Bam.

I tell that story not to embarrass anyone but because it captures something true about this particular season of life. People see a number — or what they perceive to be a number — and they make assumptions. Kind assumptions sometimes. Well intentioned assumptions. But assumptions nonetheless about what you can and cannot do.

And sometimes the most satisfying thing in the world is to quietly prove them wrong.

Here is the truth about aging that I want you to sit with.

When I do not look in the mirror I am still 25. That is genuinely how I feel. The energy. The drive. The complete refusal to accept limitations that have not been personally proven necessary. The mirror occasionally disagrees with this assessment and the mirror can mind its own business.

Because aging is not what they told you it was going to be. It is not a slow sad decline into irrelevance. It is a collection of creams and a bone density scan and a menopause specialist and a quiet determination to keep showing up for yourself in every way that matters.

And it is getting on the horse.

Every single time.

Today I will moisturize everything that needs moisturizing, lift something heavy, and remind the mirror that it does not get a vote.

-CT

For those who have been following along Justice 3D is a specialized training and consultant organization dedicated to providing advanced training to professionals who investigate sexual assault and domestic violence cases and work with trauma survivors.

The training at Fort Polk is a week long program and I am here for three days facilitating best practices for investigating SA and DV cases and what it actually means to be trauma informed.

And here is where I want to be clear about something that gets missed more often than it should.

Trauma informed practice is not just a skill set for the person sitting across from a survivor in an interview room. It is not a training you send your front line staff to and call it done. Being truly trauma informed has to live in the entire organization, in its policies, its procedures, its leadership decisions, its physical environment, and the way it treats its own people.

Think about it this way. A detective can be the most trauma informed interviewer in the room but if the organization she works for has policies that re-traumatize survivors, such as cold waiting rooms, repeated unnecessary questioning, disbelieving processes baked into the system. The individual skills do not fix the organizational harm. The whole system has to shift. Leadership has to understand it.

Supervisors have to model it. Policies have to reflect it.

The question a trauma informed organization asks is what happened to this person and how do we make sure nothing we do makes it worse.

That is the work. That is why I get on planes.

Speaking of planes.

I am currently at Terminal D5 in Atlanta waiting for my connection and I have done what any reasonable person does when they have time to kill in an airport.

I sat down and I watched people.

People watching at airports should be an Olympic sport. I am completely serious about this. The depth of human variety on display at any given gate on any given day is extraordinary.

First, the middle aged white guy in flip flops. Shorts. Completely relaxed. And nail polish. Multiple colors. Not matching. Not trying to match. Just color on his toes and a level of comfort with himself that frankly I found inspiring. Everything about his energy said retired and living his best life and I respect it completely.

Then the phone walkers.

You know who you are. Head down. Eyes on the screen. Navigating a crowded airport terminal entirely by instinct and the goodwill of strangers who see you coming and move out of the way because the alternative is a collision neither of you planned for.

There is a pole right there sir. I watched it happen in slow motion. He survived. The pole was fine.

The stilettos.

Full heels. Airport. I simply noted their existence and moved on because some decisions belong entirely to the person making them and this was clearly one of those.

The t-shirts were a category unto themselves. Washed Up Veteran — worn with complete authority by someone who had clearly earned the right to call themselves that. Brewery logos. Sports teams. People using their shirts to say the things they are not saying out loud and somehow communicating everything about themselves in a single garment.

The Bose headphone people. Large. Noise canceling. The universal signal for I am here but I am not available and I would like you to respect that boundary without me having to say it out loud.

Dogs on leashes. Cats in carriers who had opinions about being in carriers and were sharing those opinions with the entire terminal whether the terminal wanted to hear them or not.

Some people smiling. Some people decidedly not smiling. Some people running for their gate with the focused energy of someone who made a series of decisions this morning that led to this moment and is now paying for every single one of them.

None of the runners were in stilettos.

Some things have limits.

Today I will train folks to see survivors more clearly while sitting in an airport that reminded me that people are endlessly fascinating if you just look up from your phone long enough to notice them.

-CT

I want to tell you about the Bed and Breakfast at Endwell Greens.

A French traditional style home built in 1996 overlooking the 18 hole championship Endwell Greens Golf Course — spacious rooms, beautiful grounds, a porch that turns out to be the center of everything. The hosts were wonderful and the stay was genuinely pleasant and I want to thank them for that.

What I also want to tell you is that I almost did not stay there.

When I made the reservation I was told there would be other alumni staying at the property. I noted this information, filed it away, and then spent a considerable amount of time between booking and arrival quietly regretting my decision.

I wanted to be invisible. The problem with a bed and breakfast is that invisible is not an option. It is an intimate environment in a way that a hotel simply is not. In a hotel you check in, close your door, and nobody knows you exist.

In a bed and breakfast you share a porch and a kitchen and a morning with people you have never met and there is a specific kind of vulnerability in that — being seen by strangers in an unguarded moment — that I was not sure I was ready for on top of an already loaded weekend.

I pulled up and there was a cooler on the porch. Full of beer and alcohol. A party was clearly getting ready to happen.

I wanted no part of it.

I went to my room.

Saturday morning I came out early onto the porch. The cooler was considerably lighter than it had been the night before. The gin bottle had made some progress. A bag of chips sat clipped shut suggesting someone had shown admirable restraint at some point in the evening. And the faint lingering suggestion of a good cigar hung in the morning air.

I had to smile.

And then they came out. One by one. Some considerably more chipper than others. Guys from my graduating class and their wives.

People I knew of but had never actually known. The kinds of connections that a class of 500 produces — faces in the hallway, names on a list, people who existed in the same building as you for four years without your lives ever actually intersecting.

Something wonderful happened.

We talked.

We sat on that porch and we talked and they shared their breakfast pizza and their bread and their moon cookies from Roma's Bakery.

Now. You have not had a moon cookie until you have had one from Roma's. That is not an opinion. That is a fact that anyone who grew up in this region will confirm without hesitation. Soft. Sweet. That signature frosting. The kind of cookie that tastes like exactly where you came from.

Somewhere in the middle of all of it I said out loud what I was thinking.

You know what — if we were still in high school we would never be seen hanging out together.

And everyone laughed because everyone knew it was true.

That is the thing about growing up. The invisible walls that made perfect sense at 17 look absolutely ridiculous at 62. The social architecture of high school — who sits where, who talks to who, who is in which group — all of it dismantled by decades of actual living.

We have all had jobs and marriages and children and losses and moves and entire lives that rearranged our priorities in ways our 17 year old selves could not have imagined.

And our bodies. Let us be honest about our bodies. We have all changed. Every single one of us. The years show up whether you invite them or not. But there is something about a room full of people all aging together that makes it feel less like a loss and more like evidence. Evidence that you lived. That you showed up. That you are still here.

The folks at that bed and breakfast were a huge part of why this weekend felt the way it felt. I did not know I needed them. My higher power apparently did.

To the guys and their wives — thank you. For the food and the drinks and the time and the conversation and the reminder that the best connections sometimes happen when you almost talked yourself out of showing up.

I hope we keep in touch. And maybe next reunion we have a little one of our own back on that porch before the main event.

And to the people who planned this reunion — thank you. It was beautifully done. The dancing, the laughing, the reconnecting with old friends and the making of new ones. The care that goes into putting something like that together does not go unnoticed.

Some weekends remind you that the chapter is not over.

This was one of them.

I drove home two days ago with a case full of Spiedie marinade, a head full of unexpected connections, and the very specific satisfaction of a weekend that turned out nothing like I thought it would and everything like it needed to be.

-CT

Seven hours. Each way. For a Spiedie and a room full of people I may or may not remember.

Worth it.

Thirty five years. I have not lived here in over thirty five years. And yet the moment you drive back into a place that shaped you something shifts. The brain hits rewind without asking permission and suddenly you are everywhere and every age all at once.

So much has changed. For the better I would say. And so much is exactly the same in the way that some things simply refuse to move on and you are grateful for it.

When you get older the visits back home carry more weight. You start saying goodbye to people you grew up with. Family ages. Some are gone from illness. Some from time. You drive by the houses and the streets and the places where things happened and the people who were there are not all still there and that is a strange and specific kind of grief that nobody fully prepares you for.

I always drive by my childhood home when I am here. Always. Without fail.

This time it made me a little sad.

My brain kept rewinding. The childhood we had was not perfect — but I dare anyone to claim theirs was. We were poor. We did not have much. My parents were strict and did the absolute best they could with what they had.

Looking at that house this time I felt the weight of all of it in a way I did not expect.

That is the thing about going home. It does not ask how you are doing. It just shows you.

Driving around Endicott you pass the parks. And in the parks — the carousels.

We called them merry-go-rounds as kids. Everybody did. But what they actually are is something far more remarkable than that name suggests.

Broome County is known as the Carousel Capital of the World — and it earned that title. There are six antique hand-carved wooden carousels in this region, all donated to the citizens of Broome County by George F. Johnson — president of the Endicott-Johnson Shoe Corporation — who believed that the workers and families of this community deserved something beautiful and free to enjoy.

Free. To this day — still free to ride.

The two I passed this weekend — George W. Johnson Park Carousel, installed in 1934 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and Highland Park Carousel in nearby Endwell, built in the early 1920s and equally historic.

George W. Johnson Park was the one we walked to every summer as kids. It was not a special occasion. It was just what you did. You walked to the park. You rode the merry-go-round. You swam in the Z pool, which cost a quarter to get in. Named the Z pool because it was in the shape of a Z. You went home. Simple and absolutely enough.

The Carousels are enclosed now. All of them. Glass and walls added to protect what are genuinely irreplaceable antiques and I understand that completely. They needed to be preserved. The decision makes sense.

But the kids today riding those carousels are riding them inside. Protected. Contained.

I rode those carousels as a kid. Open air. Wooden horses. The music playing. The feeling of moving through the air in a circle on a summer afternoon with nowhere particular to be.

That is a specific kind of free that belongs to a different era. I am glad we had it. I am a little sad the kids today don't get the same version of it.

And then I went to Lupo's Char Pit. Because I always go to Lupo's Char Pit.

This is non negotiable. This is the first stop. This is written into the constitution of every visit to Endicott.

In 1951 John and Sam Lupo — brothers of Italian immigrants who came through Ellis Island — opened a small neighborhood meat market right here in Endicott. The Spiedie along with the original Lupo's marinade was crafted at that meat market and the rest is Southern Tier history.

But the Spiedie itself goes back even further. Camillo Iacovelli created the spiedie in Endwell in 1938 at his Parkview Restaurant in Endicott. His brother Agostino — known as Augie — popularized them when he introduced them at his own Endicott restaurant in 1939. The original marinade was made simply from wine vinegar, water, lemon juice, garlic and mint.

Cubed marinated meat — chicken, pork, lamb — grilled on a skewer and served on Italian bread with that marinade. That is a Spiedie. That is what this region put on the culinary map. That is what I drove seven hours for and I have zero regrets.

I bought the marinade to take home. Obviously.

And the bread.

No trip to Endicott is complete without Italian bread from Roma's. There are actually two Roma bakeries that have served this community — Jim Roma's on North Nanticoke Avenue, a family owned bakery and deli that has been baking fresh daily with no preservatives for decades and is still going strong. And Felix Roma — which began baking authentic Italian bread on Endicott's North Side and kept this community fed for nearly eight decades before closing its ovens in 2023.

The bread from both of these bakeries is the kind of bread that ruins you for anything you buy in a grocery store anywhere else. No preservatives. Fresh daily. The crust that does exactly what a crust is supposed to do. The kind of bread that makes a Spiedie on Italian bread from Lupo's taste like the specific thing it is supposed to taste like and nothing else will ever be a substitute.

Some things about going home are harder to leave behind than others.

The bread is one of them.

Then the pizza. Because the pizza here is genuinely as good as the pies I had in Italy. This region does not get nearly enough credit for its pizza and I will defend that position.

And while we are talking about things that started here that the rest of the world does not realize started here — Dick's Sporting Goods.

Yes. That Dick's Sporting Goods. The one with over 850 stores across the country and nearly $13 billion in annual revenue.

It started in Binghamton in 1948 when an 18 year old named Dick Stack borrowed $300 from his grandmother's cookie jar and opened a bait and tackle shop. Three hundred dollars. From a cookie jar. And built one of the largest sporting goods retailers in the United States.

The original location on Court Street in Binghamton just closed after 77 years. These places that built themselves from nothing here and then grew into something the whole country knows about deserve better than a quiet goodbye.

Last night was the meet and greet. Tonight is the actual reunion.

Here is the honest truth about reunions with a graduating class of over 500 people.

First — not all 500 showed up. Thank goodness for small mercies.

Second — of the ones who did show up, some of them I never actually met in high school. We graduated together in the loosest possible sense of that phrase. We were in the same building for four years. We shared a diploma date. Beyond that — complete strangers.

I remembered the ones I spent the most time with. The OGs. Those faces clicked immediately. We have kept in touch over the years. The muscle memory of friendship is a real thing.

And then there was everyone else.

I spent a significant portion of the evening looking at people with a smile that I hope read as warm and not as the deeply confused expression it actually was.

I had no idea who some of these people were. None. Not a flicker. Not a single neuron fired in recognition.

I said it out loud more than once.

I'm sorry — I don't remember you.

Which somehow always lands with the energy of a confession even when it is simply the truth.

In my defense — our class had over 500 graduates. The human brain was not designed to store 500 people for 45 years and retrieve them on demand at a meet and greet in Endicott on a Friday night. That is not memory failure.

That is physics.

Reunions are a strange thing. You walk into a room full of people who technically share a chapter of your life — though for some of them it was more of a footnote — and realize that a chapter is not the whole story. Everyone in that room has lived 45 years since the last bell rang. Jobs. Marriages. Children. Losses. Moves. Entire lives constructed in the years since we last shared a hallway.

We have all aged. Every single one of us. Seeing it all in one room at one time is a different kind of knowing than knowing it in theory.

I felt old last night.

But I also felt something else — the specific relief of walking into a room and realizing that nobody has it all figured out. Nobody looks exactly like they did. Nobody remembers everything.

We are just a room full of people who started in the same place and went in five hundred different directions and somehow ended up back here on a Saturday night with name tags.

Today I will eat another Spiedie and let Endicott be exactly what it is — the place that made me and the place that still knows how to feed me.

-CT

-CT

Starting with the roads.

Most side roads in Costa Rica are not paved.

They are rocks and dirt and they will remind you of that fact with every single pedal stroke.

Bumpy does not begin to cover it. Navigating those roads on a bike or a vehicle requires commitment, a solid core, and a complete willingness to release any expectations you had about what a smooth ride feels like.

The Ticos and Ticas.

The locals here are called Ticos — men — and Ticas — women. The nickname comes from the Costa Rican habit of adding the diminutive suffix tico to the end of words as a way of expressing affection.

Instead of chiquito — small — a Costa Rican says chiquitico. The term attached itself to the people during the 1856 war against invaders when allied soldiers noticed this unique linguistic habit and it stuck. It is worn with pride.

And proud they should be. The Ticos and Ticas are among the warmest most hardworking most hospitable people I have encountered anywhere.

Well educated. Community minded. Family first. Quick with a smile and deeply aware of the extraordinary place they live in. You feel it in every single interaction.

Now. The hostels and cabanas are for the tourists. The Ticos and Ticas live differently.

A traditional Tico home is modest and functional and built for the climate. Cinder block walls. A zinc or tin roof that announces every rainstorm like a percussion section.

Large open air corridors called corredores running along the outside where the family actually lives — hammocks hanging, rocking chairs lined up, the breeze doing the work that air conditioning would do anywhere else.

The heart of a Tico home is not inside. It is outside. On that corredor. Where the family gathers and life actually happens.

Windows have bars instead of screens — security and airflow at the same time. Hot water comes from a small electrical element attached directly to the shower head.

The homes are brightly painted and worn with pride. Simple. Functional. Built for a people who spend most of their lives outdoors anyway because why wouldn't you when you live here. Family is everything. Community is everything. And the home reflects exactly that.

And then there are the beaches.

In the United States where there is a beautiful beach there is inevitably a row of condos and high rises blocking the view and claiming the shoreline for whoever can afford it. Hotels. Towers. Private access. The beach as a commodity.

Not here.

Costa Rica made this decision in 1977 with the Maritime Zone Law — and it is not a suggestion. It is the law. The first 50 meters from the high tide line belong to the state.

To everyone.

They cannot be privately owned. They cannot be sold. They cannot be fenced off. No individual. No corporation. No hotel. Nobody gets to claim the Costa Rican coastline as their own.

Where you would find tall buildings in the States you find rainforest. The trees come right down to the sand. The beaches are for the people, for the wildlife, for the sea turtles that nest on them, for the scarlet macaws that fly over them, for the howler monkeys in the trees behind them.

The Costa Ricans call it national heritage. They mean it. And they wrote it into law nearly fifty years ago.

Que Tuanis — our favorite breakfast spot — loosely translates to "how cool" or "that's awesome".

Pura Vida.

You hear it everywhere here. And you see it everywhere too. On signs. On t-shirts. On the walls of restaurants and the windows of shops. On bumper stickers navigating dirt roads. Painted on buildings. Printed on menus. Stitched onto hats. It is impossible to spend five minutes in Costa Rica without encountering it in some form.

It literally means pure life but it is so much more than that. It is a greeting. A farewell. An answer to how are you. A philosophy. A way of moving through the world that says — slow down. Be here. Enjoy what is right in front of you.

Costa Rica does not just say Pura Vida. It does not just display it on every available surface. It lives it. In the island time. In the no rush energy. In the way the locals smile at you on a dirt road like there is nowhere else they would rather be.

The helmeted iguana we spotted — camouflaged so perfectly into its surroundings that my phone camera genuinely struggled to find it. It was standing right there and my camera kept asking — where?

Nature's most unbothered hide and seek champion.

The dogs. So many dogs roaming free some with collars, some without — well fed and clearly loved by the community around them.

On one of our bike rides we spotted the most delightful little doxie running in and out of his property with the pure uncontained joy of a dog who has figured out exactly how good his life is.

And then there was the beach dog.

Yesterday we walked two miles along the beach and somewhere along the way we acquired a companion. A dog — no collar, no owner in sight — who joined us with the energy of a cartoon character. Running. Sprinting. Doubling back. Kicking up sand.

Completely and utterly delighted by the whole situation in a way that made it impossible not to laugh.

He ran with us like we were his people. Like he had been waiting for us specifically and we had finally arrived and now the beach walk could properly begin.

We had no idea where he came from. We had no idea who owned him. We just walked two miles with a dog who had decided we were his for the morning and we accepted this completely.

And then — we gave him some of our water and as suddenly as he appeared — he spotted a Tica jogging down the beach, pivoted without a moment's hesitation, and joined her instead.

Just like that we were replaced

Imperial beer — the beer of Costa Rica. Cold. Simple. Perfect pool side or after a horse negotiation, or the herding of cattle.

The small pipes throughout Costa Rica mean the plumbing cannot handle toilet paper. The signs in the bathrooms are very clear about this — and because of the language difference they read do not throw paper toilet in toilet rather than toilet paper.

A small trash can sits next to the toilet for that purpose. You learn quickly.

And then occasionally you forget.

We will not be discussing this further. Keep moving. Nothing to see here.

And on our last day — two Toucans in the tree by the pool.

Just sitting there. Looking at us. As if Costa Rica wanted to make absolutely sure we left with one more thing to carry home.

We came here as a gift from a dear friend who believed we needed to discover this place, her yum. She was right. This is a yum we could never yuk. I leave slower. More present. More willing to ride into the rain and see what happens.

Today we are headed on our four to five hour road trip to San José where we will stay in a hotel before our very early flight back to the States on Tuesday.

The bumpy dirt roads of Uvita trading places with the highway. The casitas and the rainforest and the Howler Monkeys trading places with an airport hotel.

Half and half — I am coming for you.

But Costa Rica — I will be back for you too.

It has been extraordinary.

Pura Vida. 🇨🇷

-CT

I have herded animals on this trip. Word travels fast apparently.

I looked at them. They looked at me. And the thought crossed my mind — completely unbidden and entirely serious in the moment — that they were waiting for me to report for duty.

I then hung out by the pool. Watched the clouds build over the mountains with the specific energy of someone who has been in Costa Rica long enough to recognize a rain threat when she sees one.

It did not come until mid afternoon.

Which is exactly when M and I decided to go on a bike ride.

Here is what Costa Rica has taught me about rain. You cannot let the threat of it keep you from doing anything. You watch the clouds. You note the threat. And then you go anyway and embrace whatever comes.

Which is exactly what we did.

The rain arrived with the enthusiasm and commitment Costa Rica rain is known for and we rode straight into it. Dirty water spraying up our backs, pedaling through a tropical downpour on bikes with no gears and no fenders — and we had the absolute best time.

Somewhere in the middle of it I was taken right back to being a kid. Riding through rain without a care in the world, laughing at the absurdity of it, completely unbothered by being soaked. The only difference between then and now is that this time there was something considerably better than a glass of water waiting at the end of the ride.

We eventually took shelter at an outdoor restaurant bar called Kinsu. Stayed dry. Laughed about the state of our backs. And I ordered an espresso martini.

Now. I have been without half and half on this trip. Which I have handled — barely — by purchasing milk and cream and mixing my own version every morning. It is not perfect. It is close. A girl has to do what a girl has to do and I have been doing it without complaint.

Mostly.

But the espresso martini at Kinsu? Extraordinary Costa Rican coffee. Vodka. A little something sweet. Served cold in a glass and requiring absolutely no improvised half and half situation whatsoever.

Problem solved. I should have thought of this sooner.

We then did what any reasonable people do after being caught in a tropical downpour and discovering the perfect coffee solution simultaneously.

We went back to the casita and sat by the pool.

That evening the adults headed back to the restaurant on the hill — La Uvita Perdida — for ceviche, a Negroni, and a sunset view over the Whale's Tail.

The Negroni. The sunset. The Whale's Tail in the distance.

Some evenings just get it right.

The night that followed was something else entirely.

What started as rain became a full on lightning and thunder storm — the kind that shakes the mountains and means business. And then the power went out. Complete silence. The kind of silence that is so sudden and so total that it pulls you straight out of a sound sleep and sits you upright in the dark trying to figure out what just happened.

It is a strange thing — the sound of silence during a storm. The absence of the fan, the hum of the electricity, every ambient sound that you did not know you were hearing until it was gone.

Deafening in its own way.

And then just as suddenly — the power came back. The storm carried on. And Costa Rica reminded us once again that it operates on its own terms entirely.

This morning the Howler Monkeys were unbothered by any of it. The Red-lored Amazons — brilliant green parrots with their distinctive red foreheads — were singing their morning praises while I sat on the casita porch with my coffee and a nice breeze.

The silence of last night was apparently just the storm's intermission. This morning the forest picked right back up where it left off.

Today is our last full day in paradise.

I am not ready. But I am grateful. For every single bit of it.

Today I will drink my coffee slowly, listen to the Amazons, and pretend just a little longer that leaving is not tomorrow.

-CT

And a Negroni.

For those who have been following along since Italy — you know about my relationship with the Negroni. It was born in Florence and it has followed me to Costa Rica and I consider this a sign of excellent taste on everyone’s part.

Both Jaffa and another restaurant on this trip had them on the menu. I ordered without hesitation both times. Italy gave me the Negroni. Costa Rica kept the tradition alive.

Two completely different worlds and somehow the same perfect drink in both of them.

Then — Whale Tail Brewery for a drink to end the evening.

And what a place to end it. Whale Tail Brewery is a micro brewpub right in the heart of Uvita with a story worth telling. The brewmaster — Gian — is Italian. He visited Uvita, fell in love with the place, went home to Italy, shipped his brewing equipment over 6,000 miles across the ocean, and built a brewery in a small jungle town in Costa Rica.

The beers blend European tradition with Costa Rican ingredients and the result is award winning craft brews that you would not expect to find in a jungle town and absolutely should seek out when you do.

The perfect end to a perfect day.

Costa Rica continues to deliver.

Today I will appreciate every single thing this country keeps putting in front of me.

-CT

I stopped gripping the reins hard and started moving with the horse. Itano and I came to an understanding that had nothing to do with words.

We found a rhythm and we kept it. The trail got quiet around us and for a stretch it felt like just the two of us out there — the ocean, the landscape, the whole of Costa Rica doing what it does.

After the ride we had a wonderful lunch, swam in the pool, and did absolutely nothing for the rest of the afternoon in the way that only feels fully justified after two hours on a horse.

We finished the evening at Indómitos Café and Bar — a vegetarian and vegan restaurant along the main road in Uvita. Now before you say anything — I am not a vegetarian. I went in with no particular expectations.

The food was really good. Fresh, homemade, creative. Outdoor seating surrounded by plants with music in the background and staff who were genuinely warm and welcoming.

Worth a stop if you find yourself in Uvita.

Today I will think about what else I might be gripping too hard.

-CT

Eleven. Each one with its own sound, its own timing, its own place in the arrangement. Some high and piercing. Some low and resonant. Some that sounded like a flute and some that sounded like they had a very specific grievance and needed you to know about it.

And then the Yellow-throated Toucan sang us a solo on our hike for twenty minutes straight.

Twenty minutes. We stood there and just listened. We didn't check our phone. We didn't moved.

Here is what else we noticed on that same trail we had walked before.

Three new species of butterfly we had not seen on previous hikes. The Cloudless Sulphur — vibrant lemon yellow. The Papilio thoas — the King Swallowtail — one of the largest butterflies in the Americas with a wingspan that stops you mid sentence. And the Heliconius doris — bold red markings, moving slowly through the forest as if it has nowhere to be.

Six plant species we had walked right past without seeing the day before. The goldfish plant. The coral vine. The lilac flame violet. The potato vine. The White-topped Sedge. The soursop.

Same trail. Different eyes.

That is the thing about slowing down. The trail does not change. You do.

And somewhere in those twenty minutes of toucan music I had a thought.

If I lived here would I notice this? Would I hear the orchestra every morning or would it eventually just become the thing that happens while I am busy doing something else?

The question is not where you are. It is whether you are paying attention.

Today I will pay attention.

-CT

When the sun sets at 6pm sleep comes early. And when sleep comes early the morning comes naturally. No alarm needed. No argument with the clock.

The sun rose at 5. We were ready for it. Coffee in hand — Café Don Emilio still the standard everything else is being measured against — we sat and watched daylight introduce itself to the mountains of Pérez Zeledón.

And from the second floor of Cindy's house before daylight had even fully arrived — lightning over the ocean. Silent flashes in the distance illuminating the Pacific in the dark. Mountains behind us. A light show over the ocean in front of us.

Costa Rica offering more than you thought was possible from a single vantage point before the day had even officially started.

Then — the hike.

Our own little adventure this time. Just M and me on Cindy's property.

M carried the machete.

I want to sit with that for a moment. The woman who brought a sunbrella into the rainforest yesterday — the sunbrella that served no practical purpose and got caught on every branch it encountered — today carried the machete. With confidence. Without hesitation.

We walked in silence. And the rainforest had a great deal to say.

We heard the water first. Little springs moving through the property, trickling over rocks, threading through the roots of trees. The kind of sound that slows your heartbeat whether you want it to or not.

Then there were the ant mounds.

All over the forest floor — large mounds of earth that turned out to be the homes of leafcutter ants. And when I say large I mean large. These colonies can grow up to twenty feet wide and extend 23 feet underground — complete with ventilation systems, fungus gardens, nurseries and millions of residents.

The ants themselves were not visible but their architecture absolutely was. Leafcutter ants don't cut leaves to eat them — they use the leaves as fertilizer to cultivate a specific fungus that feeds the entire colony.

They have been doing this for over 25 million years. The rainforest floor was essentially a city and we had no idea we were walking through it.

Also covering the forest floor — a plant that stopped us mid step. Small, vivid green, and almost impossibly bright against the dark rocks and fallen leaves.

It turns out to be Selaginella — commonly called spike moss or rainbow moss — not a true moss but a primitive vascular plant that has been on this earth for over 300 million years. It thrives exactly here — low light, high humidity, rocky damp ground.

In Costa Rica it carpets the rainforest floor in that electric green you have to see in person to believe. Some species shimmer blue when the light hits them just right.

The rainforest floor was essentially a city dressed in the most extraordinary green carpet and we had no idea we were walking through it.

And then we saw — the Fiery-billed Aracari.

A smaller relative of the toucan found only on the Pacific slopes of southern Costa Rica and western Panama. Not a subtle bird. Black head and chest, deep olive green upper body, bright yellow underparts with a bold red band across the belly, a red rump, and a bill that is exactly what its name promises — fiery orange on top, black below. About 17 inches long. It moves through the forest in small noisy flocks.

We stood very still and watched it until it moved on.

Then the Blue Morpho butterflies found us.

Two of them. At different moments on the trail. Each one appearing out of the green like something that should not exist in real life and then proving that it does.

The Blue Morpho is Costa Rica's most iconic butterfly — declared a national symbol in 2022. With wings spanning up to eight inches it is among the largest butterflies in the world. That extraordinary cobalt blue is not actually pigment — it comes from microscopic scales on the wings that refract light like prisms.

In flight it flashes brilliant blue and then closes its wings to reveal a dull brown underside — appearing and disappearing with every beat.

We had seen them in the butterfly garden earlier in the trip and thought we understood what they were.

We did not understand what they were until we saw them here. In their habitat. More beautiful in the wild than anything a garden can contain.

Then — movement in the trees.

We stopped. Looked at each other and thought — we are not alone right now.

We peered through the canopy and there they were.

Two Howler Monkeys navigating their way through the forest beside us. Not performing. Not posing. Just moving through their world. Watching them in their actual habitat doing their actual thing was something I feel foetunate we got to see.

Costa Rica keeps giving.

We made our way to the orchard at the start of Cindy's property and picked fruit straight from the trees.

Carambola — the star fruit. Native to Southeast Asia and now found throughout the tropics, this fruit has five distinct ribs along its length so that when you slice it crosswise it forms a perfect star. Golden yellow, waxy, and crisp with a flavor that combines notes of apple, pineapple, and lemon all at once.

We also picked kaffir lime, limes, lemons, and jocotes — small tropical fruits native to Central America with a flavor that shifts from tart to sweet depending on their ripeness.

Standing in an orchard in the mountains of Costa Rica picking fruit from trees while Howler Monkeys moved through the canopy above us and Blue Morpho butterflies flashed through the forest — that is a morning I will not forget for a very long time.

Some of the photos in this post are courtesy of the internet because the rainforest inhabitants move quickly and do not wait for your camera to focus. I trust you understand.

Today I will be grateful for the 4:40 wake up that turned into all of that.

-CT

There was a tractor in the way.
Not parked. Actively digging a ditch for new water lines directly in front of the entrance to the property.

Cindy in her best version of Spanish let the operator know we needed to get in.

He told us to give him an hour.

Cindy — who knows this mountain and everything on it — suggested we head just up the dirt road while we waited to the local coffee shop.

To Café Don Emilio. Not your typical coffee shop.

Now. I want to be clear that this was presented as a practical solution to a one hour delay. What it turned out to be was one of the most unexpectedly wonderful detours of the trip.

Our goddess may or may not have arranged the tractor situation. But she absolutely arranged what came next.

Let me tell you about Café Don Emilio.

Don Emilio and Doña Rita have been farming and harvesting coffee in the mountains of Pérez Zeledón since the mid-nineties. For years it was simply what the family did — growing, picking, roasting — a tradition passed down and perfected over decades.

The coffee became so good and so beloved that in 2015 they formalized what they had already been doing for a generation and Café Don Emilio was born.

What started with a campfire, a pot, and a simple goal — roast coffee every morning — grew into something extraordinary.

They hand pick every single bean during harvest season. They dry it, roast it, and process it themselves. No big commercial operation. No shortcuts. Just a family and their mountain and their coffee.

And the equipment.

The coffee roaster and bean grinder were assembled using bicycle parts. Actual bicycle parts. Repurposed, reimagined, and put to work in a way that would make any engineer stop mid-sentence and just stare.

The coffee it produced was like nothing I have ever tasted. And I say that as someone who has been drinking coffee for a very long time and has opinions about it.

There is a reason this is rated the number one experience in Pérez Zeledón. When the coffee is grown on the hillside behind the building, hand picked by the family, and roasted in a machine made from bicycle parts by people who love what they do — it tastes like all of that.

Every cup.

One hour later we returned to the property and the gentleman with the tractor was making way for our entry as promised.

Then — the rainforest hike.

All four of us. Me, M, Cindy, and Layna.
We assembled our hiking party and took inventory of what everyone was carrying.

Layna had the machete in its carrier.

Cindy had a long snake grabber — technically called snake tongs — a professional reptile handling tool designed to safely catch and relocate a snake from a distance that does not involve being anywhere near it. A completely reasonable thing to carry into a Costa Rican rainforest.

I was carrying what I can only describe as a forked pronged tool that I believe is used for pinning snakes to the ground before relocating them. I am not entirely certain of its official name or its intended purpose.

What I can tell you is that I carried it with great confidence through the entire hike as though I knew exactly what I was doing with it.

And M.

M could not go into the rainforest without her sunbrella.

For those unfamiliar — a sunbrella is a UV protective umbrella. Elegant. Practical. Designed for exactly one environment — a sunny day on a city street where branches are not a factor.

In the rainforest the sunbrella had no point.

I say that with love and complete accuracy.
It provided no sun protection because the canopy was providing that for free. It provided no rain protection because when Costa Rican rain decides to arrive it arrives with a commitment that no umbrella is going to negotiate with.

And it got caught on every branch it encountered — enthusiastically, without apology — as though the rainforest had taken the sunbrella's presence as a personal challenge.

Each time it caught I would look up to find M in a quiet negotiation with whatever branch had decided to assert itself.

And here is the question that I could not stop thinking about on the entire hike.

If M had encountered a snake — if a venomous Costa Rican snake had appeared on that trail — what exactly was the plan with the sunbrella?

Was she going to open it at the snake?

Was she going to use it as a shield?

Was it going to get caught on a branch at the precise moment she needed it most leaving her in a standoff with both the snake and the forest simultaneously?

We did not encounter a snake. These questions remain unanswered.

The moment we set foot on the trail — the monkeys announced themselves.

Howler Monkeys — the most common primate in Costa Rica and one of the loudest land animals on earth. Male howler monkeys have an enlarged hyoid bone which allows them to amplify their calls for miles.

The sound carries through the canopy like nothing else — deep, resonant, slightly prehistoric — the kind of sound that reminds you immediately that you are deep in a rainforest and there are things living in these trees that have been here considerably longer than you have.

We never saw them. But we heard them clearly enough that seeing them almost felt unnecessary.

The Heliconia stopped us first. Also known as lobster claws or false bird of paradise — these are among the most dramatic flowering plants in the Costa Rican rainforest, with brilliant red, orange and yellow bracts that look almost too vivid to be real.

In Costa Rica there are more than 35 native species of heliconias and they are actually herbs, closely related to bananas.

Hummingbirds have evolved beaks specifically shaped to reach inside certain species of heliconia flowers. When you see one of these blooms on a trail, a hummingbird is usually not far behind.

Then came the Rubiaceae shrub with its red-stalked berry clusters — a member of the coffee family, which felt entirely appropriate given where we had just been. Deep red stems holding clusters of berries that look like something a Costa Rican forest designed specifically to be admired.

And the Velvety Gesneriad — a plant in the African violet family that grows in tropical rainforests, with soft fuzzy leaves that feel exactly as the name suggests and flowers that range from deep purple to vivid red. The kind of plant that looks like it belongs in a botanical garden and instead just grows here, quietly, on the floor of the rainforest where the light filters through the canopy.

Cindy and Layna headed back down the mountain after the hike leaving M and I to settle into the quiet of Pérez Zeledón.

And then — the rain came.

Because of course it did. This is rainy season in Costa Rica and the mountains have their own relationship with the weather that does not involve consulting your plans. It started the way Costa Rican rain starts — with intention — and the rainforest responded the way it always does.

Gratefully.

The plants lean into it. The trees drink it up. The birds get louder. The animals move. Everything that lives here knows that this rain is the reason everything is this impossibly, outrageously green and alive and they are not complaining about it.

As the rain falls and the forest settles into its quiet the coffee from Café Don Emilio still lingers somewhere in the back of our memory as the best thing we had not planned for.

Today I will drink my mountain coffee, breathe the mountain air, keep my boots on, and accept that Costa Rica keeps showing me things I did not know I needed to experience.

-CT

Coffee this morning came with an unexpected gift — two Kiskadee birds perched right beside us with the kind of confident energy that suggests they knew exactly what they were doing and where they were doing it.

The Great Kiskadee is one of the most boldly colored birds in Costa Rica — bright yellow chest, black and white striped head, rust-brown wings — and it is not subtle about its presence.

It is described by as noisy, aggressive, alert, and highly maneuverable.

But the best part is how it got its name.

It is named after its own call. It literally says kis-ka-dee. Out loud. Repeatedly. As if it decided that if you were going to be this distinctive you might as well announce yourself clearly so there is no confusion.

Now. Yesterday.

Yesterday was a quieter day in Uvita (except for the storms) and sometimes that is exactly what a day should be.

We got back on the pedal brake bikes — with slightly more confidence than the first time, though the braking situation remains a negotiation — and explored a little further.

We came upon a place called Flutterby House.

If you have ever wondered what a sustainable eco-friendly hippie surfer paradise looks like in the middle of Costa Rica — this is the answer.

Flutterby House is a beloved hostel that has been the social hub of Uvita for over a decade, nestled right at the edge of Marino Ballena National Park just a five minute walk from the beach.

People stay here in treehouses. Actual treehouses. With communal bathrooms and outdoor sinks and hammocks in the shade and a yoga deck and the kind of energy that makes you understand completely why some people arrive in Uvita and never fully leave.

The Flutterby House open air restaurant was calling and I answered.

I ordered the traditional Costa Rican breakfast staple — eggs, beans, and rice and plantain.

In Costa Rica this is called Gallo Pinto — which translates to spotted rooster — and it is the national dish. The name comes from the speckled appearance of the black beans mixed with the white rice, which apparently reminded someone of a rooster's feathers at some point in history and the name stuck.

Its roots go back to colonial times when the Spanish introduced black beans to Costa Rica and locals began mixing them with rice into something that has been on the breakfast table ever since.

Served with eggs, fried plantains, and natilla — a local sour cream — and finished with Lizano sauce, a tangy Costa Rican condiment that locals put on everything.

It was exactly what a morning in Uvita required.

We biked a little more. The day moved at the pace that Costa Rica prefers — unhurried, pleasant, entirely itself.

At some point along the road we came across a local man on his bike — completely unbothered — leading three horses tied together down the street.

Just moving through his Sunday the way people move through their days here. Where he was going with three horses was not entirely clear.

A little further on the ride qe found a group of locals playing football on a field. We stopped.

Music playing. Spectators calling out things to the players in rapid Spanish that I could not begin to translate but the tone told me everything — equal parts encouragement and commentary delivered with great feeling.

The players completely absorbed in the game. The whole scene had an energy that was entirely its own and entirely theirs and we were lucky to be watching from the edge of it.

Later we grabbed Indian food — delicious, the kind of food that reminds you that good cooking exists in every corner of the world — and took it up into the mountains to visit one of Cindy’s friends and neighbor.

The home was beautiful and majestic in a way that the word beautiful does not fully cover. A river flowing through the backyard, and a waterfall seen from the back porch.

The forest surrounding everything in that deep specific green that only Costa Rica seems to produce. The kind of place that makes you sit down, stop talking for a moment, and just take it in.

Today we head to Cindy’s house in the mountains for a couple of days — a different version of Costa Rica entirely. Different landscape, different pace, different things to discover.

This country keeps revealing itself in layers and I am not even close to done being surprised by.

Today I will drink my coffee with the Kiskadees, pack for the mountains, and accept that Costa Rica has completely ruined me for ordinary days.

-CT

Yesterday was one of those days that Costa Rica seems to specialize in — the kind where everything just works.

The weather cooperated in a way that felt almost personal. Clear skies. A breeze that had no business being as perfect as it was for rainy season. Temperature so close to ideal that you stopped noticing it and just lived in it.

We started at the Catarata Uvita — the Uvita Waterfall — a hidden gem tucked into the lush jungle just a short drive from town. Over thousands of years the water flow has smoothed out the rocks to form a natural slide that drops into a perfectly cold swimming hole.

Surrounded by dense greenery and rocky terrain, with crystal clear water and serene surroundings, it is the kind of place that makes you forget what day it is entirely.

I am not a water person. I will dangle my feet. I will walk in for a moment and acknowledge that yes, the water is lovely, and yes I can see why people enjoy this. And then I will find a comfortable spot on the bank and become the keeper of everyone's belongings while the actual water people do their thing.

M, Cindy, and Layna — fully in. Swimming holes, falls, the whole experience.

From my vantage point on the bank it was still extraordinary. Some experiences are worth watching even when you are not participating and this was absolutely one of them.

Then — the butterfly garden.

Which did not disappoint. Not even a little. There is something about being surrounded by butterflies in a Costa Rican jungle that makes the rest of the world feel very far away and very irrelevant. We lingered. We didnt rush. We had nowhere better to be.

From there we headed to Dominical for lunch.

Dominical is exactly what a surf town should be — laid back, unhurried, full of the kind of energy that makes you want to take your shoes off and stay for a week. The local riverfront spot in Dominical for breakfast or lunch is Café Mono Congo — a vibrant open air café with a beautiful jungle environment overlooking the Barú River into the Pacific Ocean.

Your choice of inside seating, river view, or on-the-river seats — so lovely you cannot visit Dominical without having at least one meal here.
Cindy recommended it. Cindy was right.

The view from the deck over the Barú River toward the Pacific is the kind of view that makes lunch feel like an occasion rather than a meal. Fresh food. Good drinks. The river moving below us and the jungle on the opposite bank.

We returned to the casitas for the afternoon. After an exilerating swim. Some napped. M, Layna and Cindy chose that option with zero hesitation and zero apology.

I chose to sit outside and read.

In Costa Rica. In that weather. With those birds.
I have made worse decisions.

As the afternoon moved toward evening we headed to La Uvita Perdida — a hidden gem perched in the exclusive Mirador Don Roger, overlooking the breathtaking Marino Ballena National Park in Uvita, with panoramic ocean views and a culinary journey rooted in local flavors and fresh ingredients.

During the afternoon sunsets the hosts offer cocktails (mocktails for the under 18), and delicious food — a magical place on the hills of Uvita where the service is personal and the views are unforgettable.

The name La Uvita Perdida means the lost Uvita.

And sitting up on that hill watching the sun descend over Marino Ballena National Park and the Pacific beyond it I understood completely why someone named it that. It feels like a place that exists slightly outside of time. Hidden. Unhurried. Entirely itself.

The sunset delivered everything it promised.

Some days in travel are about the doing — the moving, the seeing, the checking of boxes. And then there are days like yesterday. Days that are simply about being somewhere beautiful with people you love and letting the world be exactly what it is.

Costa Rica does those days very well.

Today I will carry yesterday with me and be grateful that Cindy brought us here.

-CT

Cindy's place is made up of three little casitas — casita meaning little house in Spanish. Casita Sandia, Casita Baya, and Casita Papaya — each one named after a fruit and decorated to match, the colors of the doors and interiors reflecting their names in the most charming way.

They were designed and built by Cindy's three kids with the goal of turning them into an Airbnb for groups. Three young people who looked at this piece of Costa Rica and built something beautiful on it.

Part of the surroundings is a gorgeous pool and landscaping that makes you want to forget what day it is.

It is working. What day is it?

Yesterday we got a little tour of Uvita so we could orient ourselves — coffee shops, restaurants, the lay of the land. The kind of tour that tells you where to go and how to get there which in our case is by bike. We are bike people this week.

Strategic bike people.

Strategic because of the rain.

We are here in rainy season and Costa Rica is not subtle about what that means. The storms have been consistent and committed since we arrived. They show up. They do their thing. They leave. And then the world is green and dripping and impossibly beautiful in the way that only a place that gets this much rain can be.

You learn quickly to plan around it. To watch the sky. To pivot when necessary and to accept that sometimes the beach will have to wait until the storm has finished having its moment.

Speaking of mornings.

The sun came up at 5:15 this morning.

The birds were already talking.

I do not mean a gentle tweet or two to ease you into the day. I mean a full enthusiastic conversation happening outside involving what sounded like every single one of the 350 species within a fifteen minute drive.

They were chatty.

They were committed.

Now. About the coffee.

I am a half and half person. Have been my entire life. Coffee without half and half has never been something I considered a viable option.

They do not have half and half here, or anything even close to it.

So I have been retraining my taste buds. Quietly. Without complaint. In the spirit of the open minded traveler I am choosing to be.

And here is what I discovered — Costa Rican coffee is extraordinary. Flavorful in a way that makes the half and half feel unnecessary rather than missing. Not as hard an adjustment as I anticipated. It turns out that when the coffee is this good you stop negotiating with it and simply enjoy it.

I am embracing the culture and the environment I am in.

Costa Rica — 1. Half and half — 0.

Today we had planned to go to the beach. The storms have other plans for this morning and so we are doing what Costa Rica has been quietly teaching us since we arrived.

We are pivoting.

And here is what I have learned very quickly about Costa Ricans that I think the rest of the world could stand to absorb.

There is no on time is late here.

There is no rush. There is no urgency. There is no carefully scheduled itinerary that cannot be adjusted for rain or beauty or a conversation that is going longer than expected because it turns out it needed to.

There is only the world around you and the invitation to enjoy it at whatever pace the world suggests.

Coming from someone who considers on time to be late and has never once in her life not had a plan — I find this both deeply challenging and profoundly appealing.

Costa Rica may be changing me.

Today I will let the storm do what it needs to do, watch the birds from somewhere dry, drink my coffee without half and half, and practice the very specific art of not being in a hurry.

-CT

-CT

We nodded a lot.

We laughed when they laughed and hoped we were laughing at the right things.

We understood enough. We connected completely. And honestly the moments we missed probably made for better stories on their end anyway.

JetBlue gave everyone $12 vouchers for the delay. The Dublin family received five of them and could not get them to process on their card.

So they insisted we use them. Refused to take money in return. Would not hear of it. Five vouchers handed over with the generosity of people who had just met us two hours ago and were apparently completely fine with that.

So, we got them Richmond ball caps. One each. So when they are home in Dublin, Ireland wearing their Richmond hats they will think about the two people they met during a four hour delay and hopefully laughing about it.

We took a group photo. We exchanged information. We did everything you do when a delay turns into something unexpectedly wonderful and you have the good sense to recognize it for what it is.

And then our flight was called.

Or so we thought.

M walked up to the gate and had her ticket scanned with the calm confidence of a seasoned traveler who had earned this boarding moment after four hours of waiting.

The agent looked up.

This plane is not going to Orlando.

M, but its says Orlando on the board.

This plane is going to San Juan, Puerto Rico.

The embarrassment was immediate. Complete. And fully felt.

And then — just as the embarrassment was settling in for a longer stay than we would have liked — the people already boarding for Puerto Rico turned around, laughed with us, and said get on board, the more the merrier.

Just like that the embarrassment evaporated.

Complete strangers heading to a completely different island, laughing and waving us aboard like we were old friends who had simply booked the wrong vacation.

There is no better antidote to embarrassment than a room full of people who find the whole thing as funny as you do.

Moments later an announcement came over the speakers informing all passengers to check their boarding pass, as this was not the Orlando flight.

Our plane eventually arrived at the gate, and we boarded, settled in with the quiet relief, we are finally heading to our destination.

And then the sky opened up.

A severe storm rolled in directly overhead as we were boarding. Lightning. Thunder. The kind of weather that makes you look out the window and then look at the person next to you without saying anything because you are both thinking the same thing.

Please. Not another delay.

We did not say it out loud. We simply boarded with a little extra urgency and collectively held our breath until the wheels up.

We exhaled.

We arrived in Orlando. And checked into the Hyatt which sits directly inside the airport terminal and is genuinely lovely and absolutely earned after the day we had.

Yesterday could have been awful. A four hour delay, a nearly wrong flight, a severe storm, and a canceled dinner with family — we will catch them on the way home.

And yet.

The Dublin family with their five vouchers and their refusal to take our money. The Puerto Rico passengers laughing and waving us aboard. The gate agent who kept her cool. The storm that held off just long enough.

People. Just people being genuinely, unexpectedly, wonderfully good to each other in an airport on a delayed Tuesday.

The adventure to Costa Rica has officially begun.

Today I will remember that a delayed flight and a nearly wrong destination are only a bad day if you let them be.

-CT