April 2011
1 post
Drowning in The Homesick Blues
I never saw the mornin’ ‘til I stayed up all night I never saw the sunshine ‘til you turned out the light I never saw my hometown until I stayed away too long I never heard the melody until I needed the song Tom Waits, “San Diego Serenade” It was late morning in the tree house and I was lying on the bed as a peaceful and cooling breeze blew the leaves on the trees outside. I...
March 2011
0 posts
1 tag
Being the writer you *aren't* →
Oh man, this is good.
February 2011
5 posts
Featured Blog of The Tico Times →
Not much has changed. A new home with a few new readers.
3 tags
Almost America and Back Again
Above the Gulf of Mexico, in a plane full of fishermen, college students, Ticos, and gringos, I sat overwhelmed with sadness. We had just taken off from Fort Lauderdale and I had a seat by the tiny window opening into endless blue and white clouds. With Joe to my right, we talked about how it was strange to be returning to Costa Rica after being in Puerto Rico—a place that felt to us so much like...
New Blog
Somehow the English language newspaper of Costa Rica, The Tico Times, has invited me to be one of their three featured bloggers. So, I have created a new blog via wordpress, which they will link to from their homepage (www.ticotimes.net). I’ll probably focus on my writing for the new one, but I think I’ll keep this tumblr thing going. I’ll post the url for the Tico Times blog...
Observing
I cut my toe again today. And laid in bed all day. Before I hurt my foot, I wasn’t feeling well and called off our trip to the beach. I felt weak and tired. I wondered out loud that it might be remnants of my recent sickness or that my body is having a hard time balancing the cold nights with the boiling hot days. But a part of me thinks that maybe I just didn’t want to leave the house, didn’t...
January 2011
1 post
4 tags
Welcome to the Jungle
Sorry, couldn’t resist.
At night it gets cold in this jungle on the mountain. So cold that I wear his sweater and we say, “Man, it’s freezing,” even though it couldn’t be below fifty five. Right now Texas is actually very cold. Next week it’s supposed to get down into the ‘teens. Well, I definitely don’t miss that, I thought to myself when his mom...
December 2010
2 posts
“Travel changes you. As you move through this life and this world you change...”
– -Anthony Bourdain (via memoirsofavagabond)
Even though I don’t like Anthony Bourdain, nor his tv show, I like this quote.
November 2010
1 post
5 tags
It's All Right
For the first five days, the rain did not stop at all, though sometimes it became very light, a mist existing just for the sake of keeping the whole thing going. Only on Saturday morning were the rain showers from Hurricane Tomás broken up by periods of dry air. Before that sixth day, I wondered if it would ever stop. A bright shining sun was too hard to find in my memory for it to be a...
October 2010
2 posts
4 tags
What I Can Take
The morning I awoke to find a puddle of sewage three feet away from our front porch, was the first time I said aloud, “There is only so much that an American can take.”
And there it was. After four months of trying to learn from the simplicity and rugged quirks of life in Costa Rica, I found myself sticking my stake in the mud, tying to it the battered Stars and Stripes, and declaring my...
September 2010
4 posts
3 tags
The New One Gone
Something near where I am sitting smells like the young kitten we called Tito. I am not sure if it is the smooth tapestry whose strings he used to bat or if it is the George Orwell book he used to sleep on at my feet. But it painfully reminds me of him, with his long whiskers and bold gray tabby stripes under fuzzy kitten fur. I might try to track down the smell and clean it away tomorrow. But not...
3 tags
Here We Are
From the moment we started on our first walk through the Quepos neighborhood of Boca Vieja, I knew I would like it here. Maybe it is that the people are friendlier, more likely to smile and say hola or buenas as we pass on the street. Or perhaps it is the way the ocean breeze flows in and out of our windows, making the thin cloth curtains in our tiny apartment sway back and forth. “Everything is...
2 tags
A Quarter Year Between the Mountains
Three months, the longest I have ever been away from home. The longest length of time a tourist can legally stay in Costa Rica. Enough time to miss home yet begin to forget the feeling of being there.
Our time in the house between a small town and larger city in the Central Valley was painfully normal, yet subtly exciting. Other than several weekend trips, we spent much time inside of our home’s...
August 2010
2 posts
Liking this song makes me feel more Costa Rican.
...
4 tags
The Cows Think We're Crazy
I had a Styrofoam cup of black coffee in my hand and Joe was wearing his fake ray bans as we squinted our eyes and looked at the weathered faces of two old men, trying to make sense of what they were saying. We had just gotten off the bus in San Jose de la Montaña, a tiny mountain village with no taxis or ATMs just north of Heredia. I bought my coffee from a soda run by the man with darker hair...
July 2010
5 posts
5 tags
3 tags
Things about living in the US that go...
ejdoescostarica:
I ordered an external hard drive yesterday (from California)
It just arrived to my house (In Pennsylvania)
A Few months ago my mom sent me a card
It arrived in Costa Rica 4 weeks later
U.S. Postal service: Blowing my mind since 5 minutes ago
Silver Crosses
The last time I felt this helpless, I was 20 years old and drunk on a cobblestone street in Seville, Spain in the middle of the night, talking to my mother on an international cell phone. As she told me about my Dad’s minor heart surgery, I cried. I am fairly certain that my mom thought I was overreacting—my Dad was fine and he had finally quit smoking after more than forty years and several...
Costa Rica Señoritas
During the first two or so days of my brief trip home, my Dad asked me to bring home a pretty señorita from Costa Rica for my older brother, and my twice-divorced uncle, who sold his truck to buy 8 goats and take on the career of a goat rancher, asked if he can come git him one of them Costa Rica señoritas who will cook his dinner and clean his house.
June 2010
4 posts
Taking It In
The sun disappeared behind the green mountains around six this evening and the rain has been falling for about an hour, cooling down our small home through the windows that constantly stay open. Almost every day has been like this, the rain bringing in the night, the deep calls of cattle across the fence, and our neighbors’ warm voices conversing in Spanish.
I was not sure if I would, but I like...
Save Me
While lying in our bed in a mostly dark room with just my lamp turned on, I roll over and kiss Joe as he sleeps. I have been reading for a while and I want to tell him something. I think he wakes up a little so I whisper in his ear.
“We need to get some boxes so we can start packing,” I say softly.
His response is a mostly incoherent yet endearing mumble. Maybe I suspected that he wouldn’t...
May 2010
1 post
I suppose I will write here once I am in the air...
So stay tuned. :)