A belated update

Some friends since high school reestablished contact with me this week and wondered what I’ve been up to. One even had read my blog and wondered why I hadn’t posted in quite some time. I didn’t know I had a reader.
So much has happened that it’s difficult to summarize, and I’ll certainly leave out the intimate details. I spent today at Organico Minimarket, where I became a partner in November. This was a shift from my bbq business, especially since I had been to a raw foods retreat in July and began preparing raw foods for our nascient deli section, which I looked forward to developing. I started a web page, http://www.organico.webs.com/ and a Facebook page
I spent an hour this morning at the annual meeting of our water board, which I’ve been writing about for Voice of Nosara. If you have a remote interest in our water issues here, which are dramatic, check out my latest at http://www.voiceofnosara.com/02_11_regional_03.html
Also, some great local photos are at http://www.voiceofnosara.com/community.html
The VON is a great monthly that is fortunately backed by a publisher with deep pockets who wants to be a positive force in the community, although our print run is about a 1,000. We’re doing some real journalism here.
I’m also the de facto arts reviewer, and music critic, although I would never write an unkind word and everybody here is talented and above average.
On a more personal level, I split with my wife in August. We struggled over my decision in February 2005 to move down here full time and it’s not the outcome I wanted but it became clear that we needed to move in separate directions.
I’m keeping the bbq business alive, and am going to start spending more time with my smoker near the beach. Until now I’ve been focused on the store, which has a lot of competition in a tiny seasonal market. Shlomo started the store a year ago and we’ve been trying to grow the store ‘organically,’ which means we don’t have a lot of money to put into it.
So I’ve been working harder than I ever did in DC, but at least I’m feeding people nutritional food instead of the bullshit I was paid to spread during my former career in associations. I am grateful, and still count my blessings, that I got the hell out of there, even though there have been unexpected turns here.
But I have few expectations and am not strongly attached to much except my pursuit of happiness and satisfaction. There is a lot to be said for simplifying life when there is an opportunity, or when faced with circumstances.
I’ve recently put my surfboard back in the water after a prolonged absence, and have remembered how much fun I used to have before I got tired of being smacked down more than enjoying an easier ride. I’ve lived here full time for three and a half years, and although it is turning into a different adventure from the one I once had, I see myself living here the rest of my life.
There are no paved roads here, and the dust is unbelievably bad between November and May, and although the government is slowly working on a plan to pave the main road, no one expects it to happen soon. It took me more than a month to get my Pathfinder fixed when I tried to drown it in one of the rivers north of here one night, driving home from a fiesta or combination rodeo-carnival that is traditional here.
So there’s a price to pay to live in paradise, but I feel a lot stronger for having chosen this course, and a lot more flexible.