Sumpin' Witty

Practicing Peace  And Why It’s Not Always Peaceful   Just about two weeks ago I went to Fullerton, California to visit family. After living in Costa Rica for the past eleven years, trips “home” don’t hit the same as they used to. It’s not necessarily better or worse, but the longer I live in Costa Rica, the further away I feel from that version of me who grew up in California. Of course, I’m no longer the same person who lived in California, nor am I the same person who moved to Puerto Viejo a decade and some change ago. And one of the things I noticed this time around, in addition to all of the other differences—some almost imperceptible or hard to put into words, others screaming in my face the entire trip—is how much more peaceful my life is here. And I’m not saying that people in the United States don’t live peaceful lives, I’m sure a great many do—I hope a great many do. My life there was not peaceful, and had I stayed, perhaps I would have committed to practicing peace t...

 And Here's Why You Probably Should This is not the advice that most people will tell you. This is not the advice that most people expect to hear. Most of us grew up with some kind of puritanical dogma of standing your ground, rising up to the challenges set before us, being a man and facing what comes head-on. But what if you flipped all that on its head and just... ran away? One of my best friends says in this life, you have to choose your hard. Now, I'm not saying that every time you face a problem or a difficult situation, you should change towns and change your name. But I am saying, choose your hard. Have a job you hate? Staying in that job will be hard. Quitting that job and walking into the unknown of finding a new job will be hard. Choose your hard.  Stuck in a bad relationship with a partner who hurts more than helps? A partner that makes you cry more than laugh? Staying will be hard. Leaving and starting over will be hard. Choose your hard.  Living in a place t...

Puerto Viejo recently lost one of its most memorable and most loving and lovable characters. Patrick Abrams, Captain Zero was a true legend and famous in his own right. I'll let his own words speak for themselves. This story was handed to me by Captain Zero one day while giving him a ride into town. He wanted me to help him publish it because he knew I "worked with books." I have typed the copy exactly as it was given to me so that you can read it in his own words. There is no way not to hear his voice or picture him while reading this account.  EMBRACING THE GIFT The following story recounts a series of events in the life of Patrick Abrams, the notorious Captain Zero. The story, I think, speaks volumes of Patrick’s philosophy concerning how we could and should live. I met the Captain in March of 2015 and he welcomed me into his home as he would an old friend. Patrick wrote, at some point, the first draft of this tale on 16 sheets of lined paper and gave it to me, Brain...

I woke up on my 35th birthday to my 13-year-old dog having a seizure. Not a great way to start what could very well be the mid-point in my life (depending on how much Zumba I do), but one of those moments that reminds you that shit isn't always going to be like this. Everything changes, everything comes to end, and if we're lucky enough to still be breathing, we have a chance to start again. Call it a mid-life crisis (or if I'm lucky a third-life crisis). Call it my lastest fitness obsession since I seemed to have phased out my Salsa Fever that consumed the 34th year of my life. Call it what you want, but I decided to go to Zumba. Now, going to Zumba was something I never, ever in a million years would have thought I would have done. Aside from the fact that dancing in a group setting, with a bunch of overly peepy fitness freaks, would have made me run the other way just a couple of years ago, I had a personal vendetta against Zumba. You see, when my ex of 8 years...

It’s been a year since my heart broke. And it didn’t shatter all at once, like a wine glass crashing on a tile floor, the way I imagined it would.  It crumbled, slowly, over a few months, or maybe longer, it’s hard to tell. It started with a crack that crept its way across, as little bits began to fall away. And as the crack grew and splintered across my heart, the symptoms of a broken heart began to set in.  My insides turned to liquid. My intestines, large and small, my stomach, they just turned to liquid. I couldn’t eat, on account of my insides no longer existing in a solid form. I yo-yoed between thinking I was going to vomit up my digestive system or shit it out, at any moment.  Eating went out the window and so did sleep. Of course I’d be exhausted all day, from crying, from lack of nutrition, but then night would come, but never sleep. It was like I was possessed. The dark thoughts came with the darkness and that little voice inside your h...

A day will come where you'll find yourself, seemingly, in the                                                                                                                                    middle                                                     ...