Beach Bums

20160721

What to discuss after so many miles between conversations. Well, for one, I watched dead pool on the plane from Lisbon to Newark.

He procrastinated and procrastinated. What did it lead to? A dramatic climax! Sorry to get your hopes up, no drama here, just hustle and bustle through customs, passport checks, terminals, more customs and even more passport checks. But this is not what I want to talk about.

Beaches. Our last 8-10 days was all about the beaches. I spent my blogging time in Barceloneta catching us up on Pamplona. Barceloneta was great. We hit the beach up several days and we spent one day as my sister tiny not so brown would say, “beach bumming it!” Literally waking up late, taking our time with everything except drinking adult beverages and then drinking more adult beverages. I even think that was the night that I almost got in a fight with some teenage punk! Faz sentido. But mama brown was there to remind me to “think”. Upon reflection it reminded me of the bardo state of death. Being confused and disoriented in the mean time these clear directions are being provided. Any other time, it is like, duh, don’t fight the young kid who is more drunk than me in a foreign country. But at the time, it seemed like it was not that unreasonable to Meia Lua de Compasso this kid in the thigh! The whole episode was quite the bummer because I found myself replaying the incident for the rest of the evening and into the next day. I then had to watch my back for he last couple of days there which made me feel right at home. What I did appreciate about that experience was that it was a reality check for me to peel away the “vacation” facade and remember that people do live and die in that tourist trap. That realization in conjunction with all of the service workers and artisans selling their goods that we saw reminded me of why I didn’t feel right about staying in Costa Rica at the age of 22. Which was, “what good am I to these people if I reject their dream destination (the good ole USA) and move in on their only means of making money (tourists).” I realized then that my only value to the Caribbean Ticos was that I had access to the USA. In reality I didn’t. My resolve was that I needed to learn how to build a house. Which due to external pressure, my first child, I did. I also got a Civil Engineering degree, had another child and went on to get licensed and actually start a somewhat enjoyable career. It was nice to recognize that now not only do I have the value of being a USe, but I now can garden, build houses, share capoeira, and be an engineer. I can now support the locals as a tourist. I can also stumble around in four languages. So my days in Barcelona were great for that reason. 

We ended up staying 6 nights in Barceloneta. Another amazing aspect of Barcelona was visiting the Picasso Museum and Gaudi’s Familia Sagrada. Again my American came out. Who is Gaudi? 

Don’t feel bad, at the time of his death nobody knew who he was either. That is a sad story. Unlike Picasso, he spent his last years fixated on vaginas and his father! What was awesome about the Picasso museum was getting to look at some of his work up close, I’m talking one to two inches close. Actually up really really close, it relies on technique and illusion. Of course having visited the Prado in Madrid, and seeing Picasso’s ability to replicate the works and the styles of so many masters, that is priceless. Nonetheless, up close, painting beautiful paintings does not seem out of reach for me any longer. What it takes to be a master is an unrelenting quest for perfection, day in and day out. What will it take? It will take me a few years more to be financially independent while beginning to…brush up on my skills. I do know that my fear of art is self imposed. Seeing these great artists and the streets littered with artists that were both amazing and questionable to say the least has me inspired.

Another great thing about the Barcelona trip is the recognition of my muse. Mama brown. She is my inspiration, motivation, frustration, relaxation and more. 

What is awesome about her is that she wants me to not be upset. She wants me not to be angry. She wants me to be happy. So I didn’t mention it, but she broke down, beat me to the punch, and asked me to marry her at Orgulloso Lisboa (Pride Lisboa). I had been planning on asking her to marry me in a jewelry store in Morroco, but a five Euro ring in Lisboa is even better!

Ericeira, Portugal

Cereza encima. I know…idioms don’t translate. But Ericeira, villa e suites was definitely the cherry on top. What a treat. We loved it so much we even had an argument as if it was our home over something trivial. However, one of the benefits of this trip was actually the arguments. Why do we argue, how do we argue, how do we resolve it? All of these questions were more easily answered while traveling. For one, we had nowhere to go per se. We are both pretty cheapskates. At this stage of our financial situation, we would never splurge on another room when we had a perfectly good one already paid for. And two, there is a point in which an argument on vacation, in a beautiful part of the world, in a romantic setting becomes painfully absurd and awkward. So why…it is obvious why, some sort of stress is why. Be it some sort of complicated situation such as triangulating our location, actually being lost, being hungry, or tired, a combination of all of the above. It usually is rooted in some sort of miscommunication or faulty psychic powers. But in Ericeira, we professed to each other that we really don’t want to fight. We truly are not trying to make each other miserable and we are truly trying to read in to the wants, needs, and desires of each other and in doing so we get ahead of ourselves and fall victim to our own false assumptions. These false assumptions generated by our ego’s desire to be the best set the stage for our arguments. So the takeaway is that if we do find ourselves in an argument, it is most likely rooted in these issues. Now the challenge will be as we fall into our stressful western routines, how do we constantly be incomes by compassion rather than egotistical obsession? That however, is a totally different blog. I guess it is somewhat poignant because, our ghetto did get out on this trip, and of course I conflate ghetto with being brown.