Cold Hands, Warm Heart

Cold Hands Warm Heart
Cold Soul Cold Shoulder
Cold Bones Cold Comfort

It is very cold.

I am in Uyuni, the town on the "touristy" edge of the Salt Flats, Salar de Uyuni. I have been here before. And unless my memory deceives me, I was cold then too! As I type this, sittinging in a hotel lobby, holding a mug of Coca Tea in the thinnly veiled sun of a July morning I am wearing 9 layers of clothing, and still shivering. And this is reportedly the warmest of the 3 nights ahead.

Why do I say reportedly? I have been here before! The reason I am carrying 3 pairs of thermal underwear was because the nights spent in Uyuni in 2006 were the coldest nights of my life. And as I keep pointing out, while telling the rest of my group not to be stupid and to bundle up like the Michelin man, "I'm Canadian!" Then again my theory is that no one hates being cold so much as Canadians. Being from Canada is no defence against feeling the cold.

Yesterday we set out from the hotel at 10 AM, and arrived in Uyuni at 10:30 at night. We took two transfers, a bus and a train, all of which were far more comfortable than I was expecting, though I could not have been happier to arrive. This is the way to do it, for me: I had been traveling for a day and a half straight, only to arrive, sleep 6 good hours and spend another day traveling. It would be a lie to say I was happy, per se, as I am not too thrilled with the current company. Yet as I stared out the window yesterday --and stared, and stared-- lost in that stunning, muted landscape, searching for my thoughts in each rock and field, in those moments just me and a view and my music surrounding me... I was at peace.

I think there is a part of me, pressed against the pocket at the base of my lungs where all my emotions lie, that is always moving. Sometimes it's a gentle back and forth, back and forth, steady and constant as a metranome. But at other times, for some reason or none it gets caught in the breeze and the move becomes frantic, rocking back and forth, dipping and spinning, spinning and tipping, knocking against my lungs (and emotions!)´til all I can think of is travel, travel, movement. You have probably seen me in that space; a sudden distance, a cloud of places, a roadway in my eyes. Perhaps the reason I am so soothed by such journeys --real ones, not remembered or imagined-- is that only on the road does that part of me go still, and that pressure on my lungs goes still.

I have been coveting this computer time, and a girl from another group is now staring daggers at me, so I guess I had better go. Into the Salt Flats. Into the cold. Into some of the most stunning scenery I´ve ever seen. While an entirely different part of me dreams of home.

Be well!

N.