I’ve been asked by many what it’s like, you know, actually living in lawless narcoland Mexico. I’m always at loss for words with such questions, never truly sure how to answer, but in this post, for you, I’ll try my best.

To answer, I decided to go back and read posts of mine from a year ago, six months, three months, and last month. It’s kinda’ funny, but without fully realizing it, I’ve changed, we all have.

A little over a year ago two men were found gutted and police were shot execution style and thrown on the side of the highway less than 2 kilometers from my home. THAT, for me, was the beginning of a nightmare I felt would never end.

As newspapers and local news flashed images and reports of horrific deaths and levantones non-stop, I cracked. I feared for my family, my kids. I couldn’t sleep, I paced all night listening for anything and everything. We drilled the kids over and over about what to do and what not to do. We traded talking, loving and laughing for midnight anti-kidnapping drills and endless checklists of do’s and don’ts.

Don’t look at the big trucks that seem to gather outside the house every night after 2:00 a.m. Don’t notice the man sitting next to us who has two pistols tucked neatly into his waistband. Don’t honk while driving, never look at the Hummer next to you at the stoplight, Don’t drive fast, but don’t drive too slow. Be on the look out for narco convoys, don’t get between them, don’t drive too late, don’t drive too early. Don’t ever go out alone, but don’t draw attention in big groups. Don’t See, Don’t Hear, Don’t Speak. We essentially, out of fear or perhaps hysteria, stopped living with hopes of be allowed the luxuary of simply existing.

As time passed things changed. Actually, nothing changed in regards to narco death and mayhem, but we changed. We began to notice people in the streets, people sitting in the park, laughing.
They were still alive.They were still living, but how? Was it possible, is it possible?

The answer is YES. Life goes on, you make necessary adjustments and begin living again. The truth of the matter is once you begin living again, you realize there was no reason to of ever stopped in the first place.

We go to work, our kids go to school, we go to the cinema, to the mall. We take vacations at the beach. Our kids have friends over and hang out at the park. People still dance, the barber still cuts hair, and street vendors still make the best hotdogs on earth.

Life is and always will be what you make of it, just because you live in Hell, doesn’t mean your life has to be Hell.

Carpe Diem