Being alone.
Ho-hum.
In my own space.
Twiddle-my-thumbs.
On my own time.
Diddle-dee-dum.
Commitments = take care of leg. Watch sunsets. Try not to sleep all day (but try not to punish myself if I happen to slip one or two extra siestas into my lazy, HOT afternoon).
It's oddly disconcerting.
This time.
Just.
For me.
Especially because I'm primarily confined to my bed. Due to commitment number one.
I wake up.
No alarm.
No sunrise yoga classes to teach on rooftops of nearby hostels these days.
Isn't that funny? Just when I prove to myself I'm capable of living off my unique skill set in a foreign country... I go and fall off a cliff.
Yes.
Hilarious.
teefuckinghee
The idyllic can vanish in a moment. Living life to the full expression of what makes us come alive can be totally torn away by a cliff, a car and one misplaced footstep in the dark.
Left foot?
rumble, tumble, crash, smash, tear
No.
Inhale -- create space
Exhale -- explore
One door closes. Another opens. That's what I'm supposed to tell myself in situations like these, right?
But I have my few days of resentful, adolescent glaring at that goddamn door.
I was THERE.
Christ.
I was there.
Fuck all these lessons. I'm tired of lessons.
But.
If I spend all my time resenting this change of circumstances and kicking the crap out of the door hiding my idyllic life on the other side... I won't be able to fully experience and appreciate the gift of time found in this "loss". My bum leg gave me the space to be totally still and just...contemplate.
A space I've been craving for weeks. What with all the, eh, not small changes in the not so distant future.
I wake up.
Without alarm.
Five or six.
Soft light seeping, creeping in through the billowing blue curtains.
Simple bed sprinkled with sand, looking more and more like the beach as the days wax on.
Tiny grains settling into the wrinkles and crinkles of my stained white sheet.
I hardly even notice anymore.
In fact, I expect I'll see sand fleas flitting about and crabs (Ignacio. Boy has named all crabs Ignacio just as I've named all quails Gloria. Although I do believe I spotted a crab named Harold when I was watching the sunset two nights ago) scuttling sideways through the sandy wrinkles and crinkles before I leave.
I wake up.
Five or Six.
Without alarm.
Stretch luxuriously in the blissful cool of morning.
Searing pain in my right leg as cool morning bliss pushes my stretch too far.
I contemplate getting up, moving out to watch the sunrise from the refreshing playa thirty seconds down the road and to the right.
But lazily decide to roll over, pillow between thighs to keep fucked up knees at an amicable distance.
I still don't dream, but I wish that I did.
I'd even take nightmares these days.
Nightmares instead of night after night of dreamless sleep.
I wake up again.
Seven.
Never any later than
Seven.
God knows the world would implode if this morning lady EVER woke up later than seven.
I climb out of bed -- taking care to not overextend my knee as I do -- and make for my big ol' stack o'fruit.
(which cost about ten dollars and should last three days. Um. Win?)
I eat a grapefruit the size of my head.
And a banana
the size
of a banana.
Then I creep into the kitchen and shamefully heat a pot of water hot
for my morning cup
of nescafe
and pine for the coffee at Casa Kei.
Instant coffee... Bourget, you are, um, NOT in your coffee happy place.
But at least this coffee is mine and I can make it whenever I please.
(even though I now live in a hostel with people who steal my lighters and SWIPE MY CHEESE)
I read a little.
Write a little.
Curse the slow internet for taking approximately seven eons to upload my photos and then giving me an error message and making me start the seven eons all over again.
At least avocados are thirty cents each... and the sunsets are pretty okay.
I have a hard time focusing on reading and writing.
So I look up recipes to put into my "for Troy" folder.
So that one day
when,
you know,
we're in the same country,
I can surprise him with his favorite pastry (millefeuille) when he comes to see me (wherever I happen to be).
"Surprise, Boy! I made your favorite pastry. It only took me two days."
(this will be one of the only surprises that doesn't look like this)
"Surprise, Boy! I bought the plane tickets for Guatemala. We're leaving in two weeks."
I have a hard time focusing on writing and reading.
I flip to facebook and chat with Joe, an American hobo I met whilst volunteering with alpacas in Germany who hiked the Appalachian Trail with a broken foot.
Who is now volunteering in Nicaragua at a yoga retreat I'd intended to contact
Once
Upon
a
Time.
When one door closes.
Let it be a gift.
Giving space to reevaluate.
To gain new perspective.
An opportunity to explore another ideal.
Which has room enough to include another person.
Hey. Hey there, Boy.
Cold water sputters and splashes over grateful, swampy skin. I guiltily look away from the sand (quickly turning into significant topographical landmarks) in the low tile corners, and say hello to all the spiders building their homes in the high tile corners.
I don't kill spiders in Mexico. There are just too many mosquitos to warrant the unnecessary killing spiders in Mexico.
I haven't named them yet, but perhaps I shall.
Agnes.
Bartholomew.
Prudence.
I take care to wash the wound on my knee (the stitches still look like Agnes got stuck in there) with a very humble sort of hostel soap and then douse the thing with a fizzing antiseptic. Agnes always fizzes quite impressively.
I like the fizzing. I feel like work is being done.
I hobble back to my bed, stare at the tempting pile of fruit and wonder why it can't be time for lunch yet.
When noon rolls around (finally), I put an avocado, a mango, a tomato, a lime, a plantain and my coconut oil on the plate I've temporarily stolen from the kitchen.
The majority of my not-so-perishable food is now locked away in my room. Because even though my food in the fridge is in a box with my room number, people... err... have been known to open my box and SWIPE MY CHEESE.
Special cheese.
That Orange Cat brought me from Slovenia.
I fry the plantain in coconut oil, slice the rest of the fruit, add a bit of cheese ("bit" being entirely relative) and rapturously plop myself down on the floor of my sandy room, sometimes forgetting about my knee --
"ARGH!"
-- and sometimes remembering (usually only directly after an episode of forgetting and screaming like a pirate).
I then proceed to lovingly demolish the entire plate o'fruit.
The hot afternoon passes slowly.
Tick-tock the time away.
Being alone.
Ho-hum.
In my own space.
Twiddle-my-thumbs.
On my own time.
I read Bukowski and chuckle at his repeated reference to "Betty's warm ass".
I nap.
I get out my watercolors, turn up some Tom Waits and paint a quick magic mushroom postcard for Orange Cat -- feeling like the epitome of what my tortured, starving artist-esque college boyfriend dreamed of becoming.
How did I GET here?
It's five -thirty. I pack my red crumpler bag with black camera, pink notebook and orange pen, venture down the stairs, out the gate and swing a left.
No one says hello.
Perhaps this is because I spent the first few days of my stay sending everyone the accusing, smoldering glare of, "did you take my cheese?'
Or perhaps it's just not a social hostel.
Eh. I'll give it 50-50.
I swing a right at the pile of sand and pass the only dog in all of La Punta who hasn't barked at me.
I call him Baloo. 'Cos he's big and black and fluffy.
When Baloo walks behind me, he *pooFs*.
*pooF, pooF, pooF*
Goes Baloo.
Baloo's only downside is that when I practiced acro yoga on the beach, he would always take advantage of the base's vulnerable position and cuddle up against whoever was on the sand. Who could do nothing about it, 'cos he or she was was rather preoccupied with keeping the flier in the air. The spotter would snap fingers, clap hands, shout at Baloo and try to shove the bear-dog away, but Baloo would just lift his floppy head and say, "I just... *sigh*... I just want to cuddle, guys."
And then Baloo would lugubriously look down and away and pretend that you weren't there, snapping and clapping at him to pooF along down the beach.
"Guys..."
I spread my sarong over the sand and sit myself down.
"ARGH!"
Soccer balls make their appearance.
I think of Boy and his complete obsession with the sport. Boy wants to teach me to play, but I've told him that even my soccer instructor in university called me a catastrophe.
I am not optimistic.
Boy is.
(Orange Cat would give it 50-50)
I've told Boy that he can teach me to play soccer as long as he kisses me whenever I make a mistake.
(Rule # 2)
I will be a very loved on girlfriend.
Volleyballers emerge into the easy evening air. The sand pops and crawls with Ignacios (and one terribly confused Harold), sand fleas (who've managed to make my ass itch even more than my healing knee. An impressive feat) and tourists and locals alike who've gathered to watch the sunset.
I try to find my quiet space.
Sometimes I get close.
But most of the time, I spew pedantic orange lists instead of thoughts onto the cluttered pages of my pink book. Plans instead of ideas. Statements instead of questions.
But I get close.
So close to that quiet.
Eventually, I put down the lists, the plans and the statements and just make childish crashing wave sound effects.
"You could almost beat Joy at sound effects now," Orange Cat said-it-like-it-was during our last sunrise together. "She would be proud."
I added hand motions to go with my crashes and bubbles and whooshes. Orange doubled over in laughter and nearly spilled his hot chocolate into the home of a nearby Ignacio.
I walk back through Diamante's gates and am greeted by the sight of my landlady's two young boys, stark naked and showering the beach away.
Sometimes enthusiastically humping the air and singing an American pop song.
That I don't know.
Because seven-year-old boys raised in Mexico know more about American pop culture than I do.
A golden skinned fellow covered with religious tattoos (and wearing shirts is obviously not a part of his religion) swings in the hammock. He's always in the hammock (this is probably part of his religion). Brendon and Ella discovered that he's from Colorado Springs (he probably moved to Mexico so he could practice the hammock swinging aspect of his religion properly). When I amicably approached him with, "Wow, so, I hear you're from Colorado too! " he said, "yeah."
And walked way.
err... okay.
I stood there, kind of gaping a little.
He probably took my cheese. The bastard.
I usually pass another shirtless American on my way up the stairs.
Rod.
A chain-smoking, motorcycle riding, pit-bull owning, bad Spanish speaking gringo who sounds like Nick Nolte.
"Hey! Mujer! Que onda? What happened to your leg?"
Nick Nolte's sound-alike rasps at me.
"I fell off the road in San Jose," I reply, showing him the damage.
"That looks horrible!" Nick gasps. "Why are you walking around like this? You know, if you need anything, I live just over there. What room number are you? I'll come check in on you. Just in case you need anything. Anything, okay?"
The last thing I need is this lighter-stealing-hoodlum checking in on me.
I make it up the stairs, leaning heavily on the railing for support
grab my plate of fruit
and hobble to the kitchen.
Nick Nolte's sound-alike is now sitting on the floor in front of the stove, telling my crying landlady how she ought to punish her boys for running off to the beach without telling her.
(I like my landlady. She jokes as she smokes and sometimes offers me leftover rice or tortillas dipped in beans)
"Why you got blood on your hand?" landlady asks Nick.
"I don't got blood on my hand."
"Yeah, you do," she insists. "Right there. You got blood on your hand."
"Probably Vasco," Nick references his pit-bull. "That bitch," he somehow finds that particular moment an appropriate one to slap my ass. "Oh, I'm so sorry," Nick looks shocked at himself. "Didn't mean to go touchin' you like that."
I seethe inwardly, but outwardly, I just keep slicing my avocado.
And pretend like nothing happened.
WHY? Why do I take this? Why do I sigh and seethe instead of calmly telling him to fuck off and to keep his hands to himself?
I hate that this kind of behavior has become something I'm just... numb to.
I hate that my response to people invading my personal space is to imagine myself turning to ice. Cold, impenetrable, unfeeling ice.
I hate that my response enables people to keep behaving like this.
This. Is going to change.
I don't know how.
But it's gonna.
I carry my dinner back to my room.
Sip some green tea out of my blue tin cup.
And wait for Boy to come online.
Eighteen days.
I opened a card from Boy on Valentine's Day. An inside joke fell into my lap and a love poem was scrawled onto both sides/back of the On the Far Side card.
Oof. Girl needs to up her game.
I showed Boy the watercolor postcard I was working on for him.
And we spent the night making lists.
More romantic
than pedantic.
Our first Valentine's Day tradition, as a matter of fact (Boy and I are both optimistic that we'll have quite a few Valentine's Days together. Even Orange Cat would probably give us more than 50-50).
Every year at dinner (we hope to be in the same country), we'll make a list of our favorite foods -- top five for each category (cheese has its own category).
"So I know what to put in the Troy folder."
We talk late into the night.
Usually well past that time when eighteen days turns into seventeen.
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