It was six a.m. on a Friday. I had just traveled six hours to the next big city……..and then immediately back. I realized there that two very important little cards had gone missing from my wallet: the Visa and the MasterCard. I was left, luckily, with my American Express. (That didn’t prove to be so helpful, but that’s another story entirely.)
I arrived hours before any place would open that I had been to in the last twenty-four hours. Sleep-deprived, slightly worried, yet strangely calm about it all, I sat on the curb watching the locals and a few tourists in their morning routine. I wandered the town a bit and ran into a travel agency that showed listings of the next buses out of town on the front door. I had accustomed to prepping for my departure directly upon my arrival in places so I could plan accordingly.
Seconds later, the door swung open and a nice man appeared in the doorway asking if I had any questions. We began chatting about the places I had already been, where I was going and then all the crazy adventures we both had done in our lives. He bragged endlessly about his daughter the world adventurer and gave me months of ideas for future travel plans. I actually found myself smiling for the first time in the last few hours. That was nice. He was a very interesting man with a great outlook on life: always refreshing. I left his office a few hours later with an invite to join him on his morning ocean swim to dolphin beach the next morning. I was apparently stuck in this town until I figured out my plan B anyways, and I was in need of a good workout.
That night I was early to bed, and early to rise. I showed up in a bathing suit and flip flops ready for the adventure. My new friend was bringing a boogie board just in case of any complications. He prepped me for the swim, telling me that the ocean has a mind of its own and that realizing this will allow us to enjoy ourselves this next hour. Mother Nature always has the upper hand. (I had learned this already raging the Rockies of Colorado.)
I wasn’t too worried. Given my background in sports and my addiction to running, I felt I was in pretty good shape. So, after a little stretching, ‘to tell our bodies we were going to use it’ we were on our way. The water was perfect temperature, and the waves were rhythmic. We spent the whole hour sharing our similar perspectives on life, family, the environment and how life is what you want it to be. He was in crazy shape, and I wondered how I was struggling just to keep up. I forgot to mention, this guy only has one arm. He was in an accident at twenty three years old, which completely changed his life. But, what I admired about him was that he found a way to keep doing the things he loved. He taught himself how to draw with his other hand for work, apparently stayed active and did it all with a positive attitude.
Just as we were getting close to shore two long beaches away, he stopped us. He had warned me that he had made some friends out here, but to be honest, I didn’t want to get my hopes up on meeting them that morning. Then, about three feet away from us, a pack of dolphins crossed our paths. My face lit up and I think my voice hit a new decibel level when I exclaimed how exciting that was. These are wild dolphins. They don’t approach humans. They circled around us for the next few minutes and then we made it to shore. I think I didn’t wipe that smile off my face for days. And to think, this was this guy’s morning commute to work! So it’s true I guess, your life is what you make it.
My luck seemed to be bittersweet throughout my five months in Brazil. Some days I would have mornings of wanting to break down and cry from frustration and then have crazy once-in a lifetime moments that afternoon. The flip side of luck in my life, huh? Stranded,cashless and alone on the coast of Brasil's Nordeste, and yet my cheeks hurt from smiling so much. To think....I wasn’t even supposed to be in town that day.
