Living in the Now...

May 7th, 2010: I just used up about one branch from perhaps the last tree in a remote section of the Brazilian rain forest for this post. I thankfully will not lose any sleep over it but I must say that this post has been extremely difficult to compose. The past 2 weeks I have done absolutely nothing but did everything. How do I begin to explain this...I don't know.

Currently I am in the drug slinging border city Cucata that is more like city sized oven with its temperature averaging about 99 degrees Fahrenheit. I am here with my friend Genny and Samu visiting her father and many others in her family that is in total about 1,402,020,248 people...and this is just in Cucata! I am staying at their house which resembles the typical white collar federal prison back at home because of the Colombian standard that is the 104 locks to enter and leave the house with the heavily barred windows and roof in the open areas - keeping everything but perhaps an anorexic cat and rodents from entering the compound...and...keeping everyone in, if absolutely necessary or if so desired. Thinking about it, Venezuela is by far worse with bars on high rise buildings windows and balconies all the way to the 22 floor in case Spiderman decided to make a few extra dollars after hours.

At this place...I feel I discovered somethings I must have lost a long time ago or perhaps never truly experienced. One of them is that I discovered the joy of living in the now instead of the past or the future. I have always heard people say (high pitched voice) "you need to live in the now." Yes, that sounds really easy...but in the past I was only capable of being able to do it for a few minutes at a time and then having to re-remind myself to live in the now every annoying minute or so until the past or future would quickly infiltrate my mind.

I first did not want to take responsibility for my own lack of movement here in Cucata in addition to my lack of getting out of the house. I wanted to put the blame on the city I am in, then the weather and finally an horrid excuse that I brought nothing but some clothes and a book that I think would be better if used as toilet paper instead of study material. The book is so misappropriate named "How to learn Spanish in one week" - more like 3 years.

During my time here in Cucata, I have enjoyed what most people that work 5 days a week dread doing everyday once they get off of work such as: washing cars, clothes, floors and other household chores - that I have not done much of in well over a year. I have experienced something special which money can not buy and that was hanging out with a ton of wonderful people which includes Genny´s family, making me miss living around family and a life of some stability even more.

With this said...in a few weeks, I will be back on the trail and will be going south toward Popayan, Colombia to meet up with some friends for a few days, pick up a few of my cameras and my laptop, starting to make my way back through Ecuador (since I am now again allowed to re-enter Ecuador, maxing out my stay last year on a tourist visa) going to Peru.

In a perfect world, sometimes I would like things to go differently - "but"...I will of coarse be back someday...this is definitely a country I love.