Countdown lessons: Get out of the house

A year ago I did a countdown to the start of my yearlong daily blogging project; as I enter my last ten days of the Daily Boost in its current form, I thought I’d count down once again. This time, I’m pondering things I’ve learned from writing about Costa Rica every weekday for a whole year. It’s not exactly a heroic feat, but it sure did open up a lot of doors in my brain, for whatever reason.

The first lesson, without a doubt, was one that sounds funny now in mid-pandemic: I learned to get out of the house.

I started the project in part because, after two brutally difficult years of personal and professional losses, I was not excited about a whole lot. I hoped that what was essentially a daily gratitude practice might help turn things around. It did, but what I didn’t expect was how it also restored excitement for exploring my city and country that I’d lost long before.

Just the slightest hint of accountability, the thought that someone might enjoy hearing about something if I went to it, got me hot-footing it out the door as if were being chased by a horde of demanding news editors. I went to places I hadn’t been in years and others where I’d never been at all: the Mercado Central, independent bookstores, street fairs, farmers’ markets, mountain towns. I learned how to make organic fertilizer for coffee plants in Los Santos, and I finally, finally went to the Desfile de Boyeros in San José. I snapped photos of graffiti and street art, more alert than I had been in some time. I went to a book launch and saw artisan’s work with new eyes, eager to share it with people who might love it as much as I did.

Then came the pandemic, and getting out of the house went out the door – or did it? I think I simply appreciate it more. In those early days, a visit to the supermarket felt as exhilarating as a beach vacation. That’s not quite true anymore in these more moderate months, but a bookstore trip or a quick journey out of town can still profoundly lift our spirits and reset our brains in a way that they never would have, pre-pandemic. I think that, as we emerge, I will try to remember that the outings we make for business or pleasure are medicine, in a way, a crucial balance to the time we spend at home.

I don’t think I’ll ever again take completely for granted the San José streets and shops and funny corners of humanity I love so much, and my ability to wander through them.

And, if I can help it, I’ll never, ever miss another Desfile de Boyeros.

I’m a writer in San José, Costa Rica, on a year-long quest to share daily posts on inspiring people, places and ideas from my adopted home as a kind of tonic during a rough time in the world. Sign up (top right of this page) to receive a little dose of inspiration every weekday in your mailbox; tell a friend; check out past posts; learn how to join my Overwhelmed Writers’ League, every Saturday at 1 pm EST; and please connect with me on Instagram or FacebookTo learn more about how to support Costa Rica during the crisis, visit my COVID-19 section – or for ways to enjoy Costa Rica from afar, visit Virtual Costa Rica.

‘The gift that is our lives must be let out’

I think I have written more about my father in recent years than about my mother. This is partly because, with his upbringing in Guatemala, his love of Central America, Spanish, and Costa Rica have played such a big part in my own adult life. It is also partly because his death in 2018 left a huge void in our family that all of us – led by my mother with grace, courage and humor – are still figuring out our way around.

The last reason is that my mother’s voice is so much a part of my own, in my head, that it sometimes goes unnoticed. When I say something my dad might have said, I generally ask the room, “You know what Grandpa would have said?” When I say something my mother might say, it usually just comes out of my mouth. For some three-generational bonding during the pandemic, she and I read “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” together to my seven-year-old, alternating paragraphs. It reminded me once again how much I sound like her, how many of my verbal tics, little asides I make in passing, and, yes, my potty humor comes from the person who read me my nightly stories for so many years.

What an honor to have your code written in this way by a woman who, for example, delivered the invocation before President Obama strode onto a Portland stage, as pictured here. (My mother was a teacher for many years, before becoming an Episcopal priest.) What an honor to wake up at the age of 37, eyes opened by the election of forthright misogyny to the presidency, and discover that an overlooked feminism was poured right into your bones long ago by a mother who didn’t talk about it much, but just blazed the trail and Did the Thing. Poured into my bones, as well, by the flat-out awe in my father’s voice whenever he described his wife’s strength and talent.

She was my first and best writing teacher. She still is. Her own writing – or, perhaps more to the point, her own thinking – never ceases to amaze me. That is to say, it’s always quite extraordinary when this voice you think is practically your own comes out with a perspective that is startling in its depth and freshness, reminding you how much you have to learn. I am already getting glimpses of what it is like when your child plays this same trick on you. Someone who lives within your same rhythms and patterns – someone who, in this case, learned to speak from you – drops wisdom to which you are not privy. When our closest relatives school us and stun us, it’s like a door suddenly opening within your own house, exposing a space beyond that you didn’t build, didn’t paint, didn’t even know was there.

This past Sunday, I attended “Zoom church” and listened to my mother preach a sermon; she has retired, but will sometimes step up to the plate when asked. She talked about a passage (Matthew 16: 21-28) in which Jesus tells his disciples about the fate that awaits him, and Peter is none too happy about it, arguing that the flock needs a strong leader and can’t afford to lose Jesus.

My mother offered up her own take on leadership and, well, the meaning of life. I can’t help but share some of it. Here are my excerpts, with her permission:

What about us? How do we fit into this narrative? Do we, like Peter and his friends, yearn for invincible leaders who will shelter us from some of the horror around us, or at least help us get rid of uncertainty and settle us on the right track? Some of the pablum dished out in current speeches is, I think, designed to do just that, to make us feel good.  To forget the hard stuff. To get us over the hump. So things can be more or less normal again, or maybe even better than whatever “normal” used to be.

But then Jesus said, “What will it profit you if you gain the whole world but forfeit, that is, give up, your lives?” Basically what that means is, to trade your life in for what you gain.

Gain the whole world? What do we gain? What do I gain? I was thinking about that last week. I looked around my house. I checked out my domain, my possessions, all that I have accumulated, all that I’ve managed to gain, and collect into my world. Good Lord! There’s the house I own, yay for me! Chairs, bureaus, desks, books and more books, pictures, rugs, tubs of old journals and letters, my two beloved dogs, dishes, tables, beds, on and on and on. Things I’ve acquired, things handed down through the years from one attic to another until here it all is! All here in my very own house. I live in a museum, I said to myself. What do I actually need? Have I forfeited my life for all of this? A trade-off?

And then there’s the rest of my gain: my achievements, the jobs I’ve had over the years, my status and various job titles, my privilege, my life! It’s all mine! I own it all!

Or do I?

Jesus’ orientation was not about self-preservation and hoarding. Jesus’ orientation, Jesus’ focus, was outward bound…. Right away Jesus let Peter know that Peter’s focus was all wrong. Peter, you see, like so many of us, myself included, was trying to savor what he had, his gain, and leave it at that. There was equivalency between his gain and his life.

…The Rev. Barbara Brown Taylor, Episcopal priest and author, has written about this possession-obsession, how even our very life is a gift, a gift to be savored but not owned and hoarded as if it’s a baby bird we’ve found so we rescue it and put it into a nice clean shoebox and store it away to be safe on a closet shelf. I’ve been thinking about that little bird and how it needs to be nurtured, but I also know that in time it must be released to fly away, or it will end up with nothing to show for its life but a pile of very still feathers.

The gift that is our lives must be let out, too, released and given away, shared. Such life-sharing is happening all over our country – people taking risks large and small, to speak up and to help one another. I suspect that each of us in church today can look at our gallery Zoom screens and see people there who have already found a way to let loose into the world at least a portion of their life.

[Here my mother paused, smiling at the Zoom screen full of faces: faces of people who sat at their computers just a few blocks away from her, faces of people tuning in from far away. People who have donated and volunteered and surely done all sorts of things, big and small, to help others during this time. She seemed to look each of us in the eye. “Take a look!” she urged us again. And we did. I still am.]

And that is Good News indeed!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

No habría película: The value of obvious errors

My seven-year-old daughter shares my dislike of those moments in a movie when things start going wrong. When the hero decides to explore the spooky basement, or an argument starts to brew, or (her least favorite) kids start doing something that could get them in trouble. Sometimes she even holds up her hands to her ears to block out the sounds, her eyes still fixed on the screen in fascination. She can watch superheroes confront the scariest villains without blinking an eye, but a kid tracking mud through the house will send her scurrying for the exit.

After watching her develop this habit, I realized where it came from: in the Harry Potter books, for example, I always wish I could just keep reading about the lovely holiday feasts and trips to Hogsmeade, without dark forces distracting from the fun. I get especially frustrated when someone does something that obviously puts them in danger or will otherwise turn out badly. In other words, I like my characters risk-adverse, or at least highly sensible, and I somehow passed on that predilection to my kid.

However, she is also her father’s daughter, and she’s learning from him. We watched a movie together the other day where the protagonist ignores strict instructions not to explore a certain part of the castle, and when I complained at this hard-hardedness, my daughter half-turned her head in my direction and said dismissively, “Mamá. No habría película.”

There’d be no movie. If our heroine had been sensible, we wouldn’t be watching this.

It’s something my husband says all the time. Since my daughter reminded me of it over the weekend, I’ve been thinking that maybe I need to say it to myself a bit more often in my daily life.

Why am I having to learn certain life lessons again, and again, and again? If it had been easier, pues, no habría película.

Why didn’t I make a smarter move, years ago, that would have changed the way certain things turned out? No habría película.

I’m going to try making this my mantra the next time I think to myself, “If only I’d…” It’s not a Costa Rican phrase, but of course, the matter-of-factness behind it is quintessentially tico. Shame spirals are not too popular here, which is, I think, why at least some of the country’s population wears Costa Rica’s official religion rather lightly.

Anyway, that’s my deep thought for the day. Does it ring true for you?

Featured image from Mi Costa Rica de Antaño’s piece on the Cine Magaly, which I highly recommend! Read it here.

I’m a writer in San José, Costa Rica, on a year-long quest to share daily posts on inspiring people, places and ideas from my adopted home as a kind of tonic during a rough time in the world. Sign up (top right of this page) to receive a little dose of inspiration every weekday in your mailbox; tell a friend; check out past posts; learn how to join my Overwhelmed Writers’ League, every Saturday at 1 pm EST; and please connect with me on Instagram or FacebookTo learn more about how to support Costa Rica during the crisis, visit my COVID-19 section – or for ways to enjoy Costa Rica from afar, visit Virtual Costa Rica.

 

It’s time for some Soy Yo

This week for Happy Hour, I’m busting out the massive 2016 hit that put an 11-year-old Costa Rican girl in the international spotlight.

The music video for “Soy Yo” (“I’m Me”), from Colombian band Bomba Estéreo, featured the irrepressible Sarai González, who pretty much broke the internet that year. She lives in New Jersey (or did, at the time the song came out), but her father is from Costa Rica.

If you haven’t listened in awhile, crank it up and have yourself a little Friday dance. Sarai, whatever you’re up to now, I hope you’re still just as happy and full of killer moves.

Have a great weekend.

I’m a writer in San José, Costa Rica, on a year-long quest to share daily posts on inspiring people, places and ideas from my adopted home as a kind of tonic during a rough time in the world. Sign up (top right of this page) to receive a little dose of inspiration every weekday in your mailbox; tell a friend; check out past posts; learn how to join my Overwhelmed Writers’ League, every Saturday at 1 pm EST; and please connect with me on Instagram or FacebookTo learn more about how to support Costa Rica during the crisis, visit my COVID-19 section – or for ways to enjoy Costa Rica from afar, visit Virtual Costa Rica.

What’s hard and what’s easy

The other day, as I left the supermarket and lugged my groceries to the car, I passed by a bookstore. The sign outside said: “Let’s take care of each other! In compliance with the regulations from our Health Minister, the use of a mask is required inside.”

A question suddenly popped up in my mind. Why is it that my home country, the United States, seems to be so good at some very hard things, but bad at some easy things? And Costa Rica seems to have trouble with hard things, but is good at easy things?

What I mean is: Making a rule that you have to wear a mask in a shop. Going to the supermarket without shooting someone or breaking someone’s arm. Taking a few minutes here and there to doctors and scientists in the middle of a pandemic. Making a rule that all people need to get health care, and no one should die in the street because they don’t have a terrific job. These things seem pretty basic, and Costa Rica makes them look easy. The United States makes them look hard. Very, hard. And these aren’t the only examples.

Building infrastructure that, in some parts of the country, looks like something out of “The Jetsons”? Now, that sounds very challenging to me. USA: handled. Costa Rica: juuuust a bit tougher. My home country has managed some incredible feats in its history, from putting humans on the moon, to winning world wars, to writing a Constitution that became world-renowned for its brilliance. Certainly, Costa Rica has done amazing things, too, but I guess what I’m saying is that I can’t think of a challenge facing this small country that seems easy to me. Fixing its despairingly tangled city traffic; addressing its drastic inequalities; staying safe amid the relentless flow of drugs from South to North America; these are real head-scratchers, don’t you think?

Maybe the problem is that my definition of “easy” and “hard” is all wrong. Maybe what we’re seeing in these two countries – both afflicted by serious problems, but with very different governmental and popular reactions – is that the basic things in life, the things that seem easy, actually rely on a set of simple values. When members of a society are fairly aligned in terms of what matters, those “easy” things fall into place. When they disagree about the basics, what should be easy becomes unbelievably complex.

Even when all that’s asked of us is to admit that, say, black lives matter, too.

Even when all that’s asked of us, to save a life, is to put on a mask.

I’m a writer in San José, Costa Rica, on a year-long quest to share daily posts on inspiring people, places and ideas from my adopted home as a kind of tonic during a rough time in the world. Sign up (top right of this page) to receive a little dose of inspiration every weekday in your mailbox; tell a friend; check out past posts; learn how to join my Overwhelmed Writers’ League, every Saturday at 1 pm EST; and please connect with me on Instagram or FacebookTo learn more about how to support Costa Rica during the crisis, visit my COVID-19 section – or for ways to enjoy Costa Rica from afar, visit Virtual Costa Rica.

One last chance to share… before something new arrives!

Halloo there? How are things?

It’s been an amazing ride for me this year, sharing news & inspiration & musings from Costa Rica. I’m happy to tell you that on September 15th – which is Costa Rica’s Independence Day, and the finish line of my year-long quest to post every weekday – I’ll be sharing some big news about where the Daily Boost is going from here! (Hint: Better. Bigger. Much, much bigger. Yes, I’m excited.)

As we approach that date, I have a favor to ask. It’d be amazing to surpass 1,000 followers (we’re at 941 on Facebook) and attract a few new blog subscribers before the big news breaks. If you’ve liked these posts and have never shared with a friend, would you be willing to? Or, if you use Facebook, would you be willing to invite some friends to like the Facebook page? Starting on September 1st, some changes will start to take place, so this is the moment to get some new readers in the door!

(Also: If you’ve already liked the FB page but would like to see more of my posts, click the three dots at the top of the pages, select Follow or Following, and select See First.)

Thanks so much to all of you for your incredible support over the past year. (Or many years.) I can’t wait to continue on this adventure with you… and a few new friends.

I’m a writer in San José, Costa Rica, on a year-long quest to share daily posts on inspiring people, places and ideas from my adopted home as a kind of tonic during a rough time in the world. Sign up (top right of this page) to receive a little dose of inspiration every weekday in your mailbox; tell a friend; check out past posts; learn how to join my Overwhelmed Writers’ League, every Saturday at 1 pm EST; and please connect with me on Instagram or FacebookTo learn more about how to support Costa Rica during the crisis, visit my COVID-19 section – or for ways to enjoy Costa Rica from afar, visit Virtual Costa Rica.

 

The city awaits

In case you were worried, I went to check for you: Barrio Escalante is still here.

The eastern San José neighborhood that constitutes Costa Rica’s hipster capital is quieter and very masked than usual (I can’t resist giving Saúl some product placement here, because – well, who can resist a masked zebra?). But man, it feels good to stretch your legs on those sidewalks. It feels good to buy something, ever so carefully, thinking to yourself, “We’re OUT in the WORLD!” In my case, it was a pastry at Franco and a bar of Sibú Chocolate and a few books at the Librería Francesa, which looks out onto an empty, closed-off Parque Francia. I cast plenty of wistful gazes at the mostly-empty restaurants.

The small businesses of Escalante, like others around the country, are hanging in there and waiting for us. Whenever we can get there. They hope it’s soon.

I’m lucky to have been able to work from home – so, so lucky – but boy, have I missed chepeando, that perfect word that describes the experience of being out and about in San José. It’s a troubled city, but with so many hidden marvels, all of them best experienced on foot.

I hope we’re never separated from it for quite this long again.

I’m a writer in San José, Costa Rica, on a year-long quest to share daily posts on inspiring people, places and ideas from my adopted home as a kind of tonic during a rough time in the world. Sign up (top right of this page) to receive a little dose of inspiration every weekday in your mailbox; tell a friend; check out past posts; learn how to join my Overwhelmed Writers’ League, every Saturday at 1 pm EST; and please connect with me on Instagram or FacebookTo learn more about how to support Costa Rica during the crisis, visit my COVID-19 section – or for ways to enjoy Costa Rica from afar, visit Virtual Costa Rica.

Generosity that will blow your mind

My husband was watching Channel 7’s midday news on Saturday when he shouted to me, “Come see this!”

I was glad he did. The show was covering a story that took me some time to wrap my head around, thanks in no small part to the biases and preconceptions messing around in my brain. The headline said that indigenous communities in Talamanca, in southeastern Costa Rica, had donated huge amounts of food to professional female soccer players. I kept thinking, “Isn’t it the other way around?”

No. No, it’s not. A group of Talamanca women spent 10 weeks going door to door in their communities, on foot and by boat, to collect more than 10 tons of yuca, plátano, chayote, ayote, chile dulce, culantro coyote, pejibaye, limón, malanga, caña de azúcar, mamón chino, fruta de pan, naranja, toronja, carambola and cacao. And others. But you get the idea.

They donated the food to women soccer players who are having trouble making ends meet during the COVID-19 crisis and who, in many cases, have themselves been voices for solidarity and philanthropy during this difficult time. (Check out this Boost from July.)

“We don’t have much moey, but that’s no reason not to show solidarity and share the little we have with people having a hard time,” community Edith Villanueva told Channel 7. “This country has helped us during our toughest times – during floods and earthquakes and now during the pandemic… so we thought we could show our thanks to Costa Rica by donating part of our harvests.”

Why soccer players? She said they know that these women practice all day long, holding down jobs and studying in many cases, and have been affected economically just like others in Costa Rica.

This isn’t the first time Talamanca’s indigenous communities have taken my breath away with their philanthropic efforts. When Hurricane Otto devastated northern Costa Rica, they gathered food and sent it all the way across the country to help those in need.

Once again, this region is giving us a master class in what it means to stand with others.

All images from Vice President Epsy Campbell’s public Facebook profile.

I’m a writer in San José, Costa Rica, on a year-long quest to share daily posts on inspiring people, places and ideas from my adopted home as a kind of tonic during a rough time in the world. Sign up (top right of this page) to receive a little dose of inspiration every weekday in your mailbox; tell a friend; check out past posts; learn how to join my Overwhelmed Writers’ League, every Saturday at 1 pm EST; and please connect with me on Instagram or FacebookTo learn more about how to support Costa Rica during the crisis, visit my COVID-19 section – or for ways to enjoy Costa Rica from afar, visit Virtual Costa Rica.

 

Open the ocean

I love sharing music on Fridays, when I can. Here’s a recent recording from Costa Rica that’s emblematic of our times.

“Open the Ocean,” released this week by Earthstrong, pleads with the Costa Rican government to fully open the country’s beaches. Whether or not you agree with the lyrics, the song – like so much of the art being created now – will be an interesting reminder, in the years to come, about what 2020 was really like.

Wishing you a wonderful weekend.

The unvisited spot

On this Travel Thursday, I’m thinking about places I’ve yet to see in Costa Rica. I don’t know about you, but the enforced lack of travel this year has made me even more motivated to plan a visit to those places as health regulations allow.

One of mine is San Vito, a valley town in southern Costa Rica. I’ve always been fascinated with the town’s unique place in the history of Costa Rican immigration: it was a government-sponsored relocation spot for many Italians who first came to Costa Rica to work on the railways.

I’m eager to take a stroll around San Vito, learn more about its interesting history and, yes, try to sniff out some Italian food. What are the new spots you want to explore, when you can?

(Image by user Jarib, via Shutterstock.)

I’m a writer in San José, Costa Rica, on a year-long quest to share daily posts on inspiring people, places and ideas from my adopted home as a kind of tonic during a rough time in the world. Sign up (top right of this page) to receive a little dose of inspiration every weekday in your mailbox; tell a friend; check out past posts; learn how to join my Overwhelmed Writers’ League, every Saturday at 1 pm EST; and please connect with me on Instagram or FacebookTo learn more about how to support Costa Rica during the crisis, visit my COVID-19 section – or for ways to enjoy Costa Rica from afar, visit Virtual Costa Rica.