Rocking that *International* Paradise

Annette picked Carrie and I up at 6:15am this morning.  The plan was for her to drop me off to run the half marathon, and then she and Carrie would wait for me at the finish line.  The Max Tott Half Marathon is the oldest race in Guatemala, I think.  This year was the 78 th edition. The race starts in Zone 1 of the city, then winds through Zone 5 and up into Zone 16, passing through my home turf as it then cuts down onto Blvd. Vista Hermosa in Zone 15, past Campo Marte, and along 10 Avenida to end at a stadium back in Zone 5.  Unlike the Guatemala City Half Marathon held at the end of August, this route is anything but flat.  The race includes two serious climbs and a handful of smaller ones with a total elevation gain of 1000ft.  The route (and my pace, if you're curious). I had been training well, but the last two weeks just hadn’t felt the greatest.  I told Carrie and Annette on the ride there that I was not really nervous, but I ha...

All of a sudden it’s been nearly a month since I’ve written anything.  Perhaps it’s unnecessary for me to say that January has flown by in a rather uneventful sort of way.  On the 2 nd , I spent the day in airports and flying.  Leaving from my hometown’s small airport, I am always ensured at least 3 flights and 12 hours of travel time to get to or from Guatemala City.  While I don’t particularly enjoy these long travel days, I have found that the three flights provide a sort of natural transition from one life to the other.  Take this most recent trip, for example.  My first flight was on a small plane filled with mostly small-town people leaving home.  We were nearly homogenous group.  The next flight was filled with more variation; we traveled from one big US city to another.  By the time I boarded my final flight, I was already feeling farther from home.  But then on that plane, filled not only with vacationers and business men ...

“When I am worried and cannot sleep I count my blessings instead of sheep And I fall asleep counting my blessings” As I lay tossing and turning the other night, unable to sleep, these song lyrics came unbidden (I hadn’t thought of this particular song from the movie White Christmas in years) and lodged themselves in my.  It’s funny, because the words are oddly perfect.  The fact of the matter is, I am insanely blessed and have had such an incredible stay at home this holiday season.  So when I lay in bed unable to sleep (who knows why, but this is indeed a problem I’ve been having for the past week or so), I really do find myself counting my blessings.  And there are so many of them. On this stint home, I’ve been blessed to reconnect with old friends—hours spent sitting over a table or on a couch, saying all the things that didn’t get said via Facebook messenger or Snapchat over the last few months…or years.  I deepened relationships with peo...

It is insane to me the amount of preparation goes into the Christmas holiday.  I had never stopped to think about it until this year, but when you compare Christmas to the other holidays we celebrate, it is absolutely mind-boggling how much prep there is before Christmas day. Think about it.  For example: Halloween: You create (or buy) a costume.  Buy some candy for the trick-or-treaters.  Maybe go to a party to show off your costume (and when you were young, you went trick-or-treating).  The preparation  and celebration takes no more than a few hours. Birthday: You plan a party, buy a gift, make some food, celebrate.  Again, totally possible to prepare in an afternoon. Thanksgiving: You could argue this one takes more than 1 day to prepare for, depending on the type and amount of food you’re making if you are hosting.  But still…you spend a solid day making food, cleaning the house and maybe decorating, and then you spend a day eating ...

The last weekend before I left to go home for Christmas, I took a trip to Honduras, checking my fifth Central American country off the list.  Chris and I left at sunrise on Saturday morning in what would be my car’s first international trip. Gas tank full, passports in hand, and Chris’s machete in the trunk for good measure, we were off.  The plan?  Drive to the small colonial town of Copan Ruinas (just over the Honduran border), find a place to stay, and wing the rest.  The drive should have taken us 3 ½ to 4 hours, but because a landslide dropped traffic to one lane at one point of the drive (and I am not the type of person to swing into the left lane and pass 50 stopped cars), we were halted on the road for nearly 45 minutes.  The one good thing about this stop was that it is the reason we have a soundtrack to our trip.  Don't mind the glare or the waterstains on the mirror... I still like the photo. Anytime traffic backs up in Central Amer...

My life is good.  I am supremely blessed to have the opportunities, lifestyle, and friends that I possess.  But sometimes it’s easy to forget that and get caught up in life’s petty issues.  This weekend, many activities and thoughts culminated in that reminder. Yesterday was a “typical Saturday” in the city, inasmuch as there can be such a thing.  Amy, Carrie, Michelle and I hit the trails for a run in the morning.  The day was glorious—bright blue skies, a slight chill in the air that made running comfortable, and not a hint of rain.  Still, there were moments in our run that Amy and I wished it was simply over.  As we chugged up a hill, Amy chanted, “I’m thankful for my body, I’m thankful for my health, I’m thankful that I can run.”  It’s a simple thing, but one we have to remember: there are people in this world who wish they had the ability to run.  Or walk, for that matter.  And there are people in this world who don’t have ...

I was talked into going to Costa Rica over our 4 day Thanksgiving break.  Not that I needed all that much convincing, of course; I think Amy said something to the effect of, “I’m going to Costa Rica.  You should come too.  Here’s the flight I booked.”  It was just more of that peer pressure business from my last post again.  I don’t have anything against Costa Rica.  Yet given the short nature of our break and my frugal mindset, without the prodding from friends, my first choice for the weekend’s travel plans probably would have included going somewhere that I haven’t been yet in Guatemala.  But I’m glad I made the decision (and shelled out the cash) to go to Costa Rica.  There ended up being four of us in our group, which is really almost the perfect number to travel with.  Amy, Shannon, Analisa, and I got along well the entire trip and complemented each other’s styles too, I think.  I feel like we packed a lot into our four da...