no mono business

We escaped to Costa Rica for a little vitamin D and rummy drinks to mollify the edgy state we have been in following the thaw of winter Covid (and every day family life issues) to a fresh new spring with ever growing new cases (and continued every day family issues). The toll this has taken on all of us has been tremendous, and while we find ourselves fortunate in not having lost anyone close, it is impossible not to share the pain of a community, world, so opened up to suffering and heartbreak.

Yesterday we came back to the room to find that monos (monkeys) had deconstructed our patio -- knocking over the coffee table and scattering my collected shells, which I kept in a couple of Andre's used paper coffee cups, across the floor. We hadn't realized how bold the monos actually were. I have a lot of footage of the naughties -- one of the monkeys leapt down from the railing and snatched a cup of my shells, fingering through them like a bag of Chex Mix. They were acting in a completely riotous way, shaking our ambient lamp light, kicking it with hostility. We cowered behind the glass door, the four of us, afraid if we were to open it a crack, one of them would reach their tiny mono hand in, pull us out of our room and eat our faces off! We actually were that worried.

Today, no monos. After all the theatrics of the day before, we found our patio empty, items neatly arranged in the fashion of a conscientious resort room cleaner. It was a bit of a let down. How easy it is to jump to a relationship of some sort in your mind -- think that what you were experiencing was actually mutually experienced, when in fact it wasn't that at all. Keeping in mind, of course, that these are monkeys and who the hell knows what they think. I do love their random, offbeat personalities and open disdain for people who irritate them. I appreciated the fully impassioned tantrums, yet a part of me wonders if they are trained by the resort to display these said theatrical scenes in order to enhance the Costa Rican experience. "Oh MY God -- you HAVE to stay at . . . there are SO many MONKEYS!!!"