June 2023 Stand-up
A month of rest and relaxation (sort of)
Today marks a month of being unemployed. It’s been a busy month marked with milestones, events, social obligations, and my second trip to Nicaragua this year. I feel like I’ve lived 3 years of events in one month, and while at times it has been overwhelming, suffocating, and scary, I wouldn’t have it any other way. The same old doors won’t open to new opportunities, and every day I try to lean into the gift that I’ve been given to restart and reset my life.
In this newsletter, I’ll cover:
Life and health in Nicaragua
Good reads
Planning and plotting for July
(Getting to) Life in the Tropics
I’ve traveled a lot this year. During my two weeks in Vietnam alone, I took 5 flights. I’ve eaten street food, beach cart ceviche, shared drinks, cigarettes, joints, and mini-spoons with strangers. I had no fear when I booked my flight to Nicaragua, as this would be my 4th time entering the country. I was even excited to have a 7-hour layover at Miami International Airport, as it wasn’t my first, and I had fond memories of transiting through there on trips to Latin America in my earlier 20’s. In fact, I flew this exact same itinerary on my first ever solo backpacking trip to Nicaragua in 2018— Toronto to Miami, Miami to Managua.
Imagine my surprise and will to stay peaceful when my flight from Miami to Managua was delayed, and then cancelled. When, after waiting 5 hours in line at the airline ticketing desk, I book an airport hotel to stay in until my rescheduled flight the next day, and I show up to the hotel, flooded with other travellers with cancelled flights, and they can’t find my booking. Tears fell, and the contemplation to bail on my flight to Managua and find the next flight out to Toronto or Detroit became stronger and stronger. But, I pushed through, with the kind words and encouragement from my friends waiting for me in Nicaragua, and the never-ending support from my boyfriend, despite being exhausted from a week long work offsite.
And imagine my feeling of dread when I finally board the plane the next afternoon, after the flight has been pushed back twice already, and I begin to feel chills, a fever, body aches, and a persistent migraine. I felt like we were sitting on the freezing cold plane on the runway forever. I was worried because I knew that customs in Nicaragua were still checking temperatures of travellers entering the country, and my temperature was skyrocketing despite being so cold that my fingers began numbing and my lips turned blue. Thankfully, a kind, older woman, who I affectionately called abuela, or, grandma in Spanish, gave me some ibuprofen, gave up her seat and let me lay down across our row, and laid her jacket on me.
I managed to make it through customs smoothly, even cracking a few jokes with the immigrations officer, got in my taxi, and met up with my friends in a beach house in a tiny fishing village called El Tránsito. Unfortunately, this spell of extreme fever, chills, and body aches persisted every day for nearly a week. I made arrangements for a taxi to take me to the capital of Nicaragua, a 2 hour car ride away, so that I could go to a hospital. Miraculously, the day that was to occur, things started to turn around for me. I felt more lucid than I had since I let Miami, thinking about work, creative endeavours, personal reflections, and of course, a huge reason why I made the trek down here, surfing.
The following week, I trained, I read, and I built out my portfolio and re-did my resume. I ran, my appetite was returning, and I surfed. But, last night, the daunting chills returned, driving me to put on my thickest socks, jeans, a sweater, and bundle up under a duvet in 30 degree weather. The body aches came on, and the slightest movement pained me all over. I’m currently writing this in one of my lucid moments, after taking ibuprofen.
This is my long way of saying, I will never, ever take my good health for granted again. I felt this way during my first wave of illness, when I thought that death was knocking on my doorstep, yet only a few short days later, I was binge drinking, and snorting lines from a bag sold to my friends and I deceitfully. It was my first time being ripped off, and instead of the bitter, numbing powder I would normally expect when gumming such substance, I tasted salt, and a slight fizz. I had snorted a whole line of bicarbonate of soda. Right after I vowed to “take my health seriously”.
Our bodies are not invincible. They keep score. The scars, scabs, and scrapes on the outside only tell half the story— I can’t even imagine what my insides look like. I tout being someone who can have their cake and eat it too— of course I can smoke cigarettes while on holiday, ingest questionable substances, and binge drink multiple nights a week, yet still run a half marathon and wake up early for 7AM workouts 3-4 times a week. This just simply is no longer true, and what was supposed to be 3 weeks in paradise surrounded by love and nature has turned into me fearing my life and health.
What we take for granted is crazy— we do things to suppress our appetites, to avoid feeling true energy and fatigue, to avoid the movement our body so badly needs as medicine. While death was knocking on my door, all I wished for was to have the same desire to eat as I once always had, to be able to move without pain and aches, to not be confined to my bed.
I’m not perfect, and I’m sure I’ll have hiccups and moments where the gratitude is missed on me, but I seriously will do so much to protect my health and body now, from here on out.
Good reads
I’ve been reading more than I have all year. Part of it is because I feel like I have the time to do so, but the other part is because I’ve decided that I want to pursue creative writing professionally. For me, this means doing research on what makes a good writing practice, and of course, reading things that I think are well written.
Every Summer After - Carly Fortune. This novel was as if you took Normal People by Sally Rooney and drowned it in Canadiana. It gets a solid 3/5 for me— it was a riveting, tortured love story, but uninteresting and derivative in a way that didn’t really keep me on the edge of my seat. I also hate the “effortlessly hot and every man wants to fuck me” character arch which is very much how the author positions the protagonist. Still a fun read though.
Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow - Gabrielle Zevin. Many tears were shed and many sentences highlighted just because I loved how they were written. The plot itself is wonderful, twisty and turney, refreshing in so many different ways. I love the exploration of disability, of race, of love. Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow gets 5/5 from me.
Re-reading Wild - Cheryl Strayed. This novel/memoir turned into a movie with Reese Witherspoon as the main character was life changing for me every single time I watched and read it, which hasn’t been often. For me, it’s like eating a decadent dessert that you love and sought after, but would never dream of eating every day. It elicits emotions, reflection, and forces perspective. Please please please read this book, or at the least, watch the movie if you haven’t already.
Planning and Plotting for July
I’m scheduled to fly home to Canada this week, barring any flight and illness drama. I plan on being there for a while, finally settling into the joint home my boyfriend and I are navigating, looking for work, and figuring out what exactly it looks like for me to pursue writing professionally. I expect more baking, lots of outside time, and running in my future… should I be well enough to do so.
As always, please let me know what you’re up to, what you’re reading, what you’re listening to.
Muchas gracias and smiles,
Julie