LOST

I am sitting atop Tikal Temple Four, meditating and taking notes. 

You can see Temples One and Two above the vegetation in the distance, with howler monkeys shrieking at such frightening volume one expects aliens to attack.

I have no service here, no Internet. If you are reading this, it is because someone -- preferably myself, having survived -- has transcribed the notes and perhaps even uploaded the pictures. For the moment, I cannot.

People come to Tikal to read, apparently. The picture I have of Lee at Tikal, adorning the refrigerator in my home some thousands of miles away, is of her sitting on one of these temples amid the acres and acres of them, reading.  

I read segments of the Tao Te Ching today sitting here. Elsewhere, tourists are reading their books, novels, travel guides, sitting on temples. I have no theory of why this should be. 

The ghosts of Mayan princes compel us to read, perhaps. 

I can see the ghosts of Mayan children running amid the temples, playing hide and seek, or ball, thinking of self-sacrifice in their futures.

Years ago, at Uxmal in the Yucatan, I practiced Tai Chi in an isolated corner of the ruins, where abides the garden of fertility, stele of erect penises.  Mayans pierced their genitals, not unlike these international hoards of youth who take buses hourly to Tikal today. I overhear them talking of their years of practiced aimlessness, tattoos punctuating various loci, piercings with historical precedent.

There are too many tourists. It is hard to get lost in the jungle with a myriad of languages and banal concerns offering constant distraction. I am sitting meditating on the top of Temple Four when a water bottle cap lands on my head. Others are looking at their watches, calculating how many minutes are left before they must return to their buses.

But, getting lost is still possible in this vast acreage of history and blood and ruin and jungle. One wrong turn on the path and you are alone amid the vines and ceiba trees and wasp nests and pixote creatures wandering fearlessly along. And the howler and spider monkeys overhead, perhaps a jaguar.

There are road signs warning of snakes crossing.

Tomorrow, getting lost is in the cards. If the guide wasn't stealing my money, we will be trekking deep into the jungle with mules for five days. No Internet there.

It isn't easy getting lost. There is a feeling one has when the airplane lifts off or when the lights go off on an overnight bus trip, a wonderful sense of solitude and thrill, the loss of control, giving one's self over to the universe for a brief time.

Tomorrow could be something like that.

Being alone is also something hard to accomplish. With social media and international dating apps, my first 24 hours in Guatemala City was a whirlwind of connection, stories for another time. 

I know things are happening in the United States, horrible and cruel and senseless things. I am not there. 

As Jim Morrison said, everything must be this way. 

Pictures to come.