CR091609 Wednesday 6:30am

“Nobody gets to live life backwards. Look ahead, because that’s where your future lies.” – Ann Landers

Synopsis: A handful of cultural and climate tidbits, the story of why I believe in God (a pontification on school girl crushes, swimming with Kassidy



I can hear the ocean.



And singing crickets. And geccos. They chatter like monkeys. I think. Or maybe the monkeys are nearby taunting me and throwing their voices. I’m fairly certain that I’ve been wrong all along and that the chattering sound is not a monkey. I cannot imagine that this huge noise is coming from such a tiny thing.



I smell burning trash, and can see the smoke stack down near the beach. Must be leaves. You know why. =)



We drove around Playa del Coco yesterday. There was burning trash along the side of the road. We passed a house – a regular house with a regular sized yard that you might see in any middle class California neighborhood… with a cow tied up in the back yard.



Gas here is pumped by the attendant and I don’t know if I’m supposed to tip them or not.



There is an ATM fee here every time I use my debit card. If I buy dinner with it, there is a bank charge. This was how I travelled the last time and there were no “international fees” except at ATMs. I’m irked. It doesn’t look like there are fees on the credit card. It’s best to let the banks do the exchange rate, though. When the stores and restaurants do it, you lose a little to estimation every time or to an out of date exchange rate.



Sunscreen is about $10 a bottle. It’s going on the list of things I bring back from the states. With Oil of Olay.



Laundry has to be washed and dried immediately or it sours. I can’t run a load of wash overnight and dry it in the morning because when I open the washer in the morning the clothes will be dry again. Cereal and chips go stale the day after they are opened. Costa Rica needs a “Chip Clip” business. Or Tupperware. If you hang a towel to dry, it will still be wet the following day. I think I remember something about drying towels outside in humid climates. Can’t remember where I read that but it was something about Americans finding that odd until they realized that when they hung their towels inside they never got dry.



Very little to share this morning because yesterday’s blog went out after the parade.



I dreamt about Jason last night. We were giving a workshop together at a school I had presented in months ago. I had left all of my posters up on the wall of the classroom I had used and they were annoyed. (That would never happen.) I introduced Jason while he was setting up and talked about the first time I met him. Dreams are like time travel when you’re faraway. Aw. So nice to see Jason. Haven’t seen him in… okay… 2 ½ weeks. He is the Fall Workshop presenter for the Colorado Congress of Foreign Language Teachers this weekend in Glenwood Springs. There’s a wine festival there this weekend, too. If you’re a foreign language teacher you should go and hear the very best presenter ever speak on reading techniques and strategies. (I said that in my dream and Jason brushed me off and said, “I am not.” I said, “You’re right. You’re the second best. I’m the best.” Cocky in my dreams, aren’t I?) You should also go to support our new President, Dale Crum. Seriously.. gonna be a killer workshop. Diana and Linda and Meredith are going, too.



Today’s meditation from The Art of Power was on impermanence. “We have a tendency to think that we will live forever. And therefore we do not have the insight we need to live beautifully and really cherish our loved ones.” This very thought struck me last night when Kassidy wanted to go swimming. How can I not gather this moment when she is twelve into my arms and breath it in and memorize it? How can I waste a minute of it when her being here means that she’s not there with everyone she misses? I can’t. So I don’t.



When I was 11 and 12, I had a crush. Now I can put it in relative perspective and see it only as harbingers of heart break to come but not as anything substantive. (Bitter much?) In my workshops I talk about my first big one in 5th grade. He was in 7th. He had this beautiful 1985 mullet that swung when he did his cool guy walk. Because.. when you’re 15 and in a Catholic school, you have to at least have a cool guy walk. He and his girlfriend (who I wanted to be more than anything) liked Duran Duran. My first name went well with his last name and by 6th grade I had saved a step by already practicing my married signature. Although I can remember his hair, his walk, his jacket and the leap my heart made and the lurch my stomach made every time he walked by (we had no classes together), I cannot remember a single conversation with him, even in passing.



At the end of his 8th grade year and my 6th grade year, we both left the school and moved on to public school. People ask me why I believe in God. This is why:



It was Christmas Eve of my 7th grade year. The church was packed for midnight mass. We were in there like sardines, but there was a small space to my left. Just as mass was beginning, he and his dad slid into our pew and he sat next to me. I’m sure I smiled at him. I’m sure I said nothing more. Every moment of that hour and half long service was full of him. I couldn’t think about anything else. I was obsessed with every single movement I made and what he thought of it. I’m sure I sang. I was confident in my singing then, and wouldn’t have even picked up the hymnal book I knew all the words so well. I’m sure I thought about whether or not he noticed that.



And then....



Wait for it…



The Our Father.



He reached down and he held my hand. Or maybe I reached up and grabbed it.



I held hands with him for a whole minute. I have never been so grateful to God.



We shook hands at the sign of peace.



Mass ended.



They left.



I never saw him again.



Ever.



That was 23 years ago. I was 13.



Now, when I fall in love, I know I want something different. I want a man who will talk to me. I want one who will hold my hand for more than one minute. I want one who’s heart leaps and stomach lurches when he sees me. I want a man who will practice writing his first name and my last name on notebook paper. (Okay, maybe that last one is negotiable.) The heart dance of our school girl crushes is what lets us know later in life who we like, but just like when we were twelve, will never tell us why.



I learned the hard way, that no matter how you feel about a guy, never, ever, ever come out and tell him in junior high. Crushes are so much worse when they end in unforgettable humiliation. Boys never know what to say when a girl launches the entire mass of her crush on him. I have never been able to put this life knowledge to good use until this year. She was 12. He was 14. He was moving. “Don’t tell him. Just don’t tell him.” I advised, controverting the advice of every other 12 year old around her. “Trust me. Don’t tell him.” When the heart breaks, it breaks. How quickly and completely it mends is truly all that matters.



I woke up this morning thinking about school girl crushes because today is his birthday. No… I don’t remember that because I’ve been obsessed with him for 23 years. C’mon. It’s on my Facebook sidebar, because we are “FB friends.”



I know it seems like I’m sharing intimate details, but this is something everyone knows about me already. In my workshops I talk about it as a syndrome. Everyone has their own… insert name of first crush here…. The straw they never grasped, the chance they never took. The crush that makes them nostalgic even now. The point is… as adults, we grasp the straw, we take the chance, we write our first name on notebook paper followed by all the dreams we still want to achieve.



God or fate or coincidence have continued to do this… dumped people in my path that it was imperative that I know. What I did with that acquaintance was up to me. I walk away now from the boys who don’t talk to me… and the ones who have mullets…. Kassidy asked me yesterday if I had a “type.” I used to. Before therapy. Now I like ‘em really smart with big hearts, but they still have to make my heart leap and my stomach lurch every time I see them.



Last night Kassidy cajoled me into the pool and she wore out her anger and jumped on my back and swam under my legs and played and laughed. We talked about the people who will come and who will want to play in the pool. “The great thing about “Aunts” is that they just get cooler” She said last night while looking at pictures of “Aunt” Maria’s baby, Hardie. “’Aunt’ Andrea would swim with me like this.” Paradise is lonely without our friends. It’s still Paradise… it’d just be more fun with company.



Gotta go… the pool boy is here and my audience is required.