Remote - well, it can be Remote!

I have found that living on an island, in spite of the presence of a population of approximately 15,000 people, it still gets lonely.  We live, as I have stated before, on the far southeast end of the island and outside one farm back in the mountains, we have the only habitable house here.  So there are benefits and drawbacks. 

First, the benefits:  we are away from populated areas thus avoiding barking dogs, crowing roosters, constant foot traffic or boat traffic, street lighting, thieves, complaining neighbors, noise pollution, electrical power outages, water main problems and, yes, salesmen/bible thumpers! 

The drawbacks: we are away from populated areas which can provide the assistance in a crisis, we have roaming cattle and horses periodically wandering into our yard eating the landscape, if there is an emergency it is up to us to get help via our boat in any kind of weather, sudden brush fires would be a catastrophe as it is only the two of us here and we have limited access to water, finally, we don’t get many visitors! As a matter of fact, as I type, I can see smoke from a fire just north of me quite a ways.  My friend called me on the phone to alert me to a fire but I don’t believe we will have to worry about this particular one.  However, we will keep on the alert.  So, living where we do definitely has drawbacks. 

Now the last drawback, the “we don’t get many visitors” can be a plus or a minus, depending upon how one feels on any given day.  Personally, I enjoy having people drop by and visit but being so far away from the mainstream, this seldom happens.  Thus, I give dinner parties, invite people for luncheon or drinks or just to come and have a chat.  If people happen to drop by unannounced which, believe me is very, very seldom, I have enough time to scramble around, change out of grubby clothes, straighten the house and greet the people with a beverage as I can spy their boat approaching from quite a distance.

Now, as any woman will tell you, no matter how much you love your husband, being with him 24/7 has its drawbacks.  Men don’t like to talk about the same thing women do!  I lend my ear to my husband when he goes on about construction, motors, mechanical workings of a particular tool, his photography, his opinions and enjoy learning things I may not have assimilated before.  However, it is another thing altogether for him to show any interest in my recipe discoveries, my crocheting, my card making, my sewing or my excitement regarding the re-organization of my upstairs craft room.  I mean, my husband is not big on every day conversation and we can go all day with hardly a dozen words passing between us.  I need and want to talk to a woman, especially a woman who has my interests.  

Also, living in an undereducated country, talking to locals is not inspiring.  I mean when you have people that believe drinking ice water will make you fat, that the world is only 2,500 years old, heaven is almost full, who can hardly add 2 + 2 or grasp the meaning of a particular concept, and women should bear as many children as possible to keep a man, I mean, really!  I have nothing in common with them.  We have foreigners living here but we usually see each other once a week in town on shopping day.  Lately, with the boats not running a “regular” schedule, shopping day changes from week to week.  Some people go the day the boat comes in, while others wait until the day after.  Lately, also, my husband has been in hurry to get me through my shopping, banking and paying bills so that we can go home quickly.  Therefore, my usual Friday shopping day where I could sit and chat with various people and socialize, has ceased to exist.  So, I can only see these people (if they go to the same restaurant I do) on Saturday afternoon/evening.

Now, I can go and visit friends and I do, or did, quite often.  However, when I’m the one that has to get in the boat each and every time to instigate the visit, I then begin to wonder why people can’t take the same time and effort to visit me!  After all, we live the same distance apart.  I understand that getting in a boat and going a distance is difficult, but if I can find a way, surely they can!  I also understand that people have priorities in their lives and maybe they don’t feel the need to visit as I do because they have people living close to them and access is easy.  So, why get in a boat and go the distance to come to my house?  If I lived in Sandy Bay for instance, I could periodically walk to other people’s homes and sit down to pleasantly pass the time of day.  But, of course, I don’t, so I must live with one of the “downsides” of my remote home.

Just recently, however, we went to a restaurant on the other side of the island (Bo’s Island House) where we met up with some sailors who were in port.  We had a wonderful conversation during lunch and it was so exhilarating to talk about things other than problems of the island and to chat with people who were well-travelled, informed and could relay fresh ideas.  And then another wonderful surprise.  We were at Manati this past Saturday for dinner and I met one of the sailing couples that had returned to the island.  It just so happened that his wife and I had the same interests and even like job experiences!  We spent a wonderful few hours chatting about our hobbies, our jobs, our family.  She even said the same thing I have stated in this blog – it is nice being with your husband but occasionally it is refreshing, stimulating and pleasant to visit with a woman! 

So, these two visits, I guess, will have to tide me over for a while.  Thankfully I will be leaving soon to live a life-long dream; I am going to visit Europe.  My son and I are meeting in May in Germany and spending 21 days traveling.  At least, when I return, I will have something new to talk about – but will there be anyone around to listen?

 

The beauty of language

I was in the midst of re-organizing my boxes in which I store paper, decorations, etc. for my stamping projects (cards, books, envelopes) and I came across a bundle of greeting cards that I had kept over the years.  Most were from my children with a few from good friends and it gave me pause to think.

On the island we do have greeting cards.  However, my husband refuses to acknowledge they are here and just where they can be purchased, as it would mean he would have no excuse on my birthday, our anniversary, Christmas or Valentine’s Day for not getting me a card.  I love cards!  Always have.  I love making them and have made many over the years to give to friends and family or making a special card at the request of a friend.  

I love the challenge of thinking up an idea for a card, making up verses, finding special things to decorate them with and then making a special envelope to enclose them in.  Most of all, I love doing verses.  To me the art of speaking eloquently is being lost.  People have reduced themselves to brief descriptive words, and mostly 4-letter ones at that!  I am not a prude but I have never seen the reason for daily use of  4-letter words rather than taking time to express how you feel with a more descriptive and MEANINGFUL term.  I know that people get into the habit of using certain words and it becomes second nature to them.  However, when no one around them expresses their discomfort with what is being said or the fact that the language offends them, then these same people feel that using whatever foul word comes out of their mouth is accepted.  

I am always distressed to hear the children on the streets using language my parents avoided using around us as children.  Then I hear their mothers!  They use the same language and always seem to be shouting at their charges.  I raised three children and it was a difficult task keeping on them about manners, respect, morals, hygiene, but a completely necessary one. Thankfully I have no regrets about my children.  They were all special in their own way and each has made me proud as they reached adulthood.  My husband and I never swore in front of the children.  As a matter of fact, I very seldom if ever use profanity as I feel there are better ways of conveying an idea rather than using something that means nothing or has no connection to the idea being presented!  We never let the children see us in a light unbecoming us as parents (i.e., drinking or listening to off-color jokes) and did our best to teach them respect for others.

My husband and I have been watching a T.V. series (on DVD) which has been acclaimed as one of the best series of the year.  The concept was interesting - about people in the ghetto and the overpowering presence of drugs.  However, I cannot relate to this series having been raised in a middle-class environment, with high moral values, respect for others and the system and using the language I was taught in school to convey a thought in a correct and meaningful manner.  We actually had to put on subtitles during the series just to figure out what was being said.  Even then we had no idea during the majority of the hour-long show as to the meaning of the sentences.  One could guess because of the body language and the subsequent outcome, but other than that, they were speaking a foreign language.  Some people say, this is “their” language which is indicative to that class of people.  I am sorry, but that language is not going to get them anywhere and keep them just where they are - at the bottom of the ladder.  When slang takes over and the rules of grammar are thrown out the window, then we have to guess just what is being said and the person using poor grammar will never make the impression necessary to be better than what they are.

My point, I guess, is that I miss the beauty of the language that was used in say the 1800’s!  Not to say that it is something I could tackle today as many of the words used then, being very formal, might convey a feeling to others that they are inferior to me.  So, this is why I love to make up verses and express my thoughts on paper in a card.  

In going over the wonderful cards I have received over the years, I am reminded of the love and respect my children have for me, the comfort my friends find in my friendship and the simple joy of remembering that I count for something with others.  This all comes about with words - and slang and swear words just don’t give one that feeling!

P.S.  With this thought, I must correct the title of my last last blog: Wonder What Up!  To: Wonder What’s Up?  Sorry about that!

Wonder what up?

Well, it has been a busy week here on Guanaja.  

I have been painting my upstairs craft/guest room all week, reorganizing my 1,500+ stamps to fit into shelves on the wall and my supplies for various craft projects.  Then, with our worker on vacation, I decided that all the tall bushes behind the Crotons at the front porch needed to go as they were getting pretty leggy looking without sufficient sun to make them fill out.  I was then on a bread baking kick and came upon a new recipe for a baguette which was such a hit we almost finished the first loaf in record time!

On top of that, I have been planning a trip to Europe for my son and I.  We meet in Germany on May 1st and tour Germany and Italy.  I will go to Croatia first to visit friends and on my return to the U.S. will stay with my daughter for a while and try to make a side trip to Orlando to visit family and friends.

Added to that, our one “new dog”, Lucy, seems to have a fungus and the poor thing has been chewing herself to death.  Finally reached our friend Susan who will be coming back to the island soon and she supplied me (through her worker) with a medicated shampoo for fungus and some antibiotics.  Had to bathe the poor dog today, which she clearly did not enjoy but stood still for.  We have been in the midst of a cold front and temperatures have been below normal.  I toweled her off, brought her into the house, applied an antibacterial crème and will have to repeat the process every other day for about a week!

I have been re-varnishing some rattan furniture to use downstairs in the main room thus freeing up some space upstairs.  I have been in a crochet frenzy and just got into filet crochet.  You can make pictures of things out of crochet (some what like counted-cross stitch).  I’ve made a flamingo, a pelican, a picture of two palm trees and am now working on a hummingbird.  I’m obsessed!  I made two seahorses for my grandsons’ birthdays, which are the week of the 20th of March (along with their Mom’s birthday and their cousin’s birthday).  I’m also working on a project for my daughter for her birthday but can’t disclose it now because she reads these blogs!

I keep an eye on our friend’s house (which is under construction), am trying to pay his taxes for him and took care of his electric bill while he is back in the States.

Then, I caught a cold but managed to overcome in 3 days!  Of course I lost two nights sleep because I woke up and couldn't go back to sleep.  But I used the time to crochet some stuff for my stepdaughter, which I cannot disclose because she reads this blog too!

We also had a huge “condo” ship visit Guanaja (“The World”) and were amazed at its size.  The boat was lit up at night and my

 husband said it was like Belco (the local electric company) on steroids!  Man, it would have been nice to run an extension cord from that boat to furnish the Cay of Bonacca with electricity when Belco cuts back from 3:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m.

Naturally, some of you will not be interested in any of this, but because so many ask what do we do all day?  Here's one answer!

Now, of course, I am blogging!  What a life I lead!