Go-Go Gadget Pen

Okay, so we did visit the jungle, but it’s not supposed to be raining like it does in the rainy season. Dana from Val’s backpacking hostel in Dangriga told us that this is how it rains when it’s the worst of the two weeks in the rainy season. The river is higher than it should be. It’s insane. I still really do enjoy the people here in Dangriga. The garufuna influence is quite interesting.

Dana is playing this really nice music called Umalalie. It sounds like a mis between caribbean and African music without drums. It’s is several Garafuna women singing in chorus. Dana is juts about the nicest, most caring person I have ever met. She is helpful, knowledgable, and familiar. When she knocks on the door, she opens it. Which may not sound like somehting that would be okay in the US, but with her, it’s more matronly, and really great.

We have been traveling for days with interrupted, choppy rest until yesterday when we finally are letting ourselves warm up to one place and relax. We went on an impromptu 12 hour tour yesterday. The host at the hotel wanted to take a trip to the local characoal ruins and to several waterfall spots for swimming, then to a local bad that serves infused rum.  We woke up at 630 am and Marcos piles 9 people in his pickup truck and we headed tot he market to buy some snacks to tide us over all day. I loved being in the bed of the pick up, but it was really hard being someone who gets car sick to bum around on the local dirt and “paved” roads of Belize. By paved they just mean some gravel has been mashed down into it. We are not too far from Guatamala, and if we were to do it all again, I think we’d check out Guatamala after San Ignacio. But, we only have a month, so we will stick to our original itinerary.

We had such an amazing day yesterday becoming chummy with the new people we met at the hotel, and the others that we picked up along the way. I think the one defining moment was whent he Mike (from Poland) and Leah (from LA) wanted to set up a group shot in front of the largest pyramid in Caracoal. At that point everyone was pretty well acquainted and enjoyed laughed at the comedy of setting up two cameras to auto-snap the photos. I even got a picture of the two dashing away form their cameras and into the shot.

I’m mulling over my resolutions. They work for me, so it’s worth it for me to think of some, but the key is not taking on too many, and to formulate them in a way that I’m adding something to my life and not taking something away (chocolate..ahem). So I’m listening to the Heartless Bastards and drinking some homemade apple wine that my neighbor gave us and it brings me to my first one. I want to be feel more compassionate towards my neighbors whom I don’t have a lot in common with. Maybe I don’t care so much about the mullet guy who had a McCain/Palin sign on his lawn. He’s an ass anyway and doesn’t even say “hi” to me when I ride my bike past him on my way home from work. I’m talking about the hypothetical neighbors too. The people in my life who are in my life by no choice of my own and I need to deal with them even though I don’t understand them. It would make my life a lot easier if I just find some damn common ground. Okay, so I’ll try.

My next resolution is not so easy. I want to write more. It’s like saying to dream more or be happy. It’s something that happens. I guess I could give myself more deadlines and blog more. But, I want to start my next book. It gets me excited to think about it. I don’t want to start it because I haven’t tried to publish the first one. But maybe the first one was just to whet my pen. It needed to be written. I finished it 5 years ago and I really just realized why I needed to write it. Today I realized it because I became reacquainted with one of the main characters. But now that the cobwebs from that book have cleared my head, maybe I can write the next one. And the one that Mike and i want to write. Our egos clashed when we wrote our last article. I swore I’d never date –let alone marry– a writer, and now he is writing. I don’t remember exactly why I was under the impression that two writers together was a terrible idea. Maybe we just need to drink more. Which would be my next resolution, but that and #2 are inversely related. My next one is a typical one.

Because last year we were so good about hiking every weekend, I want a new fitness one. This time I will not only continue with hiking every damn weekend, but also include 1 day of yoga, and 2 days of weight training. It’s lame, I know, but I can’t have one about drinking more or being a terrible person. Although it probably wouldn’t be such a bad idea to have one about being more of a bitch.