Fifth Time In Costa Rica, 21

Monteverde, like any settlement of humans, does have it´s share of imbeciles. I will not go into detail here, as it was a minor occurance, but I´m still steamed about it, and this too will pass. Suffice it to say, anyone is going to feel annoyed at times with others and the feelings will linger for a while, then they drop off and it´s like nothing ever happened. This usually takes an hour or two, for me, anyway, and I will try not to let this mood affect my writing today, Gentle Reader. And to those of you who are just itching to tell me to just let it go, will you please shut up and drop on your pointed little head! Thank you. Now, on with the show. Really, nothing happened today. It´s Holy Week, or Semana Santa, so school´s out and the bed and breakfast is busy with relatives visiting the owners and noisy kids, so it gets a bit irritating at times. It was worse yesterday, when I had to wear earplugs to write this blog, but things are more calmed down today, so far anyway. I gave the owners this morning a drawing of a morpho butterfly superimposed over a couple of hummingbirds. In exchange, I get a lovely bag of local coffee to carry home with me. Their granddaughter, who is six, sometimes takes an interest in my art and hangs out to watch and chat and I also try to show her techniques with colour. Nice kid. Noisy at times, but still nice. It is interesting seeing how tight this family is, but it seems pretty typical of the culture here. I find it interesting how in Canada, even though they are trying to give more emphasis to families, it´s still treated more like an add-on. In this country, as I imagine elsewhere in Latin America, the family is central, or you could say, the culture is the family and the family is the culture, and so strong is this culture of family that it goes a long way in influencing government social policy. I am given to understand that the idea of single young adults living alone is still a rarity, almost considered an oddity here. Everything is interpreted through family. I´m taking care to get extra rest, when I can. After breakfast I lay down for a couple of hours, even though I was feeling well-rested, and I did drop into a deep sleep for a while. The dreams, generally, are still very vivid and intense, and seem to suggest some kind of inner adjustment I am needing to make while here on vacation. Or it could be more that I am in the process of making such adjustment. I also have the feeling that my life is about to morph into a new shape when I get back, but we´ll have to wait and see. These month long vacations do seem always to bring some sense of change into my life and it´s almost like a kind of adjustment and rebalancing that happens during these times. I´m still enjoying the other guests here. I had a nice chat with a Spanish couple who now live in the US. When they found out that my Spanish is quite decent we spent the time communicating in the language of Cervantes. I still think the Iberian Spanish accent is kind of hilarious. They sound almost like a colony of bees buzzing when they speak. But be careful not to piss them off or they could easily turn into a swarm of wasps! I have learned this lesson the hard way, Gentle Reader. I did take a walk up to the reserve but I didn´t go in. I am studiously avoiding the hummingbird gallery as it makes me sick with grief to see the way visitors seem to have absolutely no regard for the personal space of these birds, and particularly birds, and especially solitary species like hummingbirds, don´t like to be imposed on. But I enjoyed the walk. Even though it´s on a road, there isn´t much traffic and the view and the many trees of this semi-wilderness are just incredible. I feel greatly privileged being here. On the way back I extended the walk to include a side road, and again, more trees, more foliage dazzling with sunlight, butterflies, but not a lot of birds as they do like to stay hidden. I guess this is what makes me a bird lover, but not a birder. I don´t go chasing after them for a look-see. I think that´s rather rude and gauche, actually. I prefer to let them come to me, or that we encounter each other by happenstance. Maybe I don´t see quite as many birds this way, but I appreciate them all the more, and it also really reinforces my respect for them, which seems to be lacking in a lot of the tourists who come here to see them. I wonder if this also stems from my being vegetarian. Please feel free to comment, anybody, if you have some insight about this, but since giving up meat in all its forms some twenty-five years ago, I seem to have really grown in my respect and appreciation for other species. I spent about three hours in Cafe Caburé working on a drawing and indulging myself with a rich dessert. The owner´s friend is still visiting from San José and her little poodle, the one who tried to eat my shirt last week, has some major behaviour problems. From a behind a closed door somewhere she could be heard whining and yelping in her pitious little high voice, her punishment for wreaking havoc when she´s allowed free run of the place. And sure enough, to shut her up, they let her out and then she proceeded to bark aggressively at everyone coming in, so they had to lock her up again. Then I had dinner in the soda, where the irritating encounter occurred. Let´s just say that I got in the last word announcing to the offending party, ¨¡Soy tu mayor!¨ or, I´m old enough to be your father. The good news is I´m over it now, and it really was kind of funny. A big hug from Monteverde.