I recently had a little back 'n forth with a friend in regards to the concept of death. She fretted a bit over what to tell her kids in regards to what it was, and I mainly quoted Whitman and a couple other divinely poets inspired poets that saw death as part and parcel of the cycle of life. To me, life is death, death is life. In this form, I control my energy a great deal. Perhaps in my late 50's - I have a difficult time seeing myself as a 60+ year old - I will exert little to no control over the physical me - my ashes will become as dust and nutrients for the water and soil, aiding this world however it finds itself then. If there's more to my energy, a soul, if you will, and what happens then...well, that's another story. My writing focus today is indeed on energy, but a subset of perhaps that absolute, infinite energy - I'm looking to discuss how I want to use my energy today.
Where do I want to put my energy? Into what? Why? What's my satisfaction level? Where do I want it to be (knowing full well that I am responsible for it and capable of having it at whatever level I choose)? Am I wasting my own precious time? Would I rather be pulling a mango off one of many fruit trees that have been left to my care, even if that means some dirty, sweaty, hard physical labor also, or am I going to rent rooms to quiet and desirous couples at 1 AM on a Saturday night? Considering my work for room trade agreement allots me one room where I knew I'd be handcuffing myself to 4 ugly mustard yellow walls where I haven't felt the key ingredient of beauty that I desire if I'm to write, my answer was easy. It just wasn't always necessarily there.
Yes, I've used some of my time well here: I got a new mouth, I busted up my computer (blown wires in a hard to get at spot leading to the LCD screen, and was able to get this fixed in one day at a local shop [it took me a few days to find this shop and decide against ordering replacement parts from the US] for what strikes me as a deal at $70), and I got a feel for the land here over my first couple weeks. And though I enjoyed the feel overall - there were quality things and there was the newness factor of living in a new country - there were some negatives that became more glaring as time went on.
Much of that has to do with the owner of this hotel and the land that houses a defunct, wanna-be eco-sanctuary. There's a hilltop. And pictures show that people have been there. Just not now. So when they say to join them up there, I'm not sure when they mean to join, and I'm not sure they know either. And that fact is left out. This was a 1st-day-in-Costa-Rica, you're-my-technical-employer, big red flag that took me some time to wrap my head around.
Add to that a number of other red flags I've sussed out as time went on from the owner of this operation, and I may as well be stitching Chinese flags alongside a six year old, his mom, grandmother, and most of the village, for the great reward of being able to live as a result! Shit, they get paid over there, even if it is a buck an hour - who knew sweatshop people had it better than me ;)
And the established trails here that I've found are roads. And the monkeys have been driven away or eaten or something to that effect. And I hadn't seen 1 squirrel since arriving. And I'm cheap and frugal and practical and guided by my feelings - I'll eat cheaply here, but I'm still providing for myself. Not for long. Additionally, I don't discuss local cuisine and restaurants because I've only ate out once, instead buying fruits, veges, pasta, potatoes, bread, and peanut butter and jelly. There'd be no lunch stop for $5 or so in lunch food for me on the lengthy bus trip I'm about to discuss - I brought bread, peanut butter and jelly and made and ate sandwiches while traveling.
And still, it mostly about this effort here by this owner being heavily in the pipe-dreamish state, bot unsurprisingly, since he probably smokes 5 j's a day. I'm all for dreams. Pipe dreams too. Just, these days, I don't want to just dream the dream and talk the talk, I want to use the talk to help manifest the dream into an actualized reality. So, computer fixed, I altered my focus.
I had a different Costa Rican 1st choice back in the states, but there were a number of issues to resolve between the 2 different property owners, and we mutually decided to shelve the idea of me working with them until September at the earliest. Well, I had this hotel, and I had another eco-lodge I was communicating with, and maybe some other deal, so I eventually just bought a ticket and figured I'd make do and make good. I have. Mainly cause I've held my tongue with the owner at this hotel long enough to not get booted out and because when the time was right, I contacted the 2 owners I'm now committed to working for, to let them know I was in CR, alive, well, and looking to get weller by working with them.
I faced up and down those same old fear foes when I approached my boss here about needing my 1st day off in 3+ weeks so I might go and see about another job, a job which, if it worked out, I'd be taking. Freshly 36 yrs old, I took one bus to Cartago (30 min), caught another to San Jose (40 min), where I bought my first bus ticket from a teller and not the bus driver, and caught a bus to San Isidro (3 hrs).
I learned straight away that I could ignore the assigned seat from the ticket, and grabbed myself a seat with some extra leg room. Par for the course, the sunny morning became overcast and then rainy, all this while steadily climbing in elevation to around 10,000 feet. We then stopped 1/2 way into the journey at a way station that I didn't know to be a way station. And I inquired with one guy if this was San Isidro, or I thought I said as much, and he seemed to confirm we were there, but he may have just thought he was confirming we were on the correct bus. Regardless, if it wasn't raining hard, I probably would have begun walking to what was supposed to be the next part of my directions. Instead, as I gazed off into the distance of what was supposed to be a lively city, but was just a way station, a kind a extremely attractive young woman with her young child in tow, informed me that the bus was re-boarding and about to leave. Yeah, language. I've since downloaded 2 different torrents containing what will hopefully bring about Spanish fluency rapido.
We make San Isidro an hour and a half later. Pause to laugh at me, if you want - I did then and now. I'm bombarded by taxi drivers before I even exit the bus. "Cowboy!" "Hey, taxi cowboy!" "No gracias," I'd say. One driver followed alongside me and offered to give me a ride to my next destination - Tinamaste - for $50. "Good deal," he said. I laughed and counter offered 50 cents. I don't think he understood the American cents, only dollars, and soon I was walking away from him, to the McDonalds, where I would either: walk past for 2 blocks and get a bus at a local transport station, or turn right, walk a couple blocks until at the outskirts of town, and then put my thumb out for a ride. I turned right.
From 18-20, I picked up a number of hitchers. I stopped for people who's cars were seemingly stranded on highways and such. I'd offer and if necessary, give them help. Then I learned to be afraid, as frequent attention to American media will do, and so because of the possible stick up or escaped prisoner or boogie-man, I didn't pick up another hitcher until I was 34. And I never engaged my dream of hitching myself. Or hopping a freight-train. That'll be next.
I had my doubts about this working, but the guy I was off to meet was pretty convinced I'd get a ride no problem - there was only 1 road going south and very few turn off's, after all. Because of the doubts and because I didn't want to waste time, I was walking south as I held out my thumb. I soon decided when I'd hear a vehicle coming that it'd be smart to turn and show off my winning smile - ahh sales. Within 2 minutes of this new trick, 5 minutes overall, a pick up pulled over and allowed me to share back seat space with a mama and baby chihuahua.
The dogs snuggled me the whole time. The ex-pat driver and the Tico passenger got high and offered me some - I declined. We talked literature and sustainable, idealistic living, and bonded about being out of the invisible prison of the "free" 50 states. Just as we were getting to a bond formation place, the driver pulled over, as he knew the road to let me off to get to "the typical Englishman's" place. Danger level of hitching - close to non-existent. And this ex-pat is now another contact, as he has a farm where he allows people to stay if they need a place to stay, and I offered to do a little work for him to return the favor of the ride.
Now I walked. 45 minutes or so. On an unpaved road. The nearest town? Don't know. Mountain vistas to my left. Eucalyptus forest to my right. Houses on farms every so often in either direction. Cows. And a magnificent bird that may be a red breasted blackbird. Decide for yourself - it let me get pretty close to admire it, and admire it I did.
And so, even before I had officially met Rob or spoke to Bebe, or seen the 2 bamboo homes, or heard about the monkeys spotted nearby, or saw the waterfall I could play and shower in, or ate bananas and mangoes and custard apples fresh off the tree, or got my hands dirty and all sorts of blistered and cut up from doing some vigorous gardening and raking and permaculture (of which I might know less than nothing), or heard about the adult boa constrictor that's been spotted on property, or bonded with Rob (here I did not decline the offer of rum or pot puffing. there's a theme here amongst the non-nationals), or, maybe more importantly, spent time alone at night by myself where I recognized I love to do yoga away from neighbors eyes and where I saw stars for perhaps the first time in CR, and where I pulled out my notebook and wrote for about 2 hours (parts of which you've seen included in this and my last blog), I knew I was home. This was where I wanted to give my energy, partly because I wouldn't have to work hard to receive it back - I merely need look around, breath in, eat it up.
Before departing the next day, I saw a black haired squirrel.
one sneak peek at where I'll be that Tom Hanks and Wilson would be overjoyed about, with more pics to come
Where do I want to put my energy? Into what? Why? What's my satisfaction level? Where do I want it to be (knowing full well that I am responsible for it and capable of having it at whatever level I choose)? Am I wasting my own precious time? Would I rather be pulling a mango off one of many fruit trees that have been left to my care, even if that means some dirty, sweaty, hard physical labor also, or am I going to rent rooms to quiet and desirous couples at 1 AM on a Saturday night? Considering my work for room trade agreement allots me one room where I knew I'd be handcuffing myself to 4 ugly mustard yellow walls where I haven't felt the key ingredient of beauty that I desire if I'm to write, my answer was easy. It just wasn't always necessarily there.
Yes, I've used some of my time well here: I got a new mouth, I busted up my computer (blown wires in a hard to get at spot leading to the LCD screen, and was able to get this fixed in one day at a local shop [it took me a few days to find this shop and decide against ordering replacement parts from the US] for what strikes me as a deal at $70), and I got a feel for the land here over my first couple weeks. And though I enjoyed the feel overall - there were quality things and there was the newness factor of living in a new country - there were some negatives that became more glaring as time went on.
Much of that has to do with the owner of this hotel and the land that houses a defunct, wanna-be eco-sanctuary. There's a hilltop. And pictures show that people have been there. Just not now. So when they say to join them up there, I'm not sure when they mean to join, and I'm not sure they know either. And that fact is left out. This was a 1st-day-in-Costa-Rica, you're-my-technical-employer, big red flag that took me some time to wrap my head around.
Add to that a number of other red flags I've sussed out as time went on from the owner of this operation, and I may as well be stitching Chinese flags alongside a six year old, his mom, grandmother, and most of the village, for the great reward of being able to live as a result! Shit, they get paid over there, even if it is a buck an hour - who knew sweatshop people had it better than me ;)
And the established trails here that I've found are roads. And the monkeys have been driven away or eaten or something to that effect. And I hadn't seen 1 squirrel since arriving. And I'm cheap and frugal and practical and guided by my feelings - I'll eat cheaply here, but I'm still providing for myself. Not for long. Additionally, I don't discuss local cuisine and restaurants because I've only ate out once, instead buying fruits, veges, pasta, potatoes, bread, and peanut butter and jelly. There'd be no lunch stop for $5 or so in lunch food for me on the lengthy bus trip I'm about to discuss - I brought bread, peanut butter and jelly and made and ate sandwiches while traveling.
And still, it mostly about this effort here by this owner being heavily in the pipe-dreamish state, bot unsurprisingly, since he probably smokes 5 j's a day. I'm all for dreams. Pipe dreams too. Just, these days, I don't want to just dream the dream and talk the talk, I want to use the talk to help manifest the dream into an actualized reality. So, computer fixed, I altered my focus.
I had a different Costa Rican 1st choice back in the states, but there were a number of issues to resolve between the 2 different property owners, and we mutually decided to shelve the idea of me working with them until September at the earliest. Well, I had this hotel, and I had another eco-lodge I was communicating with, and maybe some other deal, so I eventually just bought a ticket and figured I'd make do and make good. I have. Mainly cause I've held my tongue with the owner at this hotel long enough to not get booted out and because when the time was right, I contacted the 2 owners I'm now committed to working for, to let them know I was in CR, alive, well, and looking to get weller by working with them.
I faced up and down those same old fear foes when I approached my boss here about needing my 1st day off in 3+ weeks so I might go and see about another job, a job which, if it worked out, I'd be taking. Freshly 36 yrs old, I took one bus to Cartago (30 min), caught another to San Jose (40 min), where I bought my first bus ticket from a teller and not the bus driver, and caught a bus to San Isidro (3 hrs).
I learned straight away that I could ignore the assigned seat from the ticket, and grabbed myself a seat with some extra leg room. Par for the course, the sunny morning became overcast and then rainy, all this while steadily climbing in elevation to around 10,000 feet. We then stopped 1/2 way into the journey at a way station that I didn't know to be a way station. And I inquired with one guy if this was San Isidro, or I thought I said as much, and he seemed to confirm we were there, but he may have just thought he was confirming we were on the correct bus. Regardless, if it wasn't raining hard, I probably would have begun walking to what was supposed to be the next part of my directions. Instead, as I gazed off into the distance of what was supposed to be a lively city, but was just a way station, a kind a extremely attractive young woman with her young child in tow, informed me that the bus was re-boarding and about to leave. Yeah, language. I've since downloaded 2 different torrents containing what will hopefully bring about Spanish fluency rapido.
We make San Isidro an hour and a half later. Pause to laugh at me, if you want - I did then and now. I'm bombarded by taxi drivers before I even exit the bus. "Cowboy!" "Hey, taxi cowboy!" "No gracias," I'd say. One driver followed alongside me and offered to give me a ride to my next destination - Tinamaste - for $50. "Good deal," he said. I laughed and counter offered 50 cents. I don't think he understood the American cents, only dollars, and soon I was walking away from him, to the McDonalds, where I would either: walk past for 2 blocks and get a bus at a local transport station, or turn right, walk a couple blocks until at the outskirts of town, and then put my thumb out for a ride. I turned right.
From 18-20, I picked up a number of hitchers. I stopped for people who's cars were seemingly stranded on highways and such. I'd offer and if necessary, give them help. Then I learned to be afraid, as frequent attention to American media will do, and so because of the possible stick up or escaped prisoner or boogie-man, I didn't pick up another hitcher until I was 34. And I never engaged my dream of hitching myself. Or hopping a freight-train. That'll be next.
I had my doubts about this working, but the guy I was off to meet was pretty convinced I'd get a ride no problem - there was only 1 road going south and very few turn off's, after all. Because of the doubts and because I didn't want to waste time, I was walking south as I held out my thumb. I soon decided when I'd hear a vehicle coming that it'd be smart to turn and show off my winning smile - ahh sales. Within 2 minutes of this new trick, 5 minutes overall, a pick up pulled over and allowed me to share back seat space with a mama and baby chihuahua.
The dogs snuggled me the whole time. The ex-pat driver and the Tico passenger got high and offered me some - I declined. We talked literature and sustainable, idealistic living, and bonded about being out of the invisible prison of the "free" 50 states. Just as we were getting to a bond formation place, the driver pulled over, as he knew the road to let me off to get to "the typical Englishman's" place. Danger level of hitching - close to non-existent. And this ex-pat is now another contact, as he has a farm where he allows people to stay if they need a place to stay, and I offered to do a little work for him to return the favor of the ride.
Now I walked. 45 minutes or so. On an unpaved road. The nearest town? Don't know. Mountain vistas to my left. Eucalyptus forest to my right. Houses on farms every so often in either direction. Cows. And a magnificent bird that may be a red breasted blackbird. Decide for yourself - it let me get pretty close to admire it, and admire it I did.
And so, even before I had officially met Rob or spoke to Bebe, or seen the 2 bamboo homes, or heard about the monkeys spotted nearby, or saw the waterfall I could play and shower in, or ate bananas and mangoes and custard apples fresh off the tree, or got my hands dirty and all sorts of blistered and cut up from doing some vigorous gardening and raking and permaculture (of which I might know less than nothing), or heard about the adult boa constrictor that's been spotted on property, or bonded with Rob (here I did not decline the offer of rum or pot puffing. there's a theme here amongst the non-nationals), or, maybe more importantly, spent time alone at night by myself where I recognized I love to do yoga away from neighbors eyes and where I saw stars for perhaps the first time in CR, and where I pulled out my notebook and wrote for about 2 hours (parts of which you've seen included in this and my last blog), I knew I was home. This was where I wanted to give my energy, partly because I wouldn't have to work hard to receive it back - I merely need look around, breath in, eat it up.
Before departing the next day, I saw a black haired squirrel.
one sneak peek at where I'll be that Tom Hanks and Wilson would be overjoyed about, with more pics to come
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