Following the Yellow Brick Road- North to South
Intro
I’m driving myself to the hospital as I’m certain I’m having an appendicitis attack. This is certainly not something that you would want to having at sea of course. If the appendix explodes, you will be dead for sure. I remember having this thought while undergoing a minor attack at sea while sailing back from Hawaii to Portland.
Today I’m relatively calm. I’ve chosen the hospital for surgery based on its expansive
views of the valley. It’s highly
unlikely that this event will turn out to be life threatening. I feel another
wave of pain. God, I’m glad that
I’m headed to the hospital. Duy
will lock up the studio and I needn’t worry about anything else. Certainly there is no need to alarm
family with my circumstance until I’m certain what is going on.
Although it’s only a twenty-minute drive to the hospital, it seems more like hours. I pass the time with random thoughts through bouts of pain and panic. You are wise to listen to your body and get this diagnosed, never mind that you have a dance lesson in two hours. Or I would ask myself questions-- If you were to die, how do you feel about your life?
Without hesitation, I telepathically respond that I’ve had a full, rich life and I’ve no regrets; and yet, out of no where comes an addendum, but if I survive this, something has got to change. I literally turned around to see if there was someone in the back seat prodding me to reveal my current subliminal dissatisfaction with my all too perfect life.
It’s true that things have changed for me over the last 14 years as a glass artist. I had created an enviable life style. I had creatively persevered at something that I enjoyed immensely. It was more like play. As I examined my unexpected response more closely, however, I saw that my unconscious dissatisfaction was rooted in my disconnection from community.
My studio was in my home. I worked there and slept there. I had created a very comfortable environment for myself. I was happy with the solitude. But things had changed. I needed less and less to leave the studio. I had less need to be with others, something that I hadn’t realized was an important ingredient to a balanced, happy life.
The fax and computer changed all that. I could communicate my work with time saving tools. There was less need to have face-to-face time with the restaurant designers and architects who create the opportunities for my work. Efficiency was reducing my personal connections and work relationships. I realized that I longed for a deeper connection with others and with community. My private island had drifted off the charts. I felt lost and knew that change was inevitable if I was ever going to be found.
I pulled up to the emergency door, now weaker and folded over from the shorter bursts of pain, and asked to see a doctor. With a chuckle I told the doctor that I was certain I wasn’t pregnant, but given my symptoms I wanted his observation of my increasingly frequent episodes of gut wrenching pain. We took a blood test. The doctor concluded reluctantly that he probably should canceled his tennis match. And after marking the epicenter of my trauma with a red X, he rushed me into surgery dressed for the courts.
The game: Doctor-1, Appendix-0. I was under anesthesia for several hours of what was normally a simple operation. He had diagnosed the location and the treatment correctly of my off-the-chart red blood cells. There were only a couple of minor glitches, but he was destined to win.
When he cut on the X that marked the spot, he could not find my appendix. He enlarged the opening and began piling my intestines outside of my body cavity on my stomach. And there it was. He found the appendix hiding out under my intestines. It was indeed swollen.
As he removed it out of my stomach, the appendix exploded in his hands. If it had burst in my stomach, things would have been very complicated. Under certain conditions, it could have been fatal. Thank goodness I was not on some seagoing adventure or on the beach of some third world country. When I heard all this, I again contemplated, how short life is, how lucky I was, and I knew that something needed to change.
Out of the hospital after a few days, I told my two faithful, trustworthy employees, that I was going to close down the studio in one year. They could take it over. I would share my contacts. I would teach them how to run a business. I didn’t know what I was going to do, but I had a wake up call and I needed to answer the phone.
Prior to that phone call, for the preceding 7 years, I would spend 4 to 6 weeks during the Oregon winter in warm, sunny Central America. I would catch a plane to Mexico City or the Yucatan or Guatemala City and travel overland through Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, El Savador, Nicaraqua, and fly home from Costa Rica.
The distances between Central American countries weren’t that great and in time I had my favorite beaches and villages to visit. I always came home refreshed. I was fully invigorated with the warmth and acceptance for a stranger stripped of all treasure, but my wit and sense of equality for all whom I encountered. No one knew anything about me. Only how I was with them in the moment mattered. We were all part of the same human community. I was invited to participate in family activity. The family unit was solid. I could even enjoy the young kids, something that was no longer an acceptable practice for a single man in America.
Cultural traditions and language differentiated us. Height, skin color, and costume were also apparent, but they added to the vibrancy and challenge of acceptance. I was no better than another. Material possessions did not come between us. You shared what you had. I came with gifts of kindness, joy, and compassion. It was this sense of being a part of something greater than myself that was now drawing me to investigate the possibilities for living my life at a deeper level. Yes, I had dragons to slay, fears that needed to be addressed. These elemental life needs and personal obstacles would all be part of my upcoming journey to wherever I would choose to go. It would be the journey, not the destination that would rekindle my love of life and purpose.
I saw a documentary as a kid where 2 guys in a land rover traveled overland on the Pan American Highway through 15 nations. They would follow a connected highway system from the extreme North to the extreme South of the Americas.
They began in Alaska, along the Pacific Coast. They traversed Canada. They crossed the west coast of the United States. They continued onward through Central America. After crossing the Darien Gap in Panama, a 100 mile stretch of undeveloped swampland and forest, they reached Colombia. From there they reconnected with the Pan American Highway, traveling onward to the tip of South America.
This was also a path used by the Spaniards in their unquenchable thirst for gold. It would be the perfect route for me to follow on my personal journey. It would become my yellow brick road.
I would travel overland between Portland, Oregon and Ushuaia, Argentine and just beyond where the road system officially ends. There I would stand above the sea, surrounded by penguins, breathtaking granite formations comprising the first visible upwelling of the Andes, and marvel at the partially visible icebergs and glaciers of frozen tap water.
On my journey I would pass through every imaginable ecological zone and landscape. Though most places had their own language, I would communicate with secondary one’s, English or Spanish. The cultural diversity would enliven and enrich me. If there were common philosophical truths that bound these distinct communities, I would search for them. I would confront my dragons and befriend them. I told myself that I could do this. And I did.
The photos are by country. I was shooting slides. The slides were converted into digital images and although a tad contrasty with the shadows deepening and the highlights compressing, they convey a part of my story and the two years that I traveled. They feel a part of another era. In fact twenty years have past since I last viewed them.
There are so many stories to tell. Many of them are shared in the form of poems that I wrote. I would take a thought or experience of the day and expand it into a snapshot of my adventure. The photos are also full of memories and stories, many of which you can imagine by viewing them.
People often ask me how I afforded such a trip. I literally saved my small change. There was enough money in the Piggies to fly from Portland to Santiago, Chile.
I
hope you enjoy traveling with me on this midlife adventure of life changing
experiences. Though like Dorothy, I'll admit there is no place like home!
I enjoy sharing my adventures and poems are another way of encapsulating an experience for others to enjoy. I try and focus on those unexpected moments, reactions, and interactions. The result is less a documentary journal of hotels, fellow travelers, places visited, and costs per day.
Follow this link, Snapshots of Central America, and you will find some of my poetry, self-published over 20 years ago. They mark a journey that I made South from Portland overland toward Panama. When I re-read them, I am hurled back in time to that special moment. Poems keep my yesterdays, fresh and vivid, like roses blooming on a crystal clear day.
I’m driving myself to the hospital as I’m certain I’m having an appendicitis attack. This is certainly not something that you would want to having at sea of course. If the appendix explodes, you will be dead for sure. I remember having this thought while undergoing a minor attack at sea while sailing back from Hawaii to Portland.
Although it’s only a twenty-minute drive to the hospital, it seems more like hours. I pass the time with random thoughts through bouts of pain and panic. You are wise to listen to your body and get this diagnosed, never mind that you have a dance lesson in two hours. Or I would ask myself questions-- If you were to die, how do you feel about your life?
Without hesitation, I telepathically respond that I’ve had a full, rich life and I’ve no regrets; and yet, out of no where comes an addendum, but if I survive this, something has got to change. I literally turned around to see if there was someone in the back seat prodding me to reveal my current subliminal dissatisfaction with my all too perfect life.
It’s true that things have changed for me over the last 14 years as a glass artist. I had created an enviable life style. I had creatively persevered at something that I enjoyed immensely. It was more like play. As I examined my unexpected response more closely, however, I saw that my unconscious dissatisfaction was rooted in my disconnection from community.
My studio was in my home. I worked there and slept there. I had created a very comfortable environment for myself. I was happy with the solitude. But things had changed. I needed less and less to leave the studio. I had less need to be with others, something that I hadn’t realized was an important ingredient to a balanced, happy life.
The fax and computer changed all that. I could communicate my work with time saving tools. There was less need to have face-to-face time with the restaurant designers and architects who create the opportunities for my work. Efficiency was reducing my personal connections and work relationships. I realized that I longed for a deeper connection with others and with community. My private island had drifted off the charts. I felt lost and knew that change was inevitable if I was ever going to be found.
I pulled up to the emergency door, now weaker and folded over from the shorter bursts of pain, and asked to see a doctor. With a chuckle I told the doctor that I was certain I wasn’t pregnant, but given my symptoms I wanted his observation of my increasingly frequent episodes of gut wrenching pain. We took a blood test. The doctor concluded reluctantly that he probably should canceled his tennis match. And after marking the epicenter of my trauma with a red X, he rushed me into surgery dressed for the courts.
The game: Doctor-1, Appendix-0. I was under anesthesia for several hours of what was normally a simple operation. He had diagnosed the location and the treatment correctly of my off-the-chart red blood cells. There were only a couple of minor glitches, but he was destined to win.
When he cut on the X that marked the spot, he could not find my appendix. He enlarged the opening and began piling my intestines outside of my body cavity on my stomach. And there it was. He found the appendix hiding out under my intestines. It was indeed swollen.
As he removed it out of my stomach, the appendix exploded in his hands. If it had burst in my stomach, things would have been very complicated. Under certain conditions, it could have been fatal. Thank goodness I was not on some seagoing adventure or on the beach of some third world country. When I heard all this, I again contemplated, how short life is, how lucky I was, and I knew that something needed to change.
Out of the hospital after a few days, I told my two faithful, trustworthy employees, that I was going to close down the studio in one year. They could take it over. I would share my contacts. I would teach them how to run a business. I didn’t know what I was going to do, but I had a wake up call and I needed to answer the phone.
Prior to that phone call, for the preceding 7 years, I would spend 4 to 6 weeks during the Oregon winter in warm, sunny Central America. I would catch a plane to Mexico City or the Yucatan or Guatemala City and travel overland through Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, El Savador, Nicaraqua, and fly home from Costa Rica.
The distances between Central American countries weren’t that great and in time I had my favorite beaches and villages to visit. I always came home refreshed. I was fully invigorated with the warmth and acceptance for a stranger stripped of all treasure, but my wit and sense of equality for all whom I encountered. No one knew anything about me. Only how I was with them in the moment mattered. We were all part of the same human community. I was invited to participate in family activity. The family unit was solid. I could even enjoy the young kids, something that was no longer an acceptable practice for a single man in America.
Cultural traditions and language differentiated us. Height, skin color, and costume were also apparent, but they added to the vibrancy and challenge of acceptance. I was no better than another. Material possessions did not come between us. You shared what you had. I came with gifts of kindness, joy, and compassion. It was this sense of being a part of something greater than myself that was now drawing me to investigate the possibilities for living my life at a deeper level. Yes, I had dragons to slay, fears that needed to be addressed. These elemental life needs and personal obstacles would all be part of my upcoming journey to wherever I would choose to go. It would be the journey, not the destination that would rekindle my love of life and purpose.
I saw a documentary as a kid where 2 guys in a land rover traveled overland on the Pan American Highway through 15 nations. They would follow a connected highway system from the extreme North to the extreme South of the Americas.
They began in Alaska, along the Pacific Coast. They traversed Canada. They crossed the west coast of the United States. They continued onward through Central America. After crossing the Darien Gap in Panama, a 100 mile stretch of undeveloped swampland and forest, they reached Colombia. From there they reconnected with the Pan American Highway, traveling onward to the tip of South America.
This was also a path used by the Spaniards in their unquenchable thirst for gold. It would be the perfect route for me to follow on my personal journey. It would become my yellow brick road.
I would travel overland between Portland, Oregon and Ushuaia, Argentine and just beyond where the road system officially ends. There I would stand above the sea, surrounded by penguins, breathtaking granite formations comprising the first visible upwelling of the Andes, and marvel at the partially visible icebergs and glaciers of frozen tap water.
On my journey I would pass through every imaginable ecological zone and landscape. Though most places had their own language, I would communicate with secondary one’s, English or Spanish. The cultural diversity would enliven and enrich me. If there were common philosophical truths that bound these distinct communities, I would search for them. I would confront my dragons and befriend them. I told myself that I could do this. And I did.
The photos are by country. I was shooting slides. The slides were converted into digital images and although a tad contrasty with the shadows deepening and the highlights compressing, they convey a part of my story and the two years that I traveled. They feel a part of another era. In fact twenty years have past since I last viewed them.
There are so many stories to tell. Many of them are shared in the form of poems that I wrote. I would take a thought or experience of the day and expand it into a snapshot of my adventure. The photos are also full of memories and stories, many of which you can imagine by viewing them.
People often ask me how I afforded such a trip. I literally saved my small change. There was enough money in the Piggies to fly from Portland to Santiago, Chile.
Photos of Central and South America-1990-1992
Each of the 11 photos below is the cover of a photo album. Double click on the link below the photo and it takes you to that album. If you are also interested in reading more about the trip, I've created captions under the photos.
#1 Album
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#2 Album
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#3 Album
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#4 Album
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#5 Album
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#9 Album
#11 Album
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I enjoy sharing my adventures and poems are another way of encapsulating an experience for others to enjoy. I try and focus on those unexpected moments, reactions, and interactions. The result is less a documentary journal of hotels, fellow travelers, places visited, and costs per day.
