Finally, I can sit down.
Finally, I’m over the initial shock of returning from New Orleans to a house still unfinished. Yes Barry, I have learned anger management. There were lots of busy feet flying around here for the first few weeks after returning, including mine, but I remained, mostly, externally calm. Internally, it took longer to calm down and to readjust to reality, Taiji center, get in balance with gravity. Most of the final details for the house are now with the woodworkers: these very methodical, very precise, very slow - and also very sensitive - artisans.
Yes, we are still in TRANSITION INSANITY. At this point, the second floor of the house is ready to live in. And it really is a house you can live in! Okay, the second floor laundry still isn’t operational due to… oh you don’t want to get me started. But, apart from that, I am eager to break out into ALL the upper floor: three bedrooms, three bathrooms, sitting area, walk-in closet, laundry/utility room, and the most important room of the house after the kitchen, the library. But the process of organizing creates havoc - boxes and stuff strewn all over - and Gerry doesn’t like chronic chaos and would rather wait. He prefers to continue camping out in one of the guest rooms - using it like a hotel room, and taking meals over at the apartment with Janet, the kids, dogs, cats and sometimes chickens.
We’ve been camping out for a year and a half now. First, we got rooms at TexMex, then briefly lodged at the Intercontinental, then moved to the first guest room in the house/building site, then to the second guest room. In between all this, we (or more often Gerald…) would escape to New Orleans whenever possible.
We moved all of the antiques and valuables to our flat in New Orleans (yeah I know, to get whacked by the next hurricane) and left all the old, shabby furniture to decorate the house at El Tigre. And this has presented a bit of a decorating challenge to say the least. But, HEAR THIS THIEVES, LADRONES, HAMPA, we have no valuables at El Tigre - just junky stuff we’ve been hauling around for donkeys’ years!
We are now officially in Code Yellow at the Finca. A few nights a go, at around 11PM, Jose called and told us that a Blue Suzuki SUV with two guys in it had parked in the lot opposite the stables, and that they had begun moving quietly about, possibly casing the property. Everybody jumped into action as trained…floodlights, dogs, guns, phone calls, cars moving up the mountain to block, if necessary. Within minutes, Jose, the dogs, Armando, and then the muni police, chased that Blue Suzuki right out of El Rodeo. Even GRAK went out to join in the action. I stayed in bed. As GRAK likes to say, why keep a dog and bark yourself. We doubt those guys will be back anytime soon.
In New Orleans, security is all electronic and when the power’s out, they call in the National Guard.
GRAK is highly security conscious and I take the path of least resistance and just go along with him. Also, the training is a lot of fun. I’m becoming quite a sharp-shooter now that I’ve switched to my right hand, although I’m usually left-handed. One time, as I was stepping into an elevator after a job interview, the interviewer asked me to sign something and when I did, he exclaimed, “Oh, you’re left-handed!” My response was, “Do I still get the job?” The door closed before he could respond but, yes, I still got the job.
Gerald went to San Jose for appointments today, including renewing his concealed weapons license, and was told that the printing/picture on the new plastic license will deteriorate before it expires! They recommended that he protect the card with a plastic coating, but that he can’t use a hot plasticizing system because that would destroy it. However, after much discussion, the only cold system they knew about was a guy on a street down in San Jose somewhere.
Besides sorting out the household, we are also busy out in the gardens, expanding and diversifying the orchards, hortaleza and ornamental gardens. We’re now in the third season of garden design and it’s become a work in progress. People ask me how many workers it takes to maintain a garden like the one we’re creating at El Tigre. Answer: One good man.
Armando Parra is a master-gardener, trained by his father and grandfather in the old ways, e.g. to layer frijoles with garlic as a repellent, to rotate crops, and to observe and understand nature. Take grasshoppers. Armando just tolerates grasshopper season because they are fascinating insects to look at, they attract awesome birds as prey, and soon we go back into balance. We lose some brunfelsia leaves but the shrub leafs back out again. If I want to protect something, however, Armando makes a repellent spray of chili peppers and soap, and that tends to send the grasshoppers to the tastier plant further down in the shrubbery. Armando’s right. Just leave them be and nature will cycle around.
Even the kids spend time out in the gardens. I saw little Danny picking Madero Negro leaves and rubbing them over his arms as a repellent. Madero Negro (Gliricidia sepium) is often used as an insect repellent - the girls put satchels of it mixed with citronella grass in the drawers. Anyway, Danny was rubbing the plant over some itchy bites. He needed something for the itch, so I suggested he go apply ice wrapped in a wet cloth until the itching stops. Then we would look at another remedy if he needed it. He didn’t.
Danny is a clever kid. He won the Science Fair prize for his composting project. And his older cousin won 1st prize in his age category for his soap-making experiments. Both kids went on to compete in Ciudad Colon. I used to volunteer as one of the Science Fair judges, but when Armando’s grandkids kept winning - even though I abstained from evaluating anyone I knew - it was just getting too close.
In the afternoon, everybody stops for tea. We change it everyday! Today we mixed pineapple sage with lemon grass, infused for 5 minutes. Awesome! You could add a Stevia leaf or honey, but I prefer it savory.
It had to happen sooner or later. A big cat has moved up our way from the forest and has begun tormenting our animals, especially our male cats. It has already killed Skinny Bones and badly mauled Manchito and Sylvester - we treated both for bite abscesses and luckily they survived. Sylvester is already on his 5th life after a few close calls in Ciudad Colon. Some of you remember that we lost Beastie’s sister, Grisela to a Boa Constrictor. We’re not sure what the cat species is that is attacking our animals yet, perhaps a Jaguaruni (?). Janet described it as a grey-striped cat with huge paws the size of a medium-sized dog. She says that he is strikingly beautiful - majestic - rarely spotted but sometimes heard when he strikes - and then our dogs and cats come racing back home howling. Now the cats don’t stray far from the house and the dogs don’t want to tangle with that big cat either.
The good news is that the birds have returned to feed and nest in the lower gardens - no longer tormented by our cats. The forest gives us balance - death cycling into life. Trees die, fall, provide shelter for the living and compost for that yet to live. Cycles are all around us in the forest, easily observable.
Today was my first chance to escape the household duties and hike down into the forest. I went alone - not even Flopsy came with me – maybe still too scared of that big cat. But I saw the horses in pasture, and then the forest inhabitants. You are never alone in the forest - no doubt the monkeys and other animals spend far more time observing me from their bird’s eye view than I do them. But there is plenty to see. I enjoy walking by myself - even as a kid I mostly kept to myself.
I was bullied a lot as a kid. I was an ugly, scrawny kid, kept to my own company, and got teased and taunted a lot. Boys seem to outgrow bullying before girls, who are far crueler. I finally developed enough confidence to stand up to them. Even now, I prefer animals and other people who also love nature, generally introverted people.
In the forest, I feel connected and, at times, hyper-alert. For example when scaling a mountain or approaching a waterfall to fill the bottle, eyes and ears open for the Fer-de-Lance snake that might blend in with a fallen log. It’s a special way to look - like hunting for the elusive morel mushroom. You have to go hyper-alert with ‘soft-eyes’ alternating with ‘hard-eyes’. You need lots of hiking with the likes of Armando to learn the tropical forest ways. Once again, I notice that the guys have cleaned the trails. They’re not taking any chances. I’m alone but not lonely. The forest is magical, musical, Paradise on Earth.
Just saw a Coatimundo for the first time today! We were both startled, not expecting to see each other. Then I opened my big mouth and said: “Wow! Who are you?” And he turned around and went back where he came from. It’s possible that this big Coatimundo might also tangle with domestic pets. Also saw a pair of small deer on the road below Tiger hill. They darted back into the forest.
The forest is always teaching something new, sharing, solving mysteries.
Success in life has nothing to do with wealth. We could go back to work and buy that awesome new Toyota Hilux 4x4 Diesel Turbo Pickup Truck (GRAK would get a Land Rover, of course) but we are too busy living the life. Gerry retired over two years ago. I shifted from pharmacy and the pharmaceutical industry into plants back in the late 1980s and haven’t left the forest since. First studied medicinal plants in Pennsylvania, especially Black Cohosh (Cimicifuga racemosa) back at the farm in Pennsylvania, and then got into tropical botany when we moved to Costa Rica in 1997. I don’t write or study to publish – just learning and observing…
In fruit now in forest, just glimpsed today:
Guayacan (Acosmiun panamense), Caregres: Picramnia antidesma and P. latifolia, Guayaba (Psidium guajava), Eugenia species, Siparuna species f.Monimiaceae…all I can remember.
