I used to think that I wanted to live on an island, or at least somewhere tropical. It would be so amazing, never having to deal with cold weather or snow or slippery sidewalks.
So I tried it out. I worked in Mexico for nine months. I went to school in Nice, France for a summer. And for the last five years, I spent at least three weeks and as long as six every winter living on an island.
What did I discover? There’s no place like home.
It’s one thing to stay in a hotel or in a resort during a vacation, but that isn’t what actually living somewhere is like.
When you are staying in a condo and cooking your own food and having to fend for yourself, it isn’t nearly as romantic or wonderful as you might think.
First, there are bugs and creatures to deal with. When I worked in Mexico there were cockroaches, snakes, scorpions, mosquitoes and tarantulas. The mosquito bites made my legs swell up.
Luckily those were the only bites I had to deal with.
I remember someone having appendicitis and actually needing surgery. Mexico wouldn’t be my first choice of places to have a health crisis of any sort, let alone an operation.
Grocery shopping was interesting. There were chickens in the markets, dead and hanging upside down waiting to be bought and cooked. The flies were enthusiastically partying around them. It wasn’t a big deal, but I just wasn’t used to that.
In Puerto Rico and Cuba, the mosquitoes had their way with me again. There’s no getting away from it.
Cockroaches are a whole other world of nastiness. There was one getting intimate with my toothbrush one night in Mexico. I couldn’t figure out what the sound was but if you can imagine a three-inch long disgusting black bug rubbing itself against plastic bristles, then you have an idea.
They were in my roommate’s bed in Costa Rica. They also enjoyed hiding in the bathroom and hanging out in the shower. They didn’t find me in Puerto Rico, thank goodness.
Food can be expensive too. Unless you want to live on a diet of fast food or coconuts and bananas, everything you are used to eating just costs more. Every time I came home I realized how much I missed peanut butter and broccoli.
Things like that shouldn’t be delicacies.
The weather is wonderful – until it isn’t. The afternoons are hot, almost unbearable actually and unless you are right on the beach then it can be rather uncomfortable.
You go to an island for the warm weather and then find yourself searching for air conditioning.
I never dealt with any severe tropical storms or hurricanes, thank goodness.
I enjoyed my time walking on the beach, but the sun is relentless and after 11:00 in the morning it wasn’t nice to be out anymore. Now that I am getting older I try to avoid the sun even more, and it isn’t easy when you are on an island.
There were lots of good times too, but I learned something about myself in all of that time spent traveling.
I don’t like living out of a suitcase.
I don’t like mosquitoes, but they really like me.
Travelling isn’t as easy as it was before 9/11.
I guess I needed to travel to understand and appreciate all that I have right here. It’s kind of how life goes.
Something else is always better than what you already have, until you find out that it isn’t. By running away, I learned that there really is no place like home.