A Slice of Life

In the Beginning

It’s a hot January day. I lie in the sand with my eyes shut, pretending to be asleep. Marixa thinks I’m crazy for lying flat out in the sun like an iguana. If that is crazy then she’s right—I’m stark raving mad and happy about it. Behind my closed eyes, I’m thinking hard. I’m going to have to start earning money soon and I don’t know how. I have almost none left and even though I am living on nearly nothing, I can’t live on absolutely nothing. I’ve been living in Costa Rica for seven months and I don’t want to go back to the States. I’m trying to sort out my options.

Marixa isn’t really my friend although she wishes she was. This is because I’m a Gringa and she thinks I’m rich. I try to like her but I just can’t. All she wants to talk about is money. And I haven’t got any or anything to say about it. But she has a car and she invited me to the beach. It’s an old orange car from the 1970’s - that funny kind that can’t decide if it’s a truck or a car and is about half of each. It seems like a fair trade – I put up with her and she takes me where I want to go.

She said we were going to Tamarindo which is her favorite. The orange truck-car doesn’t go very fast so we drove for a long time. When we finally we got here, she parked the car on the circle at the end of the road and we hauled our stuff to a little tree on the beach. There’s a restaurant behind it for people who have money, but we haven’t got any.

It’s nice here. Definitely worth a few hours of annoying conversation. The sound of the ocean is so soothing that I would fall asleep if I weren’t actually roasting to death...

A man has come over and is talking to Marixa. She makes me open my eyes to introduce us and tells me he is her friend Erasmo. Maybe this is why she drove that poor car all the way to Tamarindo. I say hi. Erasmo is extremely friendly and too old for me and not handsome. But I am nice. I am the guest so I humor them.

They’re talking about me as if I weren’t right there listening. Erasmo asks who I am and Marixa tells him I’m a Gringa living in Guaitil. He asks if I speak Spanish and she says yes. He wonders what I’m doing here and she says she doesn’t really know. He says that the office he works for is looking for a bilingual secretary and wonders if I might be interested. Marixa tells him to ask me. He asks me.

It’s a real estate office called The Marina Trading Post. Erasmo wonders if I know John or Jogi or Joost. I don’t know anyone here. I don’t really want to work in real estate. I don’t think I’d have the heart to sell something that isn’t even mine.

But I could sit in their chair. I could answer their phone, read some good books and take my time figuring out what to do. So I say yes.