Wordless Wednesday.

Dominican Republic Thanksgiving.

 I’d heard about the iguanas and I so wanted to see the purported island full of them, but that never got round to happening. The pamphlet even touted a-thousand flamingoes and caves for the exploring and such and those, too, sounded like they’d be easy to add to that short list of things that had to happen.

Instead, though, instead the Dominican Republic was filled with the chewing of broken Spanish words and accidentally crunchy, half-filled roadside chicken empanadas. It was having misguided faith in an ancient GPS unit, right up until the eager-to-please rental would no longer scale an unpaved road leading up a mountain, the one dotted with burros and confused locals. It was big slabs of pork shoulder hanging from hooks on the side of the road and strings of pink snapper sold to those driving by that were not either one of us. It was admiring the children and their braids and moms for being able to balance big bowls on their heads without bothering to use hands. Huge rollers in her hair. Roosters singing along with the sunrise. Not using blinkers while on the road and fading in with the locals. Spanish music, with a side of reggaeton on the dial, por favor. Sailing on an ancient sailboat and peering at egrets with binoculars for the low price of a-thousand pesos. It was witnessing oblivious singers and in-the-street dancers. It was sharing a wave with a whole lot of children. Honking, so much honking. Travel advice from gas jockeys not bothering to lean on English. Girl working at customs who sees my passport, instantly smirks and says “Looking good.” Oh, plantains. Small trucks so weighed down by pounds and pounds of green bananas. El Presidente. Stars pinned up in the sky while on a quiet balcony at 4am, save for the occasional goat baaaaing down below. New levels of honesty in a friendship, a hole broken clean through a once well-constructed wall. Swimming without sunscreen. Never, ever eating indoors, opting for candles and such. It was saying and repeating (interchangeably) “I can’t believe how beautiful all of this is” and “I just love vacation.” It was a longish sigh of a paid few days off without so much of a mention of turkey. 

Wordless Wednesday.

as yet untitled.

It helps to have a goal in mind.

Say, when that New York afterthought

of an October visit

fell together, it was to see leaves painted

yellow, brown and orange

evidence of a season not wanting

to be forgotten.

And now, in a spot of Nicaragua

so rarely visited, and in the midst

of a power outage

and facing the sea

I recall the goal being discovery,

seeing what hadn’t yet been,

filling eyes up with surprises.

The gut wanted it.

When I don’t want to offer an explanation,

I take that easy route, the one

not as true: “I wanted to find a spot

where the sun gave out more warmth

this time of year.” And it slowly puzzles,

is eventually accepted.

I didn’t expect howler monkeys singing at 6,

hermit crabs stepping sideways out of my sand-path

or even the rare lonely celebrated lightning bug.

I didn’t expect the kindness of strangers

or a persistently curious mosquito,

though, they too, are my puzzle pieces.

Lessons learned.

Not treating people in such a way because they've done what you have perceived to be a good thing but because, by and large, everyone, everywhere is deserving of your kindness, no matter what it is they have done, are doing or will do. Letting bygones be exactly that and not pieces you can hold on to to use against someone later and hit them below the belt with it. Not giving a "gift" to someone because he or she has done you a kindness, but because you want to and need to give of yourself ... and because you most certainly can. Always, always, always act "as if" and let the cards fall where they may.

I guess I'm just picking pieces up along the path. Life's pretty good.

Bad Reputation — Foo Fighters & Joan Jett

Hey, look! Look which song went and got even better! And, as I'm a pretty fair-to-middlin' fan of the Foo, I'm more than incredibly (pleasantly?) surprised that it is Dave Grohl and crew making this song even better than it was already. This is powerful happiness, that's what this is. By all means, enjoy at maximum volume. 

Happily lost in translation: Nicaragua living.

I want to retrace my steps before moving forward any more. Maybe not so much retrace, either, as relive. Having the unique advantage of sitting on a deck amongst the trees and within earshot of the music the ocean makes, then, here are my words. I hope they’ll do.

We met Julio, a tour guide who could easily answer any question we had about this country, no matter how obscure, and we pestered him with them for the hours it took us to arrive at a dormant volcano. There was a wonderful smell hanging around the coffee plantation on the way and bright flowers innumerable. There was a hike around its crater, a cloud forest (!) and the best frijoles I can ever remember eating. Fed a couple too-skinny-to-be-living dogs some of our mushy bananas.

  

A zipline followed, high amongst the trees, and we flew upside down and like Superman. Sweat, laughed, freaked out and landed.

  

Traveled towards Granada, a city that’s been around since the 1500s, and we learned of how many parts of its shambles were being repaired. Plenty of “se vende” signs. We spent some time in its churches and bell towers. Took a tour behind a horse named Pinole (named after a soft drink). It rained on us the whole time, but we didn’t much mind. I leaned on the Spanish still hanging around in this head since the 9^th grade and didn’t fare too poorly. Stopped just short of singing “Un Elefante Se Balanceaba” to the man at the reins.

Wordless Wednesday.

Raindrops kept falling on my head.

taken from inside a tiny, tiny boat

A long day filled with being and doing, of climbing so many steps, so many times, asking so many things out of these poor calves, then jumping into a small boat to travel into a sleepy town and experience roadside tacos and local artwork and overpriced handmade jewelry. There was a finally captured cloudy smear of a sunset and there were chased dolphins, too (with nary a photo to prove the tiny baby of the bunch they had jumping in formation with the others). I've other remembrances to stack on those others, like coins on top of coins, though highlights work just as well. Blink and you'll miss these. Tomorrow will be even more filled, and there aren't many hours to go before it happens all over again but, looking back, if I were to pluck a favorite moment out of this Monday now passed, I'll go on record with just this one: having felt raindrops on my face while in a resting pose during our morning yoga class? That's way, way up there at the top.

Snapshot of a Sunday night: Nicaragua.

It took a couple of flights and what amounted to being a very long, bumpy taxi cab ride to arrive here but, the good part is that we did so safely: I'm in Nicaragua! And, yes, it's a yoga retreat of sorts and, no, I didn't come simply for the yoga. While it's great to set aside 90 minutes out of the day to tie and untie my body in a knot on a platform outside, both looking at and hearing the ocean below the whole time, I was drawn to this business for the adventure; I came because I'd never been before. I also wanted to meet the other like minds, the other adventurers, the thrill-seekers. The good part? I've found a good lot of them. 

I'm in a wooden villa, built high amongst the trees (it's practically a treehouse). I get to take my showers out on the balcony if I want to (I do!) and there's a plunge pool right outside my front door (which amounts to an unheated hot tub). It's only just past 9 over this way, though most have gone to bed. Only a couple days into this trek and it's become so easy to follow the sun's schedule, rising when it does and retiring not long after it dips below the horizon. The howler monkeys will be starting up soon enough. Ah! The bed is comfortable and dreams of fresh papaya and guava juice are so ready to begin.

What's more, a man can hear his thoughts here. Whatever level of stress there was in my life before this venture (on that little to none level), let's just say it's gone and dropped a few notches lower. 

 

I sound like some kind of a hippy reborn. I absolutely swear I'm not. But, this? I could get used to this. This is some kind of fairly undiscovered paradise.

These emptier fingers.

Oft-times

when I’m asked what I fear

I try in absolute earnest

to clamber around for one

and prop it up on semi-proud display

because I know it and so well, too

as we have stare out competitions

every Thursday mid-morning

just to familiarize ourselves

with the other

feign bravery, minutes on end

before slinking away.

That one fear used to be paper cuts

but even it has lost

the silent wince.

Even it.

Just tonight I found one, though.

If I were to run out of words,

hands and typing fingers left empty,

what would I do with this desire?

This empty shell of a man would still

wander, but fail to share about

it later. Perhaps I shouldn’t write

quite so much, just in case. Perhaps

tonight I’ll cozy up to a neighbor’s TV set,

stop with these thoughts.

The very expert ones know

ignoring your fear gets you

both everywhere and nowhere.

Tom Waits — "Satisfied"

Now I know, at long last, that I do need this album. And it will be mine .. oh yes, it will be mine.

I Know You Got Soul.

For a good time, see what this sounds like in your ear-holes. I like nothing more than being able to share these mixes I've pieced together from a time gone by. From cassette tapes to compact discs to a simple click of a play button on your computer screen. Turn it up and carry on. And I sure hope this bunch of songs transports you right back to the 70s. It came right out of my pile of CDs and I figured it needed a new audience. It's been hiding far too long. If you've any comments, by all means, spill 'em!

There are levels of friendship.

We've so few of them, these friends. There are the ones who put on a smile for you if you happen to see them (when and if), they usually begging quotations around the title of "friend," and there are the ones who remain so, past moving to other states and falling into and out of the shackles of love, where being busy and doing errands don't count as excuses for not calling and connecting, when time and distance are less obstacles than they are realities you wade past. Those latter types are the ones I'm after, those I'd stick in my pockets if it was feasible to do so. And then there are still others (this being a new category unto itself, recently discovered, like so many dinosaur bones) who you felt you were locked in with, those you had history with, those who knew your jokes and still laughed at them anyway. Only, well, they've dropped off, no right explanations accepted, like being left without a guidebook. The sense being, of course, that they've no more need for you, not in a-million, and you're left to fend without a right arm, one you'd done so many good things with before: the phantom limb never going away, not entirely. Or, maybe it does, maybe it does, given time. It's far easier to bemoan the fresh wound, though. It might be like those empty nesting parents who have to adjust to a child who has become a man and holds mom and dad in a different sort of regard than he once did, but I've no real proof of that. I simply know it hurts to have to steer around a void. You're left still alone, but only, well, decidedly more so. Especially if it happens twice, and unexpectedly, without warning. Trap doors. Pulled out rugs. Especially then. The only antidote is to be certain you're there for them, of course, whenever they need it, if they need it. You know how it should work or how it might work a little better. You have ideas. Just, for the love, don't call in the replacements. Substitute teachers never seem to slide into that left behind pair of shoes so well. And you know that full well. Too well.

Less beauty, more Beast.

I hate to break it to you, but this little guy (my wee nephew) was probably cuter than your kid, niece or nephew was this past Halloween. I mean, if we're gonna get down to brass tacks about it and stuff, I'm fairly certain he'd have to go ahead and win. Best (and least intimidating) little Beast I've ever seen.

Wordless Wednesday.

Remember, remember.

This being the brand new start of a favorite month, I figured there would be many November poems out there to read and rifle through and think on. And, while there are quite a lot, each citing change and seasons and very old English, in the absence of having written a decent one myself, I'll share this simple thought, which I rather like, and might even adhere to, were I not living exactly where I am. 

Then again, leaves aren't exactly necessary in this scenario, not if you think good and hard about it.

"Even if something is left undone, everyone must take time to sit still and watch the leaves turn." —  Elizabeth Lawrence