andreaschrisdrewfreijaguyhalliejasonetc.

It's always grey in Lima and time slips away into those slits of vanishing sun and black nights.

Above the cliff face, down the coast, the cross of Baranco cuts the mist all the way to Miraflores and the Pacific slinks and laps, icily. It feels like a transient thing, sleepily nestled against that ocean waiting to find the heat. Waiting for the fog to lift and for summer to roll in from the water like a warm tongue. Waiting to leave and move up the coast where the sun burns endless.

It is beautiful, to be sure. The shiny concrete and well-dressed of Miraflores. All those bohemians and hipsters and sidewalk sellers in Baranco. Those buildings in Centro, wasted to the color of lime and bearing down the backs of highways, out of place. From that rooftop patio where the hours roll away, it is crisp and illuminated. Always now pushed into by a colourless sky and frozen by that Arctic wind bruising its way across the country.

People come from here or people go from here. There is no in between to speak of. Lima has words for few wanderers, but for those who hear it, it weaves a lush filigree. Sweet lines of moist air and passion pushed out on hot breath into pores. It permeates, for those that listen. Intoxicates.



I came to Lima. I stay in Lima.

Wrapped coolly in that lazy grey and cocooned in its quiet poetry. Nestled, as it were, like a transient waiting for the path to be illuminated. Waiting to leave while basking in the heat of distraction, created warmth. Feeling the Castellano float off lips, over hips into the break. Dancing under the black sky until the sun cuts briefly and the damp sends everyone to bed.

Those others that come and go, those beautiful soulmates, burrow into a lack I didn't know I had. In an exchange of all the carried things, we become each other. Become changed and well because of each other. Become ourselves in the reflection of a kindred. Paths wind like nerves, tendrils of dusty roadways through the body of a continent.

And in all directions, I bring them. The lack filled.

Here is the heartbreak of wandering: the dull ache of goodbye and the swell of being bettered by another.

Beautiful strangers/ Soulmates/ Satellites in the grey.

Linked to the experience of Lima and a life shortly shared.

Snugged into the neck of Lima, warm from the appertaining intoxication, distraction, I stay. A better person for those who passed through.

xo

apologies, and that hard road.

Let`s start with an apology.

Apologies.

In this reality, time gets away. But it is never wasted. It is spent in the best ways. It is spent at breakfast with kindred spirits from other countries. It is spent in colorful markets, chasing the beautiful local children and buying those llama sweaters. Spent on trails high up in the mountains, camping under stars, sitting in darkened ruins. It is spent touching ancient stone walls and speaking Castellano with that satellite operator who talked of the Incas, and how everything is energy. Who called me hermanita and gave me a hand carved wood whistle that I should play in happiness and sadness. It is used seeing the Southern Cross for the first time, hearing Quechuan. Or placed in those friends that touch a nerve and that you miss when they move on in a different direction. Those ones that take you to the fountain park and let you cry from exhaustion into your newfound tofu. Those ones that you climb a thousand steps with, up to Christo Blanco and back. The ones that you wander through libraries, neighborhoods with. Who stop and watch, just like you.

This time is not wasted. It is spent. In churches, museums, mountains, stars, ideas, languages, people. It is spent perfectly in experience. On the intangibles that weld to your fabric.

So, apologies.

I have been here. Collecting, remaking myself in those threads of happiness so elusive a life goes on.

the way to Machu Picchu, and that town called Cusco.

The Inca Trail climbs its way through the Sacred Valley, winding across high passes into the thin air of the clouds. Breathing is difficult. Coca candy is magic.

The porters rush past all morning, laden with our things, our campsites, our sustenance. They chew wads of coca leaves stuffed into cheeks, and their calves along with large Andean lungs, carry them on soft breaths. We breath fiercely, gasping, panting, and in endless awe of those that carry and run.

The climbs are steep. So high that they transcend the cloud bank and at night it seems that the stars could drop into palms. It is cold up in those Andes, in that Sacred Valley. Shivers in the dark inside sweaters and sleeping bags with the black sky blowing cool overhead.

In the day, the ups and downs make skin swell, skin pop. Joints expand to bear the downs and that old pain burrows into that hip joint, that angry nerve. But it is all forgotten, that sacred pain, stumbling in the dark to those majestic terraces, those 7 windows for the sky. The feeling of a secret, of the sweet undiscovered, erases all. Skin seems healed. Soul, well.

The way is hard. Harder than that walk last summer, maybe.

Machu Picchu feels small after all the steps of the trail. It is a mad dash to the Sun Gate at dawn and then a small sigh. There are people, everywhere, even so early. And the flood only grows throughout the day. Quiet is hard to find. It is beautiful, to be sure. As seen in a million photographs. And it is overwhelming in the shadow of so much exhaustion, appertaining pain.

It is the thing that you walk towards, but surely not the reason.

It is perfect for naps on the ground and proper toilets and imagining what it looked like consumed by jungle, before it was discovered and trampled. It is perfect. Perfection in stone.

that city called Cusco.

Cusco is all uphill. So many steps. So much shortness of breath in the altitude. It is imaginably difficult after the way to Machu Picchu. But it is stunning. All cobbled streets, steps. Tile roofs spreading like fire into the valley. Steeples, blanks in landscape that indicate town squares, fountains, centres.

In alleys old woman parade with llamas, baby lambs, offering photos for 1 sole a piece. Vendors approach offering massages for tired bones, and jewellery to remind of the pretty things. They are relentless, and shooed only by the admission of not carrying money. Maybe later, they all say.

The children are beautiful, hanging from their mothers backs in brightly colored slings. Dark eyes and honey skin and sweet wide smiles from behind all those wooly hats. They hold out tiny fingers to wave and coo in Spanish, and sometimes in Quechuan. They laugh, freely.

Cusco is weather. Hot in the sun. Freezing elsewhere. Frigid at night. There are rarely clouds here, only the sprawling blue of sky. There is nothing to keep the heat down. The llama sweater industry is booming.

Tonight I take a night bus to the West. To Arequipa, on my way back to Lima. They say it is (blessedly) flat there.

xo

dusk, idle bets.

An idle bet in that mountain town called Boquete, and direction changes.

I arrived in the blessed cool of nightime. Streets illuminated by the warmth of so many people in curb side cafes, laughing. I arrived to the Getsemeni with the sound of salsa breezing in my ear and the stars, clear up in the sky.

Cartagena is like a dream. Those delicious and infrequent dreams that take bits of memories from past loves and plaster them together with that sweet hue of fondness.

It feels like Paris, like Barcelona, like Santiago, like Montreal.

There is some kind of magic here, undoubtedly. Somewhere, buried in the mortar of the old city walls, the bricks of fossilized coral, the slow moving hands of the clock tower, the chipped yellow paint of so many buildings, or the flooded tunnels of the Castillo, there is some magic.

This city has a brightness, with so much yellow, orange. It makes the sun feel closer, like it could be touched only by running fingertips along those old walls of those old buildings.

Burning.

The city seers and laps steam into the Bay at midday. And when the rain comes, it comes hard, making swimming pools out of potholes, sidewalks.

In the evenings, the waning sun burns down the backs of buildings, alleyways, and turns everything golden for that small bit of time. It marks out small pathways for that dry lightning that billows to the sea every night in this season. Those white flashes casting strange shadows off the tips of roofs, down onto busy streets.

So the dusk burns down to fires in the sky and sultry struts through that old town, with vendors selling mangoes, and fried cornmeal and cheese cakes, and fresh fruit juices, beer. It vanishes to the bare bulbed delight of cabinas of book vendors and the smell of grilled meat, potatoe, the constant click of horses and carriages, and the warm tones of music always in the air.

An idle bet and I find Columbia.

san blas, translated.

I arrived to San Blas in the biggest storm. I was on a tiny boat crossing the water to that island called Diablo when the sky turned dark gray and the ocean got so angry. The waves stood up and went over the boat with so much fury. It was stunning, frightening.

I arrived drenched to the bone... papers, clothing, identity, self.

The islands of the Kuna Yala are beautiful, isolated. I could almost wrap my arms around them and carry them away. They are small, perfect, drowned into the ocean as they are. Yet, I walked around them and felt lost, after Bocas and so many people and...

The sand of Diablo was clean and white and burnt toes in the midday sun. The water was a blue that lives mostly in dreams. The sky was always clear, bright, except at noon when the rain came through, always. It hammered on the grass roofed huts and dripped dampness, down onto hammocks.

At night the leaves on the trees made the sound of raindrops and the sky blew the wind around the slats of those huts, and I dreamt of things that have passed and people I miss and...

I dreamt of speaking perfect Spanish, articulating all those things that need out, with that softness that flows the words off the tongue, loose. I dreamt of what I should have said, and I woke up wondering where to find all those words lurking around my subconsious. Words of perfect Spanish for...

I dreamt of goodbye. And missing things.

I bought a new camera in the city and I kept trying to take photos, to start the archive of experience over, but all I can remember is those pictures I took at the last goodbye, and how I wish I could get just those back.

Now.

I lost a bet and came to Columbia. Sweet Cartagena.

quelonios, unembittered.

(My favourite project, despite the thievery.)

Dirt constantly under finger nails from so much scratching, so much digging in the weeds. So much sand and salt expelling from pores, always. It`s hard to feel clean anywhere here, tangled up in the mangrove of wetlands. It`s sickly sticky, sour from the sweat. Try to clean it, wash it all away but it`s already permeated. Already a part of that intangible thing that will become the new you, somehow.

Tired, constantly, despite the hours upon hours of attempted sleep on those rough wooden slats and that slight piece of foam that presses into your one sore hip sharply. Struggling to stay asleep under that fallen mosquito net while the sea crashes deep just over yonder and small Spanish voices speak and poach turtle eggs down by the break.

It´s painfully beautiful on that island, lead to by endless water ways with uprooted trees guarding secrets and making cages for all the things that creep in the dark. Shades of every green shine in the sun and are dotted by the spiky red flower who`s name I never know. When there is red here, it is exquisite, intangled in all the green.

Here, the ocean moves pale grey in every direction and makes awkward swimming, standing. Everything about it is an opposite to it`s sweet sister down the coast that sways slowly with white sands and cristalline green waves.

At night the sea creatures crawl upon the sand like ancient things. Those leatherbacks, heaving and hawling all of themselves out of the surf to nest. They labour over the sand, digging into it for ages. Making it perfect. Making it sweet. And when the work is done, 100 eggs lay in the coolness below. Hoping for new life... on that island called Quelonios.

it`s tuesday somewhere.

Here is the part I`m at: the things that I have the hardest time forgetting always happen on idle Thursdays. Broken hearts, bad news, insolent dreams.

The days keep melting into each other in a very disconcerting way. Like just around the corner, time is going to bear it`s teeth and gnash at my burnt skin and that will be the end. I`ll be scarred by all those spent days.

I can`t keep track. That`s really the problem.

Right now, I`m going backwards in a thin attempt to remind myself why I want to continue going forward.

Costa Rica got to me. That`s the plain truth. Admist the tangles of mangroves and salty sea air, in the clear mountains, or in the dampness of those wetlands I could never quite find a connection. It felt edgy, in a way that made you keep your things close, or argue with taxi drivers trying to overcharge, negotiate the price of a mango, or talk back to those leering boys. It felt, exhausting. And in the end it doesn`t matter because if they want your stuff, they`ll go into your room and get it while you`re relocating a nest of turtle eggs at 3 a.m. on an idle Thursday, somewhere on that remote island called Quelonios.

And that`s how Costa Rica became erased. It vanished along with all those woven bracelets, and sweet shell pendants from Montezuma, and my favourite pen. It went along with my camera and wallet and 2gbs of memory and all those beautiful shots of friends and beaches and homes for the small time they were all mine.

All I can hope is that my stuff fed someone in need.(Though I doubt my favourite pen could buy a grain of sand.)

I`m still a little bitter.

Mostly because of the law of 3`s. Hopefully this is it. Either way, I`m outta stuff. Clearly. So I`m thinking of having a t-shirt made that says:¨No Tengo Nada¨, so the next guy is at least warned. Though I assume that would only attract more leers. Cultural differences abound..

(One day I`ll tell you about the day I wore my I heart Panama shirt.)

So.

Right now, I`m going backwards in a thin attempt to remind myself why I want to continue going forward. I came back to Bocas, to a family and friends and town that are familiar. To happy hour at Mondo Taitu and that electro 80´s night. To the Columbian vendors across from the Iguana that drink boxed wine with me and tell me how beautiful and safe their country is. To that special place with the hammocks and tents where so many hours have been spent and that I always carry in my heart.

And here, I`ve been stuck. In Bocas. Because that`s what happens here. People stay. The searing heat, and golden sun, and sweet air make everything slow, easy. Like being stuck in a vat of syrup. Delicious and hard to escape from.

But I know I have to move on. I have to find those other places where my spanish is more necessary. Where I can find those friends that moved on ages ago to places like Columbia, Peru. I need to pull at the thread and tear away...Panama City, going backwards. Mañana, talvez.

xoxo

dream in jungle.

I had a dream last night that I was looking at pictures of the Camino, but all the pictures were of things that never happened. Still, I looked at them with the same fondness, love.

(I know) I am haunted (here in this jungle).

Here in this jungle the sounds of geccos, of howler monkeys ring out at 5 a.m. and the wood smoke from the fire billows through the cabin. We crave coffee this early, this hot and the floor boards creak under blistered toes and the sand drips from pores all the way down the stairs.

The house sits back from the ocean, tucked into gardens and trees with so many white-faced monkeys swinging, babies clutched to backs, throwing mangoes at the tin roofs.

Head sits in elbow at 5 a.m. as the sun rises out in the distance and the barrel of the Pacific crashes on the Playa Grande just into the yonder. It smells of salt, and sweat, in that elbow.

At 8 a.m. it is hot. Bothered. And the work is tedious, difficult (sometimes), dirty (mostly). And the sweet pineapple compensates, when it can make its way to camp.... otherwise, the fire burns the rice and beans and we hunch tired over bowls, laughing.

Hammocks in the sand at the burning bits of the day. Those afternoons... Sweet breezes, where they can be found and that fresh water pool two beaches over. Homes for all those burning daydreams.

Then the sun sinks early and the guitar and woodsmoke and cards sift through the air until the candle light melts away.

Darkness, bed with clean skin and all that sand and dreams of all those lovely things that never happened.

Bocas (in ten lines.)

Arrived in the searing heat of a tropical sun, sweat for days and body angry from all the hot.

Wandered that one main street backwards and forwards until that Camping Spot appeared, then wandered from there to the casa for ages.

Left a language, found a language, never understood that tight-lipped Panamanian of the Señora except when it came to scrambled eggs and feeling like family.

Explained wisdom and Jenga to Rodolfo, then sat silently for hours in the aftermath watching that tower sway precarious.

Was scarred by that mystical sea creature and the appertaining booty shot, antibiotics.

Danced in the street late into the night with that Costa Rican musician, to that sweet music I couldn´t hear, swaying.

Broke my heart good on that idle Thursday evening outside that Campíng Spot.

Broke someone else´s in misplaced... everything.

Bastimentos, mud.

Left Bocas in a mad rain storm, sweating on 2 hours sleep and that sting of goodbye.

(now Boquete.)

red frog.

Went to the beach the other day and for hours after felt the undertow pulling at me, the force of the waves crashing against my back.

Residual motion.

I´m sure some part of me is still out there, buoyed to those waves. I find sand on my skin, constantly. Expelling that ocean from pores.

The beach I most love here is named Red Frog. It´s the one that tanned me the most, bit me the most, is the most furious, beautiful. You get there by boat. Across the bay in amongst those other islands and past that expanse that spreads endlessly to the Caribbean Sea. Then down the straight into the marsh land on the gentle rolling waters and sounds of birds, flapping, all the way to the other tip of that isla named Bastimentos.

The boat docks and cracks against those wooden beams.

There are countless pathways to that beach. Some are raised pathways over mirky swamps that open onto gravel roads and twist around the low hills. Others are grassy, lush jungle walks through that reedy low hanging canopy with the sloths and flying things and other creatures unseen. Some ways are unmarked and secretive. Secret to you, to me. All of them open up to the gleam. The perfect brightness of sun hitting white sands and one hundred immaculate breaks rolling at your toes. That living thing crashing the color of emerald and spraying salt upwards, frothing at the feet of the jungle and the belly button of the sun.

Moving, always, pulling.

This beach is framed by points. Great bluffs extending like tropical towers at either end. Pathways twist up and into forest and slide with walkways of mud made from the rain. Wet earth squishes between toes and the salt water calls.

The sun burns quickly on this beach, but for all the heat there is also shade. Shelter, under those trees with the leaves the children make into cups. Cool, under those trees with the edges to hang clothes away from the ants and the sand that itches clean bodies. Safety from the sear of sunburn.

On the beach, local children run wild up the trunks of trees on tiptoe and across rogue branches to watch the tourists doze on brightly colored sarongs, with coolers of rum and Platanita Loca. They all carry purses of banana leaves housing tiny communities of those rare red frogs. They pose for photos in exchange for things like cookies and sometimes just purified ice that they melt in the big leaves of those low hanging trees and drink like the water they can´t.

But they mostly like Oreos and cheese flavored Pringles, and that´s my favourite part. Those children on the beach hand in hand with the tiny Red Frogs and the perfect waves rolling...

Ramblings.

I woke up this morning to the mad hammering of torrential rain on that tin roof. The sound galvanized a sweaty dream and the whole room cooled within a second. I was dreaming about Oreos and chasing down words with my teeth, and finding somewhere to hide everything that I remembered.

(I mixed those antibiotics from last week´s hospital visit with a benadryl to stop the heat from itching, and my head ran wild with dream.)

Then my alarm sounded, and I could smell the scrambled eggs the Señora was cooking and the coffee from Lorena and Justin´s organic farm, and the rain kept moving and it was morning.

It´s so hot here. I know mostly you´re in snow and hate me for saying that, but heavy heat is just as oppressive as the deep cold. For the last 3 days it was hard to move anything, anywhere. It was hard to breath. The moment any energy was exerted, skin would erupt and pour uncontrollably. It was actually kind of astounding...and disgusting, that much sweat.

One day, I drank 3 litres of water, in succession.

It´s hot here.

But the heat finally broke from those torrential rains and the weather has been softer since. This happens to have coincided with my decision to finally do all the touristy things Bocas. First, snorkeling in Dolphin Bay and Zappatista! Sadly, canceled by the rain.

After changing my reservation to Sunday, I went back home and did my homework. And the Señora fed me.. again.

The Señora has taken to feeding me whenever I´m in the house. And she goes to great pains to take the meat out of whatever she´s cooked...so I feel obliged. The other morning while I was trying desperately to get through the scrambled eggs with onion and tomato, grill cheese sandwhich, and half a pineapple, she asked me if I liked banana bread. ¨Si, Señora! Me gusta mucho la dulce de banana!¨

Never did I imagine that she would come out with a huge chunk of banana right then and there! Now I get banana bread with EVERYTHING else every morning and I´m sure I´m gonna burst... Or the 3 pairs of pants I brought with me will stop fitting me imminently.

(NOTE: No puedo comer mas- I can´t eat anymore- is a commonly uttered thing in my house, yet the food doesn´t get less or stop coming.)

Truthfully, it´s very kind and I´m happy for the home cooking.. mas. And I assume the banana bread is almost done with now, so... phew.

I´ve been here nearly three weeks to the day. So far, I can speak Spanish (almost), dance salsa (kinda), and cook rice and beans with coconut milk from scratch. And it feels so much longer than just 3 weeks... I can´t wait to see what happens next.

Miss you. xo

That time.

(Small disgression from travel talk at the end of a hard week)

She remembers that day they walked into Molinaseca carefully.

It was cool for the first time since....the beginning. It was cool in a way they forgot about in all those days over the fiery Meseta. It was mountainous. Clear.

Sometime before lunch they reached the highest point and there they wrote things on rocks that were meant to be secrets. He looked at hers anyway and then didn´t leave her side the whole day. It was the day her uncle died and she´d known it had happened from the moment she wrote ´Uncle, be peaceful´ on that rock, and she told him so. That she´d felt her Uncle pass.

He never left her side the whole day.

Sometime after lunch she took a photo of him on a rocky pass. The horizon a sea of mountains and green and the sky crisp with those clouds, those ethereal clouds. His t-shirt was blue and not ripped yet. His hair stuck to the right.

Click.

Later, as she picked her way carefully across that rocky rubble she told him about her fractured collarbone. That bone to the right that would jut and swell slightly when it rained, damaged doing dive rolls in an ill-fated karate class. He asked her why she was taking karate and she could tell he already knew the answer. Because she wanted to be a ninja.

She asked about his parents, his sisters and he spoke of them quietly, as an old soul. They talked about life, and also about geology.

Later she called her mother (and got the sad news) while he sat next to her. She cried quietly on his shoulder, and then alone behind that hostel staring at that farm and feeling bad that she didn´t want to go home.

At dusk he bought her beer and threaded her blister. She found a magic paste for his arm, infected with a cut from that drunken night. Then they ate vegetarian soup with huges chunks of bacon that she dropped bit by bit onto his plate while they laughed and stared at each other.

She remembers that day on the grass in Portomarin carefully.

They sat in that damp grass against that concrete, elbow to elbow for hours. The others talked and played songs on that ukelele and rolled cigarettes from loose tobacco to save money. They ate ham flavored chips that she liked because of him and despite being a vegetarian.

They all started dinner separately so they would have more wine. Wine in addition to all that cheap supermarket wine in the afternoon, and beer on the lawn, and all that. After dinner the others smoked cigarettes of tea and they laid back in the damp grass talking about how he caught up with her that other day and how she was glad for it. They talked about differences that didn´t matter, and they also talked about geology.

It got cold, up there in those mountains and she wore his hoodie, and in that sea of people they went to sleep. Happy.

She thinks of those days carefully. In that mass of good days. Threaded to her, into her. She thinks of them especially in the absence of any help for that ache. That burrowing thing that she picked at and scarred and so matches that one on his shoulder.

She thinks of those days specifically, carefully. And walking west in her memory, she leaves them there... in that mass of perfect days.

Small places, Carnivale.

Carvivale is magic in small places like Bocas.

It´s the return of all those family, those friends that left for bigger towns, dreams. And it´s the tourists that flea now to those bigger towns, dreams. (The ones with the supposed epic Carnivales, like Panama City, like San Jose.)

Carnivale here is children and music. It´s devils dancing in the streets at midday and that cracking sound of the whips on wood and the smell of barbecued meats and rice and beans and stale beer, sweat. It´s holding up that kid, too small to see. It´s that booming base constant in the damp air and that town square filled and bars tearing at the seams. It´s stepping over drunks, over crushed beer cans, bottles. It´s sharing wine, rum.

It´s the beach to escape, or to return. It´s home for a break. For Jenga. For goodbyes, hellos. For those hammocks at The (camping) Spot and vino rojo from the box.

It´s the crackle of speakers transcended by drums, and clasping fingers and hips badly (like a gringa) with that Costa Rican musician. In the heavy heat dancing. Swaying on those Spanish songs with the words that vanish in their speed, ´til the sky is black and the power fades and the water at home is gone.

Late. Nights.

It´s Carnivale in Bocas del Toro, where I live for a while.

Panama (firstly)

Panama is hot. Steaming, really. The weather digs into the pores and pulls hard. In stillness, the skin decompresses and feels like a starfish out of water.

It´s gritty here, or it seemed to be at first. I´m used to it now and anyway, I feel like it could only be a prelude to places like Ecuador, Bolivia. Those places without a world wonder.

(Aside: My Great-great Grandfather worked building the Canal, which is a strange thing to know when you´re standing in front of it. Or in front of that archival photo mosaic, looking for a glint of yourself.)

Panama City was the beginning. Was overwhelming. I stayed in Casco Viejo where gentrification is in the midst. The buildings are beautiful, the buildings are falling down. Planks, bare bulbs, flat screen tvs. This is Panama.

In Panama City, I mostly wandered. Wandered to the Miraflores Locks where I missed all the big ships, but watched the small ones rise with the gates. Wandered to the tip of Cerro Ancon and stood in the sway of the Republic of Panama flag, hard won in it´s place. I wandered across the coast of that Old Town, knocking on hollow bricks meant as pirate code. Wandered through the hostel and all the new people. Drank with some, ate with some, left.

And then, Bocas.

In Bocas I am burned and bit and in love with it. My skin contracts almost painfully with the weather and the pores open to the surf and sand and feel dirty and I am constantly accosted by mosquitoes and sea creatures, but... In the mornings Senora makes me huevos and piña and Rodolpho asks ¨How you doin´today, Leeeeeesa?¨ And the people all say ¨Buenos¨and want to talk and the boat taxis constantly offer to take me to Bastimientos and I tell them that the sun burned me and there will be no beach today or tomorrow and then Rodolpho or Jason or that other student ask me to go and I do because that´s what you do in Bocas.

Bocas is beautiful. Not shiny, not clean, not perfect. Beautiful.

It´s main bits are owned entirely by gringos, but if you wander slightly to the right you´ll find the true Bocas. Those hearts that sold the land and lost the money and built anew with less, with much less. They speak all different languages and cobble them together to something new. And they are quiet. And they are good.

It´s hard to see nonetheless. I have too much...we have too much. But I know this is just a prelude to those places without a world wonder.

Bocas is good. Beautiful.

(Pictures forthcoming)

xo

post two (pre-travelogue.. barely)

They say the Camino starts when you leave your front door and ends... when it ends.

The Camino never felt like it ended. It felt paused, but in that crazed way. Like a horse caged mid-race. One day I started walking and just as things started to make sense, the world dropped off into ocean (Finisterre) and real life swung back around from the wings of planes. To apply all those things that started to make sense to real life meant a whole lot change. And constantly. But that's kinda the thing, isn't it? A willingness to evolve and fight for the minimums...

I'm still trying to figure it all out, trying to keep moving forward, so I know the Camino hasn't really ended. It's just continuing in another form on another continent in brand new shoes (!!), but still with the same intent.

A pilgrim would say to this: Buen Camino.

Plane leaves in the morning. (Eeeeeeeee!)

post one (pre-travelogue).

February 4h. 8:15 a.m. Departure….

Glorious, excited, terrified departure.

I spent so much time plotting and dreaming and twisting the idea of a magical escape over in my mind that now that it’s on the doorstep I somehow feel… fearful. But that seems about right. The thing with realizing that you’re not living the life your supposed to and feeling compelled (in the deepest sense) to change it, is that there’s hardly time to absorb the change as it’s happening. And then one morning you wake up, and all the biggest steps have been taken and all that’s left is the leap… and you wonder how you actually managed to execute the plan. How you got… here.

I’m sure I came here by way of a dozen beginnings. A foot in front of the other... and blisters for ages. I came here on the venom of dissatisfaction, the sweetness of happiness found, a sadness levied, a broken heart for ones lost, the sear of so many goodbyes, appertaining tears, disappointment, chance encounters in underground malls, and of course, belief.

(But not in that order.)

To be true to the feeling, I came here by way of a dozen ends. The sensation of dismantling a life built. One by one the books went, and the CD’s, furniture. Then the appliances, the coffee maker, popcorn popper, and then the plants- all to perfect homes in hopes of being perfectly returned one day…off in the unknown future.

Last it was that beloved apartment.

Oh, that sweet corner apartment with the beautiful arches and the windows that allowed for a cross-breeze in every room and the sunken tub with the chipped porcelain and the windowsill that was a dream for soaps of all kinds and the rooftop deck with its lush couches and so much red wine and the musical boiler room and all those artists, everywhere…

(Swoon. Sigh.) Gone.

I’ve had dreams since the great dismantling where I am running through wheat fields and that apartment is chasing me, in all it’s concrete arched majesty. I’m running and it’s trying to swallow me. Whole. So it turns out that I am glad to be rid of it, which surprises me more than anyone. The objects that anchor always end up being the most frightening.

So now I’m nomad. Unburdened by a job that was killing me in the slowest way, free of all the anchors, untethered. I might be too old to be a nomad (if nomadic behavior has an age-limit) but this seems to be exactly what I’m supposed to be right now… someone who’s plotting a new course.

So....

February 4h. 8:15 a.m. Departure…. Destination: South America.