Day 85: Yes, Summer, You are in Central America

So, when you´ve lived someplace for awhile you get comfortable. When you´ve survived eighty days without getting bit by a dog, hitten by a car, or thrown in the back of a moving car to get your organs harvested out, you get a little jaded. You think you´re invincible and nothing can happen to you.

I´m not invincible anymore.

Don´t worry, I´m safe and unharmed, I just don´t have as much stuff anymore. Today, someone climbed our fence, and reached through our gated porch to steal my rope. MY ROPE! It cost 15 lempiras (less than a dollar) but that´s what they wanted... And they only wanted one of them... they left the other. But they stole some of my clothes for good measure too.

I was sad because I´ve been very happy and comfortable thinking I live in a safe little bubble. But... when you live in a town that´s referred to as "Little Colombia," where gunshots are often a nighttime lullaby, it´s naive to think that you are in fact safe... but I did. El Ladron stole my sense of safety, along with mis cosas, and I don´t even think he knew he took it.

So, I went to the Pulperia tonight and told Don Casteñeda what happened (all in spanish) and he graciously let me buy a new rope from him. :) Sully and I sat on the front porch of the Pulperia with The Don and his sons and friends and laughed and talked and shared stories while he taught me how to tie seven different knots. It was one of my favorite nights here so far. Sitting on the porch, doing nothing but shooting the breeze. It reminded me of college. When the best thing to do was enjoy a warm nighttime breeze on the front porch, sipping a cup of hot tea, swapping stories between the cigarette smoke underneath the stars with your best friends. Part of it made me long for home, but part of me knew that this was home now, too.