ll resist the temptation to include me and my friends in your next monologue.

Spain is not a litigious society. Not yet. The first time I came here it took me about 15 minutes to figure out that I better watch where the heck I was stepping. There could be a gapinig hole in the sidewalk, a banana peel, or dog poo. Better yet, construction sites practically have a “Welcome!” sign on the outside. We walk right through them all the time. I’ve learned to walk with one eye constantly scanning for hazards.

For my husband, it’s a particularly big challenge. It’s not that he’s clumsy, he’s just so busy looking around for photo ops that he pretty much NEVER watches where he’s going. A couple of days ago I saw a little girl about 2 walking with her papa. She was gazing at the stars, waving at the passing scooters, and suddenly WHAM! She walked right into the side of a big trash dumpster. When she picked herself up and smiled, I couldn’t help but chuckle. Then I flashed on two thoughts: 1) That’s exactly what my honey looks like when he’s walking around in Spain (and yes, he has nearly fallen several times); and 2) If that had happened in the US an enraged parent would have raced into the store demanding to know why that damn trash can was out in the middle of the sidewalk — and what is your attorney’s name and number?

Spaniards are practical. They figure that if you’re dumb enough to step in a hole, or dog poop, it’s your own dang fault. And besides, I always wanted to see what the inside of a giant crane looked like anyway.

When my first granddaughter was born, I was a ripe old 42 years old. Jordan, weighing in at just under 2 pounds, was the most fragile and incredibly beautiful baby girl I had ever seen, and I knew that this little fighter would change my life.

Spending countless hours at the hospital, working full-time, going to school full-time, spending time with our youngest son (who still lived at home), and still finding time for my husband, taught me all kinds of lessons. Most importantly, I had to grasp that I wasn’t 24 anymore, Toto! The rules had changed while I wasn’t paying attention. But I sure as h@$$ wasn’t a typical Granny either! I’d be damned if I was going to retire so that I could babysit and do some occasional volunteer work. Quick Disclaimer: Grandparents who do those things of their own accord, and not out of guilt or a desire to do nothing more exciting than sit in a rocking chair, have my respect and admiration. It’s just not me.

Jordan made me realize that I had two clear choices within the boundaries of the culture that I live in. I could cut back on my work, babysit Jordan, and forget my dream of completing my Bachelors’ degree. Or I could swim upstream; I could be the best Granny I knew how to be, and still follow my dreams. For me, there was never any real choice.

Today I find myself living a life that is shocking to some, and apparently encouraging to others. Because my choices are not always conventional, I have been mentioned in a few blogs, and just yesterday I was featured in Laura Allen’s post “Business without borders” in The Virtual Wire. The most important thing to me, though, is that I follow what author Paulo Coelho calls my “personal legend.” In one of my favorite books, “The Alchemist,” Coelho (roughly translated) writes, “When you follow your personal legend, all the universe conspires to assist you.”

My dream of learning another language, experiencing another culture, living every single day of my life, and — just maybe — encouraging others to follow their dreams, is my personal legend. Still trying to grasp it, but it is very, very real, and I am very, very grateful!!

Hours and hours apparently. I decided about a week ago that if I was going to put photos on my blog that I would do it right. I created an account on flickr.com, spent several hours editing, uploading, and creating tags, titles, and descriptions for all my photos, and then went to install the most popular plug-in to tie my flickr photo album to WordPress. And guess what? It won’t work, no matter what I do. My speculation is that it has to do with either a sporadic internet connection here (which I doubt, because I had no trouble uploading the photos to flickr), or there is something that isn’t working right in the connection between flickr and my host provider. But I won’t pick on them just yet. Not until I know for sure what the cause is.

Anyway, here are a few photos to tide us over until I can get the entire album connected.

First, a couple of snapshots of Semana Santa, Holy Week. This is a huge festival in Spain, celebrated with more flair in the south than anywhere else. There are organizations of church members who have the privilege of wearing traditional robes, capes, and sometimes the pointed hoods that make Americans shake in their boots. I’d like to understand how the pointed hoods that are such a strong symbol of religion in Spain became such an ugly thing in the US. Anyway, here are a couple of shots until I can get the photo album working.

Semana Santa — Life size statues of the holy familiy and various saints that are carried through the city to the beat of drums

Semana Santa in Almuñécar in the south

I’ll post a couple of more photos as time allows. Unfortunately I don’t have a lot of time left here, this trip. sniff sniff….

I have a ridiculous number of photos, so I´ll keep hammering away at the photo album and try to get it to work. Any suggestions??

Yesterday as I was watching yet another bank of clouds roll in, and hearing myself whine about it — yet again, I realized just how many differences there are between living in Spain and living in Colorado. The more I think about every-day differences, the longer the list grows. Interestingly enough, though, none of those things outweigh the benefits of being in a place that you love.

The first time I came to Spain, it was in January. I have never been so cold in my life. It wasn’t because the thermometer said it was colder. It was because Colorado is very very dry. And Dénia is very very humid. The apartments in Spain where I have the great good fortune to stay are all inside huge buildings, with little sunlight. The floors are ceramic tile, and the heat is delivered by small in-room units that most people never use. They just put on another layer of clothes. I’m not used to that. If I’m inside my bedroom, I expect to be warm, damnit!

And I am accustomed to drinking great water right out of the kitchen faucet. Not here. You have to go to the grocery store and buy water. And doing laundry? Not one Spaniard that I know has a clothes dryer. They all have tiny, very efficient washing machines, and outdoor clothes lines. That’s not so bad. Except when it rains for 3 weeks solid. I finally had to bring the clothes-hanger-thingy inside, turn on a portable heater, close up a room, and dry my clothes.

Then there’s parking. I have yet to visit a Spanish town (and I’ve visited lots of ‘em) where you can find a parking spot in less than 15 minutes. I, on the other hand, have a garage where both my cars live in cozy, warm comfort. When it’s snowing, I push a button and the garage door opens for me and I drive in the warm garage and hurry into the warm house. Of course there are parking garages here, but none of my friends want to pay the extra several hundred Euros a year that it costs to rent one. And who can blame them?

You want warm water and fuel for your stove? Call the Butano. The Butane Guy. He’ll come around in a week, or whenever it’s convenient, and drop off a big ugly orange tank of butane that you store IN YOUR APARTMENT, about 15 feet from where you sleep. If the Butano gets too busy and doesn’t get around to you, you just pray that a neighbor has a spare tank they can loan you.

The list gets longer and longer the more I think about it, but the interesting thing is that none of these things matters one bit. I am so accustomed to being comfortable in my own little Colorado world, that it surprises even me that none of these things really bother me, and they most certainly don’t have any impact on whether or not I want to be here. In fact, it’s almsot nice to be kicked out of my comfort zone, and realize that comfort is not what matters. So you’re inconvenienced a little bit. So what? A little change in comfort level just makes the experience richer. Somehow the paella tastes better cooked over butane or, if you’re really lucky, you’ll find one cooked over wood (and, lucky me, will be doing exactly that on Saturday). Driving around in circles looking for a parking place is just not that big of a deal when you open your eyes to the incredible beauty of the one-car-wide streets with bougainvillea-laced balconies.

Yes, it’s been raining for 3 weeks. I wake up every April morning dressed in 2 layers of pajamas and covered with 3 blankets (you think I exaggerate?). And although I will get down on my knees and thank my lucky stars when the sun comes out, I’ve decided that I’m done whining. Besides, my husband just told me they’re expecting 4 inches of snow in Colorado today.

Most people are puzzled by my attachment to Spain. How could an American, with so much freedom and privilege, prefer to be in a country outside the US? My friend, Ardith Loustalet coined a term that explains it all in a single phrase. Ardith said to me “Denise, it’s simple. You love it because it is living outside of culture.” Huh? What the heck does that mean? She summed it up like this: “Living outside of culture means that you are away from your country, so there is no one from your own culture to hold you to the social rules of your own culture. At the same time, you are immersed in another culture where you are really an outsider. So no one holds you to the rules of that country either.” I can’t think of a much freer way to live. Of course that doesn’t mean that you can be rude or stupid. It just means that you can move around with relative anonymity.

Here’s an example. At home I wouldn’t dream of sleeping until 9 or 10am (much less noon or later), and there’s no way I would leave the house without at least some basic makeup. But here I can sleep as much as I want, get up when I want, and there’s nobody who will think I’m a bum. This morning I heard the drums of the Easter Week procession, so I threw on my jeans and raced out the door with my camera. Makeup? Hair? Who’s gonna care? I wanted those photos and I knew I wouldn’t bump into anyone I knew.

I realize these are rather fluffy examples, but you can take it to lots of different levels. As I’ve mentioned before, I can go out dancing until 7am here and although my friends back home think I’m nuts, I realize that I have the choice whether to tell them about my escapades or not. It’s not unusual to stay out all night here, so no one will give me a second thought. In the US I am (for some unknown reason) very uncomfortable eating in a restaurant alone. Here, I don’t feel self-conscious at all. If I’m in the mood for a particular meal and my friends don’t want to come, I won’t hesitate to go and eat someplace by myself.

I can get up when I want to, eat when and where I want to, and stay up all night if I feel like it. In a nutshell, there are no rules. At least none beyond decent behavior. I can breathe deep and set my own pace and my own rules. Ahhhhhhhhhhh……………..

Every person on the planet should have at least a few Spanish Sundays in their life. One of the many things that Spaniards do well is Sunday. Pretty much everyone sleeps late and gets up when they feel like it. They have a leisurely cup of coffee. But we’re talking serious coffee, not the watered-down American stuff. Coffee here is a lot like in Italy. Small servings, super strong. After coffee and a light breakfast you can fiddle around the house or read or listen to music or take a walk. The walking is what I prefer. When you get out on the street there are people everywhere. Grandparents with strollers, giggling toddlers, teenagers laughing and wrestling with their friends, or couples holding hands.

If you’re organized you will have made a reservation for lunch (around 2 or 3pm) with friends and/or family at a really great family-owned restaurant that is a short drive out into the country somewhere. The reservation is necessary because you have ordered some type of paella — an incredible rice dish that comes in as many different forms as you can imagine. Good paella is something that is carefully considered and lovingly created by hand. There are fast tourist paellas, but those are like comparing a McDonald’s hamburger with a gourmet meal at Chez Whatever. They have absolutely nothing in common.

So here we are. At a beautiful little old house out in the middle of nowhere, and the parking lot is packed. You know you’re off to a good start. When you enter you typically don’t have to wait because your table is ready, but you might as well leave your American impatience in the car, because it will do you no good here. You sit down and the relaxing, and indulging begins.

First you order a couple of tapas to hold you over until the paella arrives. For me, I always have to have olives, which also come in a zillion different flavors, and I love the smoky red peppers called Piquillos that are roasted and served with either olive oil and garlic or they’re stuffed with a variety of wonderful things. Another of my favorites is grilled baby artichokes. Just thinking about it, I can hardly sit here and type. I want to jump up and run to the closest restaurant. Flavors like you can’t believe.

But I try to control myself because I know that the best is coming. Some people have a salad, but we usually skip right to the paella. I could write an entire book on paella, but that’s already been done. The short version is that paella has a very distinct character and many different forms and flavors. Once you get hooked on it, you’re hooked for life.

Of course, lunch is accompanied by fabulous red wine, which costs about the same as a Coke. Explain that one to me. If you’re really lucky you’ll be in a place that serves “el vino de la tierra” which literally means “the wine of the land” and roughly translated means the local wine. It’s typically young, a little fruity, but oh-so-good.

After about 3 hours you drag yourself up out of your chair and either go for a long, casual stroll, or meander back home and collapse in your pajamas for a nice cozy siesta. When you feel like it, you get up and maybe take another walk (everybody is out on the street all the time, even in pretty bad weather), or maybe rent a movie and stay in.

All in all, it’s a day that everybody deserves. Filled to the brim with relaxation, good company, good food, good wine, and no “deberes” — “shoulds.” Nothing but the good life.

I’m not exactly what you’d call a girly-girl. I love my jeans and I just bought a new pair of Danskos. But in Spain, it is amazing what you see at the grocery store and in the mall. The women here think that if you stick your nose out of your own door you better be ready for the cover of Rolling Stone. It cracks me up. You’ll see women with babies, girls that are 12, and grandmothers, all wearing pointy-toed boots and cleavage-revealing shirts — at the grocery store, for goodness sake! My friends just groan and shake their heads when they see me.

The benefit to this kind of attention to feminine fashion is that all the accompanying services are plentiful, and cheap. A couple of days ago we went to the esthetician and I had my eyebrows and lip waxed, plus had a face massage, for a whopping 6 Euros (about $7.50) which is about half what it costs me in Colorado. And today I went with Irene to get her hair done so while I waited I had a manicure and they insisted on putting pink polish on my nails. Oy vey. But again, I had a full manicure and hand massage, and it cost me 9 Euros. Not $25. So even a non-girly girl like me can comfortably enjoy some pampering here.

Going to the hair salon is an experience in and of itself. First, not just anyone can walk in. You have to ring a bell and they peek at you through the window and then buzz you in. If you’re paying attention you will notice that the tiny salon, where both men and women come to get haircuts and manicures, has more worker bees than clients. Upon closer inspection you’ll notice that this team of experts is decked out in very fashionable matching clothes, shoes, AND jewelry! There is a girl that lets you in the door and later takes your money. Then there is a line-up of girls who take care of you. Forget having one hair stylist. The entire team gathers around you to discuss your hair type, face shape, and all the things they would like to do for you. After you agree to the services one of them takes you over for the longest, most luxurious hair wash you can imagine. They wash your hair 2 or 3 times and treat it with all kinds of wonderful smelling stuff that turns it soft as a newborn baby’s head. Then they hand you off to the next girl who combs out your hair. Yet another comes and does the color. Another cuts. And finally you have the blow-dryer girl. And if you want a manicure, while all these things are happening, the cute little manicurist girl pulls up beside you with a cool little seat/table and hunkers over your hands as if there were nothing more fascinating in the world. I swear I’m not making this stuff up. You feel like a queen who has the command of an entire army of beauty experts. Oh, and to be fair to the guys, they get the same treatment. So for me this is a cross between fashion heaven and fashion hell. Everybody gives me trouble about my preferred style (which is a joke because I have no style) and yet, on the other hand, I can pamper myself like crazy. It’s a tough job, but somebody’s gotta do it….

Landed on Monday night in Madrid, in a downpour. Ah well, the show must go on. Poor me.

Before I could catch my breath my friend Lucia and her boyfriend were whisking me away to meet more friends at a tapas bar (don’t say that too loud in English in mixed company). Within a couple of hours of arrival I was happily munching on tapas and sipping a glass of great red wine, laughing and joking and soaking up every second.

If you don’t know, tapas are small appetizers of every shape, size, color, and flavor. The story goes that eons ago the king of Spain was out hunting on a windy day and a servant brought him a glass of wine with a piece of bread and a small bit of food on top. When the king asked why the “tapa” (cover) the servant replied that he didn’t want his majesty to get anything in his drink, so the tapa protected the wine from dirt and bugs. The king loved it and tapas are now a very important part of Spanish cuisinie.

But, I digress. After tapas we went to Lucia’s apartment to have some of my favorite food with some of my favorite people. The Descalzo family (translation: “barefoot” family — seriously!) is my Madrileño family. When I am in Madrid they insist on providing a room and great food. Felix, the Papa, cook, and Maestro of the Bota, had dinner waiting when we arrived at 10pm. Felix had prepared one of my very favorite Spanish foods — tortilla de patatas, and he handed me the bota when I walked in the door. A bota is a leather wine skin that requires a particular technique to drink from, unless, of course, you don’t mind wearing your wine on your shirt. Felix taught me to drink wine from a bota a few years ago.

Practicing my bota technique with the family has become something of a tradition. Maria Luisa, Lucia’s mom, is an amazingly warm and wonderful person who never met a stranger. Miguel, Lucia’s brother, is my music buddy. Somehow we started exchanging CDs a few years ago and my music collection has benefited immensely from his good taste and generosity. Not to mention that he’s just plain cool. And Lucia, well, Lucia came to study English with me only a few days after I had returned to the US from a 4 month stint in Spain. She was my salvation and has become a close friend. I don’t want to bore you with too many details, so tomorrow I’ll add a couple of photos so you can see for yourself.

Work couldn’t have been further from my mind, but the next day I flew to Alicante where I stayed with our “Spanish daughter” Irene in her college apartment. I knew with college kids there would be a good Internet connection, but I also remember how college kids live, so I wasn’t all that excited about staying in Alicante until Irene finished her exams this week. To my surprise the apartment wasn’t all that bad, but the sink was full of dishes. And the bathroom? Well, let’s just say I decided that it wouldn’t kill me to wait 24 hours for a shower…

So, back to the subject of work. I was able to connect to the Internet right away, but my excitement over my Vonage V-Phone faded in less than 5 minutes. I hooked everything up, including the fancy headset that I had purchased just for this trip, and called home to test my new toy. “Hello? Hello? Are you there? The line is buzzing so loud I can’t hear you.” I tested it several other times and there was just no way it was going to work. So my first technical challenge was to get telephone coverage that wouldn’t cost my clients a penny, yet wouldn’t drain my own bank account. I’ve discovered that Skype offers a service that allows people to call me from a regular telephone, so I intend to test that tomorrow and I’ll report back. My advice is to steer clear of Vonage’s V-phone.

I’m really happy to report that working from Spain has so far been a snap. When I started my business I gathered as much information as possible about working virtually. Some of the information came through the Virtual Training Program at AssistU, and I picked up other tips from reading books and talking to other VAs. I think the single best source of information for me is David Allen’s book Getting Things Done. In order to work effectively away from my office I only have to carry my laptop and an individual folder for each client that has about 5 sheets of notes in each one. For each client I have a secure file on my computer that has all of the information that I need. It’s amazing to me that I really do have everything I need at my fingertips.

We interrupt this really boring post to bring you something a little more interesting (well, to me it is, at least). It is 4am in Dénia and we just walked in the door. Irene, her mother Chelo, her friend Anita, and I went to La Sidreria, one of my very favorite tapas bars, at 10pm, the typical dinner time here. While we were munching on incredible goodies, the owner of the bar/restaurant, Javier, came by to say hello and to tell us about his upcoming 2 year excursion through South America and the US. He is a friend of Chelo’s and I’ve met him before, so I invited him to stop in Colorado for a visit. In turn he gave me a t-shirt from his restaurant. Then Irene’s friend, Nelson showed up and took us out to party. We danced until 3:30am which, in Spanish time, is actually pretty early to call it a night. But Irene was tired and asked me to make an excuse that I have to work in the morning so that she could save her reputation and still go home to sleep.

The reason that I tell you this story is because it is very indicatave of the culture here, and why I love it so much. It doesn’t matter one twit that I’m a grandmother. Nobody cares how old you are or where you’re from. In fact, Anita, who is 19, shouted in my ear, above the roaring music, “Denise, you dance like a Spaniard. I wish I could dance like you.” I almost fell over laughing. It’s like being on a different planet. Here you can be yourself, without fear of judgment or ridicule. It doesn’t mean that I wear mini-skirts or act half my age. I just like to dance. And in the Spanish-speaking world, that is simply normal. What a gift it is to be in this exciting, passionate place.

And, by the way, after 4 days of rain, the sun is finally shining. What more could I ask?