Solo Travel, Complications

I am sitting in Liberia Airport, using the compass app on my phone to find West so I can chant the sun down. This trip is ending as it began -- with as many complications as possible.  A brush fire kept us sitting on the runway for two hours, then just as we were about to take off, a mechanical issue sent us back to the airport where we learned the flight was cancelled and we had to wait until tomorrow to fly out. 

Oddly enough, none of this phases me.  I am stuck here true, but here is a warm paradise, removed from the life that I have determined to adjust.  I am not alone, not really.  One other person from the retreat was on my flight, and she is sitting here with me, commiserating between our solitary wifi binges. And when I feel panic rising, I remember that I can chant down the sun.  One of the things I learned this week.  One more thing I thought I would never do in life.  Ever. 

The sun is truly down, and dark is descending over the feeble lights from the airport and the hotel across the street.  All the families with small children have been sent to hotels for the night.  The only frustration I feel comes from the overstimulation -- so many people talking, conspiracy theorizing and complaining.  It is a sharp awakening from my week of retreat.  It is hard to realize again that not everyone leads with compassion.  

I hoped to gently ease back into my life after this unhoneymoon, but it seems I am being tossed.  I can kick and scream and join the over stimulating chorus.  Or I can jump without fear, remembering that I can fly.

Solo Travel, the Video

The teacher of our retreat showed that "Alexander's Transformation" video that has been making the rounds of the internet and I lost it.  Lost.  It.  I ended up sobbing into my hands in the bathroom.  The idea of the courage behind that transformation just struck me in the heart.  The perseverance and the positive talk even as he fell and fell and fell again.  Just knowing that these things are possible -- so what's my excuse?  But really, it was the song.  That Coldplay song.  Because the truth is, no one can fix you.  Only you can fix you. And as it turns out, my day of tears had only begun.

After the video, we got all warmed up and practiced our little combo.  Our teacher turned us to face the panoramic seascape, and told us there was a person way out on the little spit of land in the distance, and next time we went through the dance, we had to project our dance out to that person.  We had to somehow make that person feel the joy and the power and the love that brought us all together, dancing together.  She put the music on, and I just felt full, so full of all that I am and will be.  I started to cry again while we were dancing.  I thought to myself, this is the water that mixes the cement that puts me together again.

In the evening, we practiced yoga, then we walked down to the beach to chant down the setting sun.  Sitting on the sand, facing the water, with lovely voices all around, all chanting about the light of the sun and the light of ourselves, I filled up and overflowed again.  I started to despair of ever being able to recreate the calm, tensile strength of this retreat after I got home.  My voice broke as the last edge of the sun slipped below the waves and we ended our chanting.  In the absence of human sound that followed, the mortar set around another section of my brick house.

Solo Travel, the Lines

I went zip lining because the very idea terrifies me.  Flying across valleys, rivers, jungles and whatever suspended only by a harness and a cable? Sure.  Sign me up.  I fear heights and I don't like roller coasters, but the whole point of this trip is to do things that terrify me.

I went alone, and as the tour group assembled, I remained the only solo traveler among two happy young couples and a family of five.  I felt calm and happy as I got hooked into my harness.  I felt a wave of nostalgic zen as we piled into the open bed of a pickup truck for the drive to the lines. I was fine until we got to the first line and one of our guides went over how to sit in the harness, slow down and keep straight.  I barely heard him over the blood rushing in my ears.  My knees and hands shook from adrenaline.  I couldn't breathe, and when it was my turn, I could barely walk to the line to get hooked in.  I dropped off the side of the mountain, sliding over the cable with my eyes shut tight, screaming like a little girl in a haunted house.  The first line was a long ride.  I couldn't see the end from the start.  

After the first line, it got easier.  Over the course of ten or so lines, I trusted.  I trusted the harness.  I trusted the lines.  I trusted the goofy, flirty Costa Rican boys who were there to protect us.  I trusted myself to make it across.  

And isn't that the theme of this first year or so?  I can't see the end from the beginning, but it only works if I leap and trust myself to make it across.  All is well.  All will be well.  I hope I can continue to believe this when I get dropped back into my "real" life again.  I hope I will continue to go over the canopy into the wild.  

Solo Travel, the Flight

I fell asleep on the plane and when I woke up, we had fallen off the edge of the world -- outside was nothing but water and a few cotton ball clouds.  There was a horizon, but I couldn't see it because the sky and the water were the same color.  So, there I was, wrapped in infinite, putting the full hard stop on the person that was.  The person that was part of, companion to, connected with -- and this took my breath.  I needed the full hard stop so I could gather enough voice to speak the person who is.  Complete.  Entire.  Imperfect unto herself.

The day did not start off well.  I woke up to a message that my flight had been cancelled. I panicked.  This trip was the thing I had been looking forward to for months.  This was the mortar I would use to put together the brick house that is myself.  I ended up finding the earlier flight and I booked it without hesitation, rushing to the airport thanking the personality gods that I am always two hours early for everything.  I booked it even though I can't afford it, because of the moment.  The moment in the mirror, just after I got the cancellation message, where I looked at my frightened self.

In that moment, my frightened self wondered how bad it would really be to Chuck the trip, stay home and be safe (if bored) for a week.  The frightened voice was small, thank goodness, but still comforting.  So, I marched myself to the internet, found the earlier flight, threw everything in my bag, and got myself to the airport in plenty of time.  My fingers and hands shook so much, I could barely complete the reservation online.  Somehow it happened, and I got on a plane where I could fall asleep and wake up to find we had fallen off the edge of the world.

In the taxi on the way to the airport, I noticed a bright, clear full moon.  It was glowing brown in a deeper brown sky.  I felt the last layers of panic shake down through my body and out my feet.  The only shaking I would be doing for the next week would be for sheer joy, dancing.  I felt inclined to be peaceful, patient, to love and trust in the good nature of all people and things.