Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5
The morning came with a sense of confidence, the few days I'd spent wandering the streets allowing me to glean a familiarity that rounded the rough edges of Big Corn Island. As I walked along the beach toward the bungalows I'd be staying in, I was approached by some shirtless children who'd been swimming in the ocean, beads of water running down brown, goose-bumped skin, little fingers with little nails reaching for the large bottle of water I was carrying.
"Agua! Por favor!"
I didn't stop walking. Didn't have to. I simply smiled, handed them the water, and continued on my way, the lapping of the waves reassuringly low-key, bobbing their white crests to Marley, singing "Every little thing... s'gonna be alright!"
Ladies and gentlemen, I present:
I arrived at the bungalows, smiling while passing a couple in their mid-eighties, my excitement palpable underneath skin and tissue, grabbed the key from a grinning Cassie, ordered a proper breakfast (proper meaning huge), and dropped off the backpack that was so much more heavy than the weight involved.
Only a few minutes later I found myself a few yards from the shore, ants and other tiny insects nibbling away unobtrusively at my feet while I ate a simple, delicious breakfast; one without black beans, rice, and plantains. Just inside the open kitchen, a balding man in his mid to late forties smoked a cigar, putting down his iPad and asking in clear English "Are you from the United States?"
"I am."
"Yeah, I'm from Chicago. I come here a few weeks out of the year to relax. Get my head back in the game."
"Yeah? What do you do?"
"What do you mean?"
My eye twitched a little at this. Contextually, everyone should know what people mean by this. You aren't clever for asking "What do you mean?"
It's the 90s for fuck sake.
"What interactions do you have with the world that help define you? What do you do for work? For a hobby? Are they the same? What do you do?"
And he told me. I've spoken with him since. He's legitimate.
For the last twenty five years, he'd been a part of an exploratory expedition through Honduras looking for the Legendary City of Ciudad Blanca. What's more, given Lidar technology, they'd found it.
Let me say this a different way. This man had dedicated the larger portion of his life toward a goal that was literally legendary, unfounded in recorded history, a geographical Bigfoot whose myth was based on hearsay from a civilization on its way to being lost in its own right, and that he, in turn, fucking found it.
Don't believe me? Click here.
You back? Okay.
So eventually Al spoke up, ribbing the both of us playfully, "Tom! Leave the poor man alone! You can tell he's hungry!"
I'm confident enough to not have thought too much into it. I'd ordered a large breakfast, after all. Still, I followed through with the joke. I looked at him like he'd kicked my puppy, hand held to my heart like it had just been shot, then smiled without changing my posture.
"Is that a fat joke, asshole?"
Then the three of us bursting into laughter.
After breakfast, Tom invited me to the white sand beach fifty yards from the bungalows. In that short walk, I saw two things that struck me.
The first was this:
This shell grabbed my attention for several reasons, the first being that this amalgamation of keratin and bone seemed to me an organic, almost artistic legacy that the turtle had left behind. The second being that something about it being solitary, broken, and laying prostrated on grass and dirt, entirely out of its element, placed here for me as much as anyone else, left me with a sense of honor to be presented with such a specimen. And the third was the joy that comes from experiencing unfamiliar fauna; a key reason why I came to this island in the first place. And then I kept walking, only to discover another beautiful piece of living inspiration.
I never got a picture of it. Kept getting side tracked. And I regret that to this day. But there it was, a tree three feet thick, blown over by winds and erosion, it's roots splaying from the ground taller than I was. It was at once tragic, this mighty tree laid low by the passage of time and elements it couldn't control. But upon closer inspection, the power of the seemingly stagnant scene erupted into a realization. Where it's branches had fallen into the soil, the tree began to take root again, adamantly growing horizontally even as it's photo-tropic nature reached toward the heavens.
Adapt. Overcome. And live.
I stared at the tree for too long, apparently, Tom making fun of what seemed like a simple, childish fascination. I joined him in the ocean and we talked about my writing, his work, and where he'd be going next. It turns out he was leaving for Chicago the next day. I hate to admit it, but my first thought was "Shit. Now I can't speak casual English anymore."
After basking in one's own ignorance for long enough, it becomes a necessity to remind yourself of the familiar. C'est la vie.
Afterward, I sat on a plastic chair, salt pulling my skin taught as the water evaporated, the waves lapping, the sun forcing my book to cast a shadow across itself.
Easy living.
At dinner that night, I sat at the same table, eating delicious European cuisine from Al and Cassie's homeland, the bugs ever-so-slightly nipping me from toe to ankle. In the background, Al, Cassie, and Tom were speaking Spanish to one another, the former two smoking quickly made, exquisitely hand-rolled cigarettes, Tom with his cigar. They would laugh, look away reminiscently, then continue on the to the next story.
After I was finished, Cassie offered me a shot of rum. I declined, wanting a fresh mind when I went to the rock jetty. Instead I chose to join them for a little while, getting to know these people who'd approached me with such casually open arms. It didn't take long for us to all be sharing jokes and telling stories. But as the twilight of the evening turned into the dark of night, the conversation followed a similar path.
I told them the mission statement of why I had come to Nicaragua, which involved dwelling on some of the basest, most violent portions of mankind; portions that I was all too familiar with. The guilt took hold and I began speaking through angry tears. And I realized that I was already beginning to drop the barriers I'd put up, sacrificing safety and comfort for emotional growth.
I was raw in this place.
So I said goodbye to Tom and went to the black rock jetty, legs crossed Indian-style as I sat on a patch of grass surrounded by cooled lava, a myriad of stars giving an infinite depth to the sky above me, waves throwing themselves on top of bits of coral that poked through the coy ebbs of the tide.
And I waited, dwelling on every single tragic incident that is referable in my mental Rolodex. All the pain I'd suffered mixed with the guilt of all the pain I'd caused. This terrible conception was then mixed with the tragedies I couldn't prevent.
In other words, I tried to call down hell.
Then the cool ocean sprayed across my face, carried by a determined wind intent on reaching some unfathomable destination, baptizing me in a misty mysticism.
And the strangest thing happened:
Nothing. Not a goddamned thing.