Gossip Girl

Gossip Girl

Filed under Blog Notes

Jul 11

Our little village abounds with urban myths of well heeled widows taking up with strapping young Mexican gardeners. One minute these guys are sweating in the sun, laying their, er, sod. I can’t even picture it without hearing imaginary porn music. The next thing you know the senora is coming out on to the terraza with a big glass of limonada and a gleam in her eye. Chapter Two? The gardener moves into the big house. His latin machismo soon surfaces, and he starts bossing the senora around. She is such a slave to passion that when he starts staying out all night all she can do is beg, clutching his leg and being dragged across the floor while he sneers in contempt and shakes her loose so he can go spend her money on some tart at the cantina, and the senora starts drinking straight tequila. The next thing you know, you never see her for lunch any more. According to the local grapevine, this pattern repeats itself all the time.

As common as these tales are, there seems to be a little something extra in the water at the moment. There’s been a recent spike in the number of stories regarding single women and their gardeners. It seems that the notion of this kind of big house/ field hand carrying on doesn’t have the salacious firepower that it once did, and the local gossips are trying to make up for in quantity what they are missing in quality. Last week, I heard three different gringa-and-the-gardener stories, which is pretty hot for the local demographic. We’re kind of a small town to be having this widows gone wild action all over the place. Frankly, I’d have a hard time swallowing three patronas falling for their gardeners in greater Los Angeles, never mind the village of Ajijic.

Perhaps I’m not the only one to raise an eyebrow at the sudden uptick in ravenously horny homeowners who can’t watch their lawn getting watered without dropping their negligees. I notice that recent stories include the addition of details that are getting juicier all the time. One thrilling variation includes the added twist of the faithful servant caring for the senora when she twisted her ankle, and subsequently getting her addicted to heroin! How awesome is that! Now he is rumored to be keeping her docile with regular injections of exotic drug cocktails, and is moving her hand across the signature lines of various deeds and titles while she is nodding out in an opiate coma. Once he gets the combination to her safe, well, I wouldn’t think much of her chances then….

Some of these chestnuts come my way in my job as a realtor, usually with the hopeful notion that it will result in an undervalued property, as in “I heard about a house in Chula Vista? where the woman is having an affair with her gardener? and she’s signed over all her property to him because she’s mad at her children for not coming to see her, and he doesn’t know how much it’s worth, so when she dies, he’s going to sell it for cheap!” Hope springs eternal, is all I can say.

Believe me, if you can’t take this level of small town drama, you are not ready for Lakeside. I personally thrive on it, the more lurid the gossip, the better. Unfortunately, the element that interferes with my ability to suspend reality long enough to enjoy these stories is the fact that’s it’s always the gardener. Jesus, not my gardener! Nobody in their right mind would have an affair with him, no matter what kind of drugs he was packing in his truck along with the WeedWacker and pruning shears. All the gardeners I know are completely retarded, or have glass eyes, or —in the rare cases where they are under 50–would rather shoot themselves up with drugs than have to throw a schtup into one of the old babes I lunch with. Give me a break. There are a few brown eyed hunks with flashing white smiles driving around in Chevy Avalanches, but believe me when I tell you, they know how much the land is worth. They know what they’re worth, too, and it’s usually a bundle, owing nothing at all to any dame in a negligee with a dope habit.

There is, of course, a kernel of truth to these stories. Somewhere along the line, some gal with a taste for margaritas in the afternoon probably did start a little something with her gardener, who was probably close to her own age and may have been with her for thirty years, and maybe her kids did neglect her.

The other dramatic structure that local gossip is likely to take involves lesbians, usually on motorcycles, who come into town and break up marriages with their irresistible lesbian powers. Like cobras hynotizing helpless birds, these black leather clad fembots have only to crook a finger and cast a certain sort of glance, and wives who are about to celebrate their golden anniversary are unable to prevent themselves from packing up and moving into the poolhouse with them, a slave to unnatural sex that couldn’t be imagined before these mighty sapphists rolled into town. A key element of this story is that everyone has sex with the ravishing seductress, who isn’t particularly fastidious about gender preference. Obviously, sooner or later the husband loses his mind and kills the lesbian, the wife, himself, or some combination of the three.

That story actually has a little more than a kernel of truth, happening pretty much just that way back in the ’80′s, when all the good stuff was happening around here. Frankly, the real story of that episode is even more sensational than the recycled fiction that gets handed around along with the gardener gossip, as it had the added zest of communism and theatre people.

There are local webboards that supply us with a cyber version of the back fence, but I never get any good stories there. The gossip on the internet is not more reliable than the stories I hear from flesh and blood nut jobs all over town and it seldom has the color and dash that I love so much. Who can get worked up over exterminators and visas? Bah. The internet isn’t always such a giant step forward.

But I’m sure glad to have it, so that I can share the really good stuff with you. Just between us, right?

9 Comments

9 Responses to “Gossip Girl”

Ginger said on July 13th, 2010 at 6:42 am

There’s a waiter in a popular restaurant by your office who has told me in his halting English that “I no wanna work no more, you married?” & then lingers by my table hoping, I guess that I’ll sweep him into my Honda Fit & give him the life he thinks he deserves.

Never mind that I’m probably 3 times his age & his ambitions for an easier life turn my stomach but if he’s hitting on ME, for God’s sake, there must be a lot of aging gringas willing to pretend their liver spots are freckles in a cute, Doris Day sort of way.

It may be ageist or sexist but it makes my wrinkled skin crawl.
Elliott said on July 13th, 2010 at 7:20 am

BUAHHAHAAH! Thanks for your comment, you are officially hired as a co-blogger.
Josh said on July 14th, 2010 at 5:28 am

You’ve been watching too many Mexican soap operas, Elliott. Good stuff!!
Elliott said on July 14th, 2010 at 6:21 am

Oh, Josh, the telenovelas! I live for them, and believe me, as intense and melodramatic as you can possibly imagine? Not even close.
I really missed you guys this year, I know it was an awesome time.
Chris Rogers said on July 18th, 2010 at 2:07 pm

Elliott,

You are a fantastic writer. So colorful, so descriptive. This piece is terrific. And hysterical. I haven’t spent enough time reading your blog, so there are probably many more posts equally delightful.) Privately, I could add to your lore with the story of the man who built my house.

Mi jardinero is the sweetest man alive. He’s cute, smart, funny, and more. But he’s a devoted family man with 3 kids and a 4th on the way. And I’m pretty stuck on my husband.

Chris
Anónima said on July 21st, 2010 at 2:55 pm

Not too very long ago, I personally knew an aging gringa (a word that rarely crosses my lips/fingers, but in her case I will make the exception) who fell in lust with her very young–can you say 18 year old?–gardener. He smoked large quantities of her marijuana, slept in her bed, let her take his picture with joint in hand, and spoke no English other than “I love you”.

Oh, and I believe he also learned to say, “Let me help you carry that big heavy purse.”

One afternoon, he offered to move her truck for her. She passed him the keys. Neither he nor the truck have been seen since. Pretty soon, she moved back to the States.

True story.

As is the lesbian tale you told, Elliott. But it wasn’t me, I swear.
Elliott said on July 21st, 2010 at 3:09 pm

Oooooh, Anonima, what a good post. It’s like seeing someone you just barely but not quite recognize at a masquerade!
Anónima said on July 21st, 2010 at 4:57 pm

And the whole thing happened in your very own little town!
TW said on July 22nd, 2010 at 2:17 am

Why do I have the feeling of being neutered, after reading this blog and posts?