Impressions: Que Linda (Our Home)

When Suzy and I lived in Busan, South Korea, we were always happy to receive visitors, but were also self-conscious about what we could offer as hosts: "Yes, this is our three-room, fifteenth-floor apartment, and, yes, that is the polluted beach of industrial Dadepo, where no one in his right mind would swim"--nothing too tourist-friendly, in other words--nothing justifying a one or two week jaunt to the other side of the world.   (--That's not quite fair, there were a lot of things to see and do in Korea, even in our small corner of it, and the culture was endlessly fascinating; and, indeed, the trip, as a whole, constitutes one of our fondest memories as well as the defining moment of our then fledgling relationship, but, still, it was a long long way away, and, whatever it might have been doing for Suzy and me, we did feel, to some extent, especially early on, incapable of making  it worth any traveler's while.)  Consequently, when family or friends showed up, we either said, "Hi, now leave," or, if we could manage it, "Hey, let's get out of here."

That is not the case here in Costa Rica.

Despite the adjustments we needed to make--adjustments that seem less and less important every day, Suzy and I cannot wait to host you here--cannot wait to see your reactions, even just going up our driveway.

Our initial impression of the grandeur of this place has completely sustained itself--such beauty as permits no downsides (--all those bugaboos and their bites were inflated by my sneaking fear that maybe, with so much seemingly at stake, things were not quite what they appeared to be).

Ha, I want you to just sit on our back porch in the morning and feel yourself, all your senses, being swept up in the glorious chance of everyday, flighted song, sturdy movements, the verdure, the evaporating cool; or to sit there in the evening and watch city lights exchange themselves for the sun's last exuberance on the mountains' rim; we can sit there together and chat and eat simple, delicious food, just.  Or we can listen to rain on the slatted roof, or watch lightning play in the Jurassic distance, or you can choose our own adventure in la finca de Angelina up our place, or we can take a day trip the other way to the beach.  Actually, I would have you just walk our own farm, pick a fruit, take a picture, wave to the man letting the toros out to pasture.  I want you to see how blue the sky can be--how the lushness makes it snap.

And, of course, I want you to be with the three, who somehow contain it all, all of life, all the many riches of the world thrice over, from Far East Asia to the Western Coast of the Americas, north to south, starry firmament to the Earth's core--our forever adventure--our destiny--our three, who contain it all and are, somehow, more than it, too.

Yes, come visit us in Costa Rica.  Que linda.

No TV.

Just the three.

And the laundry licking the breeze.  And the towering arboles.

And our sweet neighbors, who each and all receive our luck in having triplets as their very own.

Come visit us in Costa Rica.  Que linda.

No computer.  Nor smartphones.

Just a pile of half-formed Lego constructions, and a cardboard box fort, games and projects, ubiquitous colors and paper and scissors, staples and tape.

And books.  And imagination enough to match their surroundings.

And energy enough to fill both--pressing each tick of the clock, even through their sleep.

The three.  Our three.  Que linda.

And 1500 avocado trees, and lemons, and grapefruits and sugar cane.

The heap of compost, where weekly Scout and I deposit our discards.

And the garden besides.  The greenhouse orchids.

The guard dogs keeping at their duty even in their kennel as we walk by.

--Now, let me break from the idyllic here.  Those blasted dogs will some nights bark at every hour--and one of them right outside our master bedroom.  Sleep here, ironically, is sometimes a real trick for Suzy and me, squeezed between those dogs and the three times typical unpredictability of a child.  And those dogs poop all over the front and back yards too--bark, shit, run, bark, run, shit, torture me, and torture me, and bite Francisco, and bark and shit.  Of course, the poop disintegrates in less than a day, which I suppose is convenient for all you dog owners thinking of maybe moving to the tropics, but still, on that aforementioned perambulation of the premises, do keep an eye out where you step.

The dogs do not, to me, seem all that necessary, and, even if they were, I sometimes wonder if the security they provide does not completely contradict itself if no one can sleep.  Some nights, I feel like there is nothing worse a thief might steal.  And the place is not exactly low-hanging fruit for thieves.  That driveway is a killer climb, as I already told you, and it's gated off.

But I suppose, as I also said in an earlier post, the dogs are not really for humans--not here.  Our closest neighbor--the farm's neighbor, that is--is a seminary school; and not infrequently it throws a party with live music (always terrible), loud cheering (always fake), and speaking in tongues over a microphone (--I'm not kidding), but that is more a source of security, I would think, than a reason for it.  I mean, really.

--Actually, one time, I was walking down into Dulce Nombre, the little town center below our home, to go to the bakery and get a bit of exercise, and I had to pass this group of young men--three parked cars, all opened, nine or so twenty-somethings, drinking, smoking, doing whatever else, music blaring from the car in front.  I did pause, I admit, in my mind.  I thought, Hmmm, probably just seminary students, but maybe, just maybe, the unsavory type of people that warrant dogs and gates--and seminaries.  We had heard of drug dealers and dangerous darkness, of accosted foreigners, and we had seen the disregardful condom left here or there on the road stretching beyond our driveway.  Even a little bit of fear can be tyrannical.  But I decided to push on--figured the beard and broad daylight were enough a deterrent for even the worst kind of disease-free character.  And that is when I realized what these hoodlums were listening to: "I can feel it coming in the air tonight"--yep, that's right, Phil Collins.  "Hold o-on"  I shuttered, kept my head straight down and walked on, of course.  On my way back up, one of them commented--something like, "Ha, he went to get bread," which made the others laugh, but not obnoxiously, not discourteously.  "Just another day for you and me in paradise...Da, da ding doe, ding a doe ding..."

Imagine my disbelief, when, a week later, I saw the police busting some guys right in that very spot--I presume for drugs, though, I suppose, it might have been for listening to Phil Collins...  I mean, really.

...Anyway, where was I--oh, yes, "the hills are alive..."

Que linda.  Que linda.  Come visit us in Costa Rica.

Just follow the signs to the seminary, and then, at the last moment, turn left.  Eden is just up that long steep driveway.

(Que linda--it means "how beautiful," and is as readily used to describe children as some wonderful place.)