Blissed Out and Blessed

Sorry I’ve been absent in my posts for the past few weeks, but I just returned from a trip that I will always consider to be one of the most memorable and love-filled seven days of my lifetime.  I spent the 11th through the 18th of December with some of the most amazing people and music to cross my path in this short lifetime.  I wrote the following passage on the plane en route to Cancun…

Long ago I fell in love.  It was a love that was always giving back.  A love I could depend on; one that was there with each sunrise and lingering through every sunset.  It was a love that filled me with a sense of adventure and of new discovery and it was always introducing me to exciting people and places.  This love gave me a deeper understanding of the world and taught me that perspective can change and grow with time.  This love had no end and would be by my side until the end of time.  And so began my love affair with a thing called “music” and an obsession with traveling to experience it with like minded “freaks” who felt the same as I.

It’s funny how a group of guys offering me a free ticket to see a band I had never heard of in exchange for a ride to the show 12 years ago spiraled me into a decade of untouchable experiences leading to my present state of being on an American Airlines flight to Cancun to meet up with my “team” to celebrate the beauty of bluegrass for four brilliant days at an all-inclusive resort in Tulum.

Music is on helluva drug.  It hooks you, consumes you, takes you up and, sometimes, brings you down.  It compulses you to move your body, close your eyes, laugh out loud, hug a stranger (ie make a new friend), scream laugh, clap, spin…But with music, there are no negative side effects, except a perpetually empty pocketbook and what my team refers to as “festivation deprivation” (the act of going through withdrawal from 24/7 friends and music to being in your cubicle at 9am on Monday morning).  There are countless positive impacts that arise from obsessive musical consumption that keep me bubbling over with gratitude towards those guys who so long ago towed me to my first Phish show in Cleveland.

We have a saying amongst the group of 60 friends from all points in the country whom I’ll be meeting in Mexico in a few short hours…”Music brought us together, but love makes us friends.”  So, not only do I have music to thank for making me take leap of faith after leap of faith with love, traveling and opening up both my soul and my mind…But also for bringing me together with these amazing folks who have come to make my world spin round.  Our relationships have evolved from clumsily giggling and apologetically spilling drinks on each other in the front row, to spending holidays with one another, watching each other get married and have children or holding hands and wiping away the tears that spawn from each failed relationship or bump in the rollercoaster ride called life, traveling the country, and now internationally, as a pack…as a force to be reckoned with.

We are family, we work best as a team and we want everyone to know it…simply because we are proud of how awesome our friends are and are privileged to be included in such an amazing group.

In the coming days, we will dance in the sand beneath the stars to the beat of the upright bass, wearing shiny things, drowning each other in hugs and “I love you’s” and shots of tequila and simply doing what we know we do BEST together…creating an amazing experience with bluegrass as our soundtrack.

I don’t know what I would do without the people I am spending the next week amongst and, to be honest, I’m glad that will remain an unanswered question.  I’ll see you on the other side with more stories than I can count, memories that will last forever and a lot more love than I have here today.

Dedicated to Team Shit Show.

I guess that this must be the place…

The sea is angry today, with thunderous waves crashing against the shore of Hawksnest beach.  We brought snorkel gear along on the $5 ride in the red and white striped Westin taxi, but breathing salt water through a tube smothered by white caps seems unappealing.  Lying on the beach and riding the waves will suffice for this afternoon.

I’m adapting to the climate here, which makes the small inconveniences of island life even less meaningful.  My sweat glands are weaning themselves from their perpetual perspiration and the mosquitoes are lessening their relentless pursuit of my “new blood,” as long time locals call it.  The uphill treks all over the town are easier as my calves and thighs toughen themselves each day, transforming more each day to accommodate my pedestrian mode of transportation.  I even noticed goosebumps freckling my legs as I exited the 80 degree waters today.  Physically, my person is synchronizing with the island.

Mentally, I have settled in as well.  I moved my two suitcases into my first island home yesterday with the help of a friend with a Geo Tracker, missing a window and bearing seat belts a bit too tight as they had long since lost their powers of adjustability.  As we drove past Dolphin Market and putted up the steep, narrow road to Villa Lee Anna, a bubble of excitement burst in my belly.  “I have a home.”

And quite the home it is!  I have been told that the residence I landed in is a very coveted rental on the island.  With a purple flowered tree, reminiscent of the focal point in the dreamworld painting from “What Dreams May Come,” hanging low over an aged stone gate, a beautiful patio area with white lights and lush growth and wooden and granite walkways pointing in the direction of six different dwellings; it feels like enchantment before even setting foot inside of the green door labeled number 5.  To give you a mental picture of the courtyard, Villa Lee Anna has been dubbed Melrose Place, without the pool of course.

Moving through the doorway, juggling my overstuffed purple suitcase and a disassembling box of toiletries I had shipped to myself from Denver, I looked around my new dwelling and wondered what I had done to be so lucky.  Gratitude is all I am feeling right now.  Grateful is an understatement.

The villa entryway is tiled with small, brown flecked tiles, as is the rest of the large, wide open common area.  Large stone planters have been built into the walls just to the right of the front door as you enter the villa, one of which is empty, the other filled with conch shells and sand dollars and fan coral and, at some point, someone laboriously took the time to cover it in brightly colored mosaic.  Once inside the 20-25 foot wide octagon of a living room, I begin to feel the ocean breeze, drifting through the screen doors of the patio adjacent to the kitchen and being propelled through the space via three, lazily moving, low-hanging ceiling fans.

The open air kitchen beckons dinner parties and memory making, which I planned to inaugurate that evening, with a gathering of new friends and trying my hand at my first Puerto Rican cooking experience.  Twice fried mofongo and saffron rice with pork roux enjoyed on the deck with white Christmas lights twinkling and a steady breeze embracing giggles and conversation with a brand new group of comrades was a great way to begin making this beautiful villa a home.

 

“Ah, life is a…

“Ah, life is a gate, a way, a path to Paradise anyway, why not live for fun and joy and love or some sort of girl by a fireside, why not go to your desire and LAUGH…” ~ Jack Kerouac

The Local Wildlife

The town of Cruz Bay itself houses a diversification of local “wildlife” from all over the continental United States. 90% of people between the ages of 20 and 40 residing on the island work in the service industry and, if you have ever done a stint in restaurant world, you will understand what I mean when I refer to them as “wildlife.”

Much like the crew behind the restaurant scene in Colorado, the locals who make the wheels turn on this island are mostly transplants; vibrant, colorful and excited about the life they have CHOSEN for themselves, as opposed to a life they have been forced into by the standards put into place by society and family values. Not to knock the college>career>family path which most Americans strive for…It’s where I come from and I wouldn’t change a moment of my glorious childhood. 

However, I suppose many people on that path decide that they will one day retire in a place such as this as opposed to spending some of their good years here.  I don’t know if tomorrow will ever come, and experiencing paradise is not something I was willing to roll the dice for. 

The people living here all seem to have a goal…Or, like me, they are trying to figure out what that goal is or how to obtain it.  Cruz Bay is a very small and tight knit community which welcomes newcomers entertaining the right mind set with open arms. All with a good heart and a ready smile will be wildly accepted…even if their head isn’t ALWAYS in the right place.  That being said, there is a lot of opportunity here for those with ambition and a respect for the island and its people. 

I have a million ideas right now about community websites, musical endeavors and writing opportunities…My creative juices are flowing…And, for the first time, maybe its the island or maybe the new beginning, I feel I have the ability, the resources and the drive to make some of these things happen.