It is that time of year again. I write not of Christmas actually, but of heading down south of the Rio Grande. For more years than I can remember I have spent Christmas in my tent in some Latin American country, usually in some God-forsaken jungle. This year will be the same.
School ends today, and by late tomorrow a friend and I will be in Antigua, Guatemala. Two days later will find us camped around the ruins of Tikal, an ancient Mayan city set in jungle.
It will not be too wild this time. Near where we will camp is a comedor—an open air restaurant of sorts that has rice and beans, cold beer, rice and beans, chicken, and rice and beans.
I happen to love rice and beans. That is a very good thing. I love cold beer—another very good thing. I love the jungle too—yet another very good thing!
From the jungle we will make our way to Lake Atitlan. One can pass a fine week slowly walking around that lake, staying in Indian villages along the way. I hope that they have rice and beans.
My students always are a bit shocked when I tell them that I will be in my tent over Christmas. For them Christmas is presents and a tree and family and joy to the world and all around glee and merriment. And of course not a teacher or textbook in sight.
Those squealing adolescents are right of course. They are usually right of course.
They want to know how I could possibly spend the day of Christ’s birth in a tent. I respond that Joseph and Mary spent the day of the birth of the Christ child far away from their own country in a make-do shelter not their home. I too will spend the day of the birth of the Christ child far away from my own country in a make-do shelter not my home.
That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
The truth of the matter is this. God had the idea of Creation before He created man. All of nature and the cosmos was brought ex nihilo into reality simply for the pleasure of His pinnacle of creation, man. He meant that we would enjoy it. And I assure you that the first man, Adam by name, certainly did enjoy what was all about him, what was made just for him.
When God presented Adam with Eve he naturally enjoyed it even more. You know the reason. It is not fit for man to be alone, and I doubt that Adam was ever alone after discovering the joys of the first woman. And who would blame him?
The point is that all of creation is a gift. All those jungles and mountains and plains and tundra and valleys and canyons and forests—all a gift, all made just for us. And what do we call a man who receives a gift but never opens it?
So out I go into ‘wild weird climes, lying most sublime, out of space, out of time.’ Those jungles in Guatemala fit rather nicely that description.
My next writing will be from somewhere in Guatemala.
Lake Atitlan
Antigua
Tikal
Gigantes bringing in the new year