Puerto Rico

Occasionally when I publish a blog post, I end with a lesson I learned. It's something I started doing after my divorce, partly because it helped me focus on the positive, but mostly because there's so much growth going on after something like that that it's impossible not to be learning things all the time. It's interesting how many things you can learn from a hike or a climb or an interview or, in this case, a trip.

It was full of opportunities to learn lessons as, I suppose, many trips are. (I'm thinking back now to how a crazy lady kicked my son and I out of her house in Spain. It ended up being one of my favorite things that happened on that trip, because it taught my son a lot of lessons - that you can still take care of yourself in a strange country even when you can't speak the language, for one). Full of many opportunities, but, in a nutshell, one lesson emerged: Just deal. Things will still turn out just fine.

This time the lessons started even before my man and I left, when we had a mix-up with our tickets that took way more money to correct than I wanted to spend. (But I'm trying to put that memory behind me, so don't ask). Then, our plane left at 1:30am. While that meant we didn't have to spend an entire day traveling (we got to the island at noon), it certainly meant we also didn't get a night's sleep. I slept poorly on both legs of the flight, my man slept not at all. A sign that I've matured over the years: I was not crabby due to lack of sleep. In my younger days, that was certainly not the case.

Of course, the beautiful views we flew over helped:

A friend once told me about an article she'd read about three things husbands and wives can't do together if they have a poor working relationship. I don't remember two of them. The third was paddle a canoe. I remember that so well because it was very true of my ex and I. I've spent as much time on the water as he's spent not on the water, and paddling a canoe is a simple thing for me. Not only did he not know what he was doing in a canoe, but he couldn't take direction from me. My aunt was there one day he and I tried to take the canoe out, and she still talks about how horribly he treated me. So when my man and I booked a kayaking excursion for our first night in PR, I was excited, because I knew he and I would not have any issues paddling in sync.

It was recommended (wisely) that we not bring cameras on the kayak. So the top two photos (below) were taken by a tour guide. The bottom two I stole off the internet, so credit to whoever it's due. The bottom left picture shows the mangrove channel we paddled through. It took about half an hour, and was amazing to be so surrounded by all those trees. At the end, we dumped out into a huge bay (bottom right). There we waited for the sky to get dark. When it was pitch black, we put our hands in the water and watched them glow. The bay is full of dinoflagellates that, when stirred up, glow. Our hands looked like they had white shimmery powder coming off them. I'd wanted to see these since I first read about them in college. Sometimes it takes 20-some years for dreams to come true, but the wait is worth it.

The kayaking company recommended coming in a swimsuit, because you get wet. I took that very literally, and showed up in my bikini. Hey, it's a tropical island, right? However, I was the only one on the entire tour so dressed. Everyone else either had on normal clothes, or had normal clothes on over a swimsuit you couldn't see. Not only that, but we were in a park teeming with many water-fun companies and picnickers. I hate it when stuff like this happens. Again, in my younger days I would have been horrified and either stayed in the car or gone shopping. I did have a skirt on, but that was not something I could kayak in. I also had a long-sleeved top along, which I did wear. Not that it mattered in the end. I was in a kayak in the dark. Big deal.

After the kayaking, we drove down to our first hotel, which really was more like small bungalows on the beach. My man's step mom, who's been to the island many times with his dad, recommended this place (and their sangrias - which we started on with breakfast the next morning and just continued throughout the day. Fortunately the sun burns off alcohol) :-).

It was gorgeous, obviously. We spent the entire day on the beach that day. For some reason, although the place was hopping with people, almost all of them stayed in the pool. I was extremely OK with that. For me, fewer people = more happy. We took a couple-hour walk to a lighthouse down the beach, and it was on that walk that I finally lost the lens cap to my camera after many years of miraculously finding it on other various occasions it's come off (my lens is a bit bent from some past mishap, so the cap never fit quite right). Oh well.

The second day there, our rental car got a flat. Fortunately, due to the laying-in-the-sun-all-day mentality that overtakes me when I'm near water, we didn't need the car till we drove to a not-so-nearby-town (there was really nothing nearby this place) for dinner that evening. Also fortunately, my man can change a tire in literally five minutes. That kind of thing would have been a full-day tragedy if it had been up to me to take care of. 

Below, the bottom and top right photos are from where we stayed in Maunabo. The top left photo is from Isabela, the next place we went. It took quite a few hours to drive there, as we went to basically the complete opposite end of the island (from southeast to northwest). It also took a while because we had to stop and exchange the car, as the spare was also going flat.

We had laid on the beach that morning, but after leaving around noon, exchanging the car, checking into our hotel room, then moving rooms because the A/C in ours wasn't working, it was too late for anything more than a walk on the beach and dinner. We spent the next two nights we would be in Isabela, a place where Kristen, a friend of mine from my Peace Corps days, recommended.

From our walk on the beach:

Some of these (below) are also from our walk that evening. Others are from the next morning when we took a horseback ride on the beach. After the ride, we rented snorkeling gear and drove to a small reef off a place called Crash Boat beach. Another bummer part of the trip - and this is probably way too much TMI, but I'm gonna keep it real - is I now had a woman issue to deal with. This is NOT something one wants to deal with when one wants to spend the entire week in a bikini. We went snorkeling anyway. I just hoped the whole time no sharks were within a quarter-mile. We saw a lot of beautiful fish, sea fans, and coral, and, fortunately, avoided a shark attack. 

High above Isabela is a bluff overlooking the hamlet and ocean. On this bluff are quite a few very large homes. One of these houses had tons of windows in the front - and I love me some windows in a home! After one failed attempt to find it, we came upon the back of the house. I snapped a quick picture, and then the owners, who were in the driveway, came up to the car. Within moments D and J had invited us into the yard to take in the view and, a few minutes later, take in some sangria as well. We stayed about an hour, then headed back down the hill for dinner of - for the first time - "American" food. We'd been eating mofongo and/or seafood for most meals up till then.

The next morning, after another walk on the beach, we headed to San Juan for the evening. We were extremely glad to get away from the hotel in Isabela if for no other reason that the bed was horrible. I don't know how we even slept on that thing. San Juan was the only place we'd not made hotel reservations, but there are so many hotels there we knew it wouldn't take much to find one. Fortunately, that was correct, because I realized that when I get to a new place (especially one I only have a few hours in) I want to see as much as possible as soon as possible. Hotel hunting was suddenly not what I wanted to spend my time doing. We ended up here, dumped our stuff, and immediately headed into Old San Juan, which is where all these next photos are from. Fortunately we were rolling in over the cobblestone streets about the same time all the cruise ships were rolling out on the waves (remember, less people = more happy). 

We walked around, touring the old fort and town. I bought a pair of earrings of larimar stone, which has an interesting story, having been sort of "discovered" by a Peace Corps volunteer. We finished the evening with a delicious dinner of cevice and fish tacos - and bacon doughnuts for dessert. 

 It's a bit windy near the coast. Sometimes that makes pictures difficult...

The next day was our last, and we didn't even have a full day - our plane was scheduled to leave at 3pm. The only day of vacation we set our alarm, we were up at 6am so we could drive about an hour to the rainforest. I have been to somewhere around 20 countries, and have been to many various ecosystems, but this was my first time in a rainforest. The first thing I really noticed was how my camera kept wanting to turn the flash on - all those trees blocked so much sun!

I fully intended to get into the water at the bottom of that waterfall, but the water was certainly not ocean-warm, and I had a plane to get on in a few hours...

Check out the much-bigger-than-me palm tree frond! Also check out that amazing body next to me... Never mind if you don't want to - I'll check it out for you. Whew!

After the rain forest, we returned the rental car only to be told we owed $400 for the flat tire/damage to the car. We did not end up having to pay it due to an error made by the guys at the location where we traded cars. Fortunately we'd left enough time to get to the airport, because that took a while. Again, everything turned out fine.

Final thoughts: It was interesting to be in a place where iguanas run around in the wild, termites built huge mounds in trees, and a lizard running across the road can be mistaken for a squirrel. Yes, it was that big. 

It was also interesting to be in a territory of the United States. Of all the places I've been, this was also a first, and honestly, I didn't really know how to process it. I "didn't have a hook to hang it on," as a friend said to me once.  I'm used to going somewhere new and having pretty much every single thing being very specific to that culture. Of course, in most places I've been, especially in the larger cities (Cairo, Budapest), you run across a McDonald's or Pizza Hut occasionally. But it was VERY strange for me to be in a place that was obviously not "American" in many respects (the language, the local food), but very "American" in others  - road signs and rules, for one. But mostly the McDonald's chains next to the Pizza Huts next to the Church's Chickens next to the Walgreens stores next to the Home Depots next to the Chili's restaurants next to the Walmarts - on seemingly every corner in most towns of any mentionable size. I didn't have a point of reference for this, and it bothered me the entire trip. Even now, I don't know how to verbally distinguish between something Puerto Rican and something "American" (hence the quotation marks, because Puerto Ricans ARE American).

No matter, I guess. The important things were clear:
Just deal, and everything will be fine. 
The sun, water, and sangrias make issues much easier to deal with.
My man and I can paddle together.

Life is good.

Ouray 2015

We just spent three days ice climbing in Ouray with the group I've gone with for three years in a row now. The main group has been going together for six years, always with a few different people along each year.

On Saturday we climbed in an area of the park called South Park. The climbing was good, but there was a huge group of people in there who had most of the lines, and climbing around a couple dozen people in a group isn't that much fun. I got four climbs in that day. I'd hoped for more like six, which could have happened, but everyone else decided to pull the lines earlier than I would have. (Stop climbing at 2:30? Who does that!?) ;-)

On Sunday we climbed in an area called Pic o' the Vic. Much longer, harder routes than the day before. You can see how long the route is below - I put arrows on the route that was definitely the most challenging (and therefore most satisfying) that day.

The last time I climbed in this area was four years ago, and I got injured, so this was a little scary for me at first. But I got over it quickly. I don't currently have any pictures of me on that route (which was my first of the day), but here are a few of Ariel on it:

But here are a few of me on the line next to it and then another route on another side of the wall:

This is a shot of Ariel's first climb of the day, which pretty much wore him out. It was his first time climbing something so long and steep. Most of the climbs in this area are WI4s.

Other random pix of the weekend:

We had two condos rented this year. We usually eat breakfast as individual condos, lunches are whenever we want to eat during the day - people usually pack a lunch into the canyon - and then all of us eat dinner together. This is a shot of most of the guys and one of the ladies - there were four women and eight guys this year.

Saga Part II

Back in October, I posted about a saga with our property.

Since that post, when a survey had just been done, we've had to wait for the results of that as well as wait for the title company to get an appraisal company out to determine the decrease in value of my property due to the neighbor's encroachment. (Just hearing back from them took a month and a half. This has been a long process, and doesn't look like it will end anytime soon).

The final result is that the neighbor is on a total of 85 square feet of my property in two different places (that AC unit I referred to in my last post is on my property, too), with a devaluation of $5,000.00 to my property.

Now finally armed with this information, we had a meeting with them and the city planner on Tuesday.
I was hoping it would go well.
It didn't.
The neighbors were not civil.
At all.
They kept demanding to know why we had asked for this meeting and to know what we wanted. They got even less civil after hearing there was an encroachment issue.

Honestly, there are a lot of options for solving it.
They could tear down the part of their house that's on my property and move their AC unit (the most unlikely option, and one that probably neither of us care for).
They could give me 85 sq. ft. of their property.
They could pay me for whatever portion of my property they want to keep.
We could move our fence in the back (it sure would be nice to have enough room to walk back there), and the one on the side, thereby reducing the amount of my property that they're on, allowing them to pay me or trade me less. 
And probably a couple other options I'm not aware of.

But none of that is going to happen - at least not without another waiting period.

Because they think we're in the wrong.

First of all, they came into the meeting with what they were calling a survey of their property, but it was really an ILC, that they think proves their point about their property. Unfortunately for them, it was actually detrimental, because it doesn't show their house over my property line.
Secondly, they were saying that we were the ones encroaching, because our fence line is so close to their roof line, and because they "were here first."
Thirdly, because none of the previous owners of my house has had an issue.
Fourth, because I bought the house "as-is" (like it was a chipped piece of pottery or something).

They were in no mood to talk about a solution. When we mentioned the land trade, the man said, "Oh, I SEE WHAT YOU'RE AFTER! You want the property in back that you offered to buy from us that one time!"

Well, yes, that's one option.

Then we made the mistake of saying that would allow us to add on, and then he was stuck on that. "The city will never let you build an addition there!" (Mind you, all this was yelling. Neither of them spoke in a calm manner more than a couple times). He mentioned that over and over, like it would make me forget that he's on my property...?

Well, adding on is currently a non-issue. It is so far down the road that it is not the focus. The fact that there is a title issue with both our properties is the focus.

After much raising of voices, interrupting, debating, denying, and general unpleasantness, he let us know he'd "had enough of this" and walked out, his wife (I assume they're married) following on his heels.

So here's where we are now: The city will send them a letter stating that they are encroaching on my property. They will have, from my understanding, two or three months to fix the issue. If they don't, the city may have to take them to court. I don't know what solution they are going to come up with other than what I listed above, and they were unwilling to talk about those options. Honestly, I think they're going to do nothing. They seem very much like "screw other people" people.

So we wait again. 

Stenciled Headboard

A couple months ago, I took this picture of my bedroom. Two things jumped out at me. One, I needed a bedskirt. Two, the room needed something a bit more visually appealing. It felt too sterile. Originally I was thinking about adding some color, so I painted a nightstand really royal blue with the intention of doing them both, then adding some color on the wall. I'm now in the process of repainting that nightstand, because the color on the wall turned into a headboard in - yep - neutral colors.

So even though not much has been added in the way of a color palette, there is definitely more of a visually interesting focal point in the room now.

I used Kim Myles' Indian Inlay stencil for all but the bottom middle two squares (get your own stencils at Kimmyles.com) and was inspired by this photo (from www.mmontague.com/my-marrakesh/)

On a completely unrelated note, I was also noticing recently how my children's creative spirit sometimes clashes with my decor. Not that I mind, though. They'll be gone too soon, and these funny things will disappear along with them.

My necklace holder...

 With a green twist-tie dude hanging on by his toes.

My Asian bamboo tray...

 featuring a weird clay alien thing.

My bookcase...

 With a green worm-snake-dinosaur crawling along the top.

Kitchen cabinets...

 With a Valentine's Day love note taped on.

And finally, a starburst mirror...

 with a green zombie guy hanging on for dear life.

Shelf That Idea

There are a lot of perks of living in a small space. One is that I really can't gather too much stuff. At some point you can't keep bringing things in without also getting rid of things. Of course, when Christmas season rolls around, it can get a little frustrating not having anywhere to hide gifts without displacing other things - sometimes to the middle of a floor or a counter top, which really disrupts the peaceful mind of a "a place for everything and everything behind closed doors" believer like me. 

 

Which is why it's also a bit surprising that I decided to go with the open shelf look in the kitchen. But the kitchen is - befitting this 901 square foot house - quite small and enclosed. And when the bulky cabinets sit about a foot above the only workable counter space, it's an issue. 

So I came up with the idea, my man executed, and we now have a kitchen that feels much more open. Plus, we have plenty of space to work on the counter. It looks amazing and is so much more functional. 

Still much to do. Paint the cabinets that still exist - both below and on other walls. And I unfortunately (or not) mentioned a way for us to redo the wall of nothing but cabinets, and we're now both really excited about that. Guess we're just going to take it one wall at a time.

Why I Said Yes

Why I Said Yes - Part One

A wise friend once said to me, after hearing me say I'd never get married again, "Oh yes you will. You don't know what a real marriage is. Once you meet someone who shows you that, you'll get remarried."

I'm smart enough to know that there are people wiser than I am, so I admitted that maybe she was right {without shedding my normal, skeptical attitude, of course, because that's how I roll}.

Let me explain why, at that point, I was saying "never again."

I thought, with my first marriage, that I'd done most things right. I was living what most would consider a good, moral lifestyle. I met that guy in an online Christian chat room. We didn't live anywhere near each other, but we talked on the phone constantly for a month and a half. I heard about his good days and bad days and how he reacted to each. He told me about his family, his job, his hobbies. It sure sounded like he had a lot of the things that were on my list of "the ideal guy." By the time I flew to meet him, I was sure I knew him well enough to say yes when he asked. Plus, I prayed about everything. Plus, we didn't have sex before we got married. Doesn't all of that qualify as "doing most things right?"

We married after only a few months, and even fewer of those were spent living in the same area. Though I was convinced I knew him, I really didn't. I didn't know that even though he liked to read, to him that meant standing at his computer every day when he got home. I didn't know that our definitions of being a Christian didn't mesh on certain important levels (I thought it was more important to just live it. He was often really-not-nice to people over the phone (which, when you're trying to offer remote tech support, happened a lot), then excuse his behavior with, "I'm sorry. I'm a Christian. I really shouldn't be acting that way. Please forgive me.")

Of course there were many things I wouldn't know until we'd been married a while. For instance, once we had kids his take on watching them was that I was the caretaker and, on his watch, he was the babysitter. It took a while to learn that his definition of a Biblical wife was a woman who agreed with him on everything or be branded "unsubmissive." Eventually I stopped sharing things with him because it was easier than him talking at me until early morning hours until I agreed with him.

In his defense, I will never say he was the only reason our marriage failed. I was half of that partnership. I could have done things differently. I could have insisted on more counseling. I could have tried to tell him more often that I was dying inside. But I guess that for all the times that I did say something and it fell of deaf ears, I eventually gave up - years into and years before the end of our marriage. Instead, I kept quiet and kept praying. That things would get better. That I would learn to respect him. That he'd come home in a good mood from work each evening so things would go smoothly until bedtime.

Eventually, fourteen or so years into our marriage, when I was done and finally told him so, we went to counseling again. After listening to us for just one session the counselor said to him, "You know, there isn't just one form of emotional abuse. There's the kind where people yell and scream at each other. But there's also the kind where people make others feel like they're non-existent, non-valued human beings. What you guys have is not a real marriage."

Another person, a friend and a pastor that my husband-at-the-time called to try to talk some sense into me, said, "Your husband is the most legalistic man I've ever spoken to. I don't know how your marriage is going to make it."

There are a lot of people who never agreed with my divorce. I lost friends because of it. Friends who accused me of "listening to Satan" and who said, "I thought you were stronger than that."

I don't think some people realize how strong you have to be to get divorced. Or how bad things must be. It isn't the easy way out.

People didn't understand that I just couldn't live like that any longer. Not being a person. Not being respected. Not being happy. Living with someone I felt was the complete opposite of who I think a person should be. Being in an emotionally unhealthy place {and having had been there for years}.

Those people also hadn't talked to some of the people I had, who stayed in their marriages because it was the Biblical thing to do, and were now in their 50s or 60s and still miserable. In fact, I have one older friend who has made the choice to remain unhappily married. When I visited with her a few years ago she talked about how miserable she was in her marriage. When she visited again about a year ago, she told me what a better place she was in than that previous time we'd seen each other. "So you're happy?" I paraphrased. Her reply was, "Oh, no. I wouldn't ever say I'm happy."

I'm sorry, but I don't think that's Biblical, either. Don't misunderstand me and think I'm saying that being unhappy is grounds for divorce, but I don't believe God is going to reward anyone based on a "you were this ___ miserable for this ___ long, so your reward is exponentially this ___" system.

Why I Said Yes - Part II

I should know by now never to say never. My list of "I-said-never-and-then-it-happened"s is quite long.

But that's such a great thing! Among the list of things I never would have experienced if my nevers had happened:
* I would never have had my two amazing boys that are crazy and funny and adventurous.
* I never would have made some of the great friends I have.
* I never would have traveled to India.

And if THOSE things had never happened, well, it's a chain-reaction, isn't it? If those things had not made me who I am and led me to where I was, the things that I'm doing and experiencing now might never have happened.

* I might still be in an unhappy marriage.
* I might still be bored out of my mind at home.
* I probably never would have ended up back in Colorado.
* I never would have met some of the great people I've met.
* I might never have traveled to Spain and Morocco. 

Most importantly, I never would have met the man who changed one of my most important "nevers": the one we're talking about - the one where I said I'd never marry again.

Well, I'm still not married, so I guess technically...

But that's just a formality at this point.

So what did he do to change my never?

Mostly, he showed me that not all relationships or people are the same.
*Until I met him, I thought married people fought all the time.
They don't.
*Until I met him, I thought losing respect for someone you spent a lot of time with was an unavoidable natural erosion.
It isn't.
*Until I met him, I thought all men wanted to take control of their women.
They don't. Some have a lot of respect for us. This one won't even let me clean the bathroom because I am the only woman in a house full of boys who are the ones who make the mess in the bathroom.
*Until I met him, I thought love scenes from romantic movies were all scripted and void of reality.
They aren't. They happen often. Sometimes in my kitchen.
*Until I met him, I thought everyone had flaws that you just learned to put up with.
Guess what? Some people actually don't have things about them that bother you.
*Until I met him, I thought people really really needed breaks from each other.
They don't. We don't. I look forward to every single evening and weekend with him.

But I've also learned it's extremely important to spend a lot of authentic time with a significant other so you can really learn who they are.
So secondly, he showed me that he is the type of person I value.
*He is kind and compassionate and understanding.
*He is competent in so many areas.
*He is funny.
*He is solid.
*He communicates extremely well.
*He is just the right mix of emotional and cerebral.
*He treats everyone with respect.
*He is smart.
*He's pretty much every good quality and none of the bad ones.

I know that sounds like a fairy tale. I know that sounds like I'm "in love" and am still in that "honeymoon phase" where my lover can do no wrong. But I can tell you that isn't correct. Because this time I've done everything "wrong" {according to some ways of thinking} in order to make sure this is right. I've been living with this man for over a year now, because I really don't subscribe to that way of thinking anymore. I'd rather be true to who I am. I'd rather be sure. And I'm telling you, there's nothing I'd change about this man, nothing I'd delete. His background has made him who he is, and I love what he brings to my life.

I have one final story. It's not really one I like to think about, but to me it was a turning point, and therefore important. A few years ago I took a summer climbing trip with a then-friend. It was the morning of July 4th, so there was no one on the roads. We were heading somewhere new to climb. Driving through Boulder, there was a young woman in her car, turning left, slightly in our lane. Rather than moving over to the right lane and just going around her {remember how I said there was no one on the roads that morning?} this man stopped his truck, rolled down his window, and started screaming and swearing at her, as well as honking his horn intermittently. I was incredibly embarrassed to be in his vehicle. We had no idea why she was where she was. True, she shouldn't have been in our lane. But had her car stopped unexpectedly? Had she thought she could make it before we got there, then realized she couldn't, and stopped without realizing she was in our lane? Was she transporting a sick animal or fragile plants and taking things too slowly? I have no idea. But I was horrified that someone would treat someone else that way. That woman was a soul, a spirit, a fellow human being.

It made such an impression because all I could think after that was that I needed to be with someone who, in that kind of situation, would have gotten out of our vehicle to see if she needed help.

This man I've met and fallen in love with is that type of person.

In a conversation with a friend a couple weeks ago, I told her about how my man respects me, cherishes me, treats me and others well. How I would follow him to the ends of the earth because he is the kind of man I can trust that far. How even though he doesn't go around proclaiming his beliefs, he lives them. "And that," she said, "makes this union more holy than your first one."

Exactly.

And that is why, when he asked, I said yes.

Just Go

Sometimes, when people are important, you must go be with them.

It is not the first time I've made that decision, nor will it be the last. Because it is always so worth it. 

Yes, sometimes the cost of an airplane ticket is a factor. Yes, sometimes there are scheduling conflicts. But those are hurdles that can be overcome, because "sometimes" is the key word here.

What can't be overcome is the regret of not going. 

I decided to fly to Texas two weekends ago, to hang out with one of my closest friends. It was a quick, two-day trip, but we hadn't seen each other in a couple years, so it was time.

Unfortunately, we didn't take any pictures together, but that's OK. We have some from last time we were together. 

And yesterday I got home from another whirlwind weekend - this time in Minnesota. My favorite aunt turned 80 on Friday, and while we didn't make it in time to see her that day (our plane got in at 9:00pm that evening), we drove the last two hours on Saturday morning and got to hang out with her and my cousins for 25 hours (minus sleeping time).

We drove up the north shore of Lake Superior for the day, ate lunch together, walked around an old lighthouse, talked about how much we all love Minnesota lakes, and had wine in the evening. The next morning we took a very short walk (short, because Minnesota in November is no joke), and had bacon and eggs for breakfast before setting out for the airport again. 

I adore this side of my family.

I AM planning to stay home next weekend... :-)