Chapter 5 COSTA RICA!
Chapter 5
C OSTA R ICA !
As she waits in the customs line at Liberia Airport in the northwest of Costa Rica, amid people wearing floral shirts and dresses, chatting it up about their vacation intentions—zip lines, massages, catamaran tours—Charli is thinking for the fiftieth time that she’s been had. Seriously, she hasn’t been on a big trip in forever—when was the last time?—and this one, a Hail Mary if there ever was one, is the first on her list?
Okay, there are worse places to be than Costa Rica, but still ... How gullible could she be to take advice from a friend’s spiritual guide and a few weeks later touch down in Costa Rica?
In the prearranged shuttle to Tamarindo, Charli sits next to a chatty couple from Indiana who talk her ear off about how she’ll “just love it down here.” They come every year and want to buy a place before the next big boom comes.
Charli’s not up for much chitchat, but she’s trying to remember she’s partially on vacation, that she’s escaped the snow and freezing temperatures. It does feel good outside, the sun spraying warmth into the humid air. March in Boston is so tough sometimes, the way the rest of the country is warming up while Beantown clings to winter like an insecure child would to her mother.
As reggae plays through the speakers, they drive the dusty and often bumpy roads past small villages where the inhabitants stare back from their porches. Chickens roam freely. A farmer crosses the street with a cow. There’s an occasional fruit and smoothie stand. The farther she gets from the airport, the more relaxed she feels. Worst case, she gets a tan and reads a couple of books.
Her hotel is called La Linda, and it’s on the bustling main strip, where bungalow-style restaurants press up against touristy trinket shops. The white stucco nearly glows against the jungle backdrop. As she climbs out of the shuttle, the salty ocean air hits her, and it’s like a balm on her soul.
She checks into her room. Her balcony looks past the pool surrounded by sunbathers and then beyond the tall palm trees to the ocean, where she can see a lineup of surfers waiting for waves. A few jagged rocks poke through the surface of the water. Those wave riders better know what they’re doing when they catch a ride. Closer to the horizon, a powerboat flies a red-and-white flag, signifying that they have divers in the water. Two Jet Skis dart about in sharp angles.
Back in her room, she unpacks, checks out the comfy bed, and flips through the hotel’s booklet. Under the Wi-Fi password, she finds a request in bold that guests not flush toilet paper.
“Oh wow,” Charli says out loud. “That’s a first for me!”
Charli throws on her swimsuit and pullover; slides into her flip-flops; grabs her Kindle, some cash, and a towel; and heads out the door. Other than the Cape, which is poisoned by her mother’s presence, she hasn’t put her feet in the sand in a long time.
She walks by the pool. A few American children play Marco Polo. People drink fruity drinks with umbrellas poking out. At the gate, she kicks off her flip-flops and leaves them with the other sandals. It’s a beautiful beach, jungle-esque with thick-trunked palm and banyan trees that lean over and cast spots of shade on the sand. Women massage tourists. Men try to rent her a surfboard. Peddlers offer their wares, but it’s a less aggressive approach than her experiences in Mexico. Charli avoids eye contact with them; she hates being the target of street vendors. But a woman comes by with toasted coconut dusted with chocolate powder, and Charli takes a sample. Her mouth waters, and she buys a package with American dollars.
Finding a quiet spot on the sand, she sits and eats a few flakes of the coconut as she watches the tanned surfers. They ride the waves like they’ve been doing it all their lives; they probably have. She eventually stretches out on her towel and gets lost in her book.
That night, she slips into a midi dress she found on a discount rack in Anthropologie and steps into her Birkenstocks for the first time since last summer. She sits at the bar and has dinner: gallo pinto y queso de freír —black beans and rice and fried cheese. She drinks two rum drinks called pura vidas and then calls it a night.
After a surprisingly peaceful slumber, Charli takes an early dip in the water, then finds a cup of Costa Rican coffee that she takes back to her room. Turns out they know a thing or two about coffee in Costa Rica, and she enjoys every last sip of her macadamia-milk latte as she sits on her balcony, watching tropical birds fly by and the world come to life. At least she’s trying, she decides, amid the splendor of the jungle morning.
The GPS leads her by foot down a gravel road that is busy with tourists poking their heads into trinket shops and surfers headed toward the ocean with their boards under their arms. She sees a modest wooden sign with an arrow that reads E L C OLECTIVO . That’s it, the place where Frances has rented to host her sessions. Charli cuts down a path that opens to several different artist studios. When she finds the right door, she hesitates. Please, please, please let there be some validity to all this.
Stepping inside, she finds polished hardwood floors and whitewashed brick walls. Clusters of potted plants fill the corners of the room. Twenty chairs create a circle in the center. Though she’s no energy reader, she is certainly aware of the calmness that permeates the air along with the scent of flowers.
People are standing in different groups, chatting. She recognizes Frances from the photos on her website. She wears a fashionable silk blouse tucked into khaki pants, and her silver hair falls just past her shoulders. Breaking away from a group, Frances approaches with open arms and a smile that is slightly overwhelming to take in. Between the woo-woo nature of what’s about to happen and the joy pouring from this woman, this is unfamiliar ground Charli’s walking. For a moment she wants to be able to smile with such power. She wants to exude such positivity and strength. How can someone affect another so much in just a few seconds, with nothing more than a look and a hug?
After they embrace, Frances stands back and says, “Bienvenida, amiga.” She looks into Charli’s eyes, causing Charli to tense up.
“You’re nervous,” she says.
Charli looks away, embarrassed to admit it.
“Don’t worry. Everyone is.”
She puts her hands on Charli’s upper arms, which causes Charli to feel slightly uncomfortable. She’s not a big toucher. In fact, she’s way out of her element in every regard.
Charli makes awkward conversation as they wait for the rest of the crowd. She meets people from Boston who have been working with Frances for a long time, but she also shakes hands with people from Italy, France, the Netherlands, and Brazil. Apparently Frances has built up a worldwide following with her blog and YouTube videos.
Though it’s nice to be around people seeking similar answers, Charli’s relieved when Frances finally asks everyone to take a seat. Charli sits next to Letícia, a woman from Brazil. On the other side of her sits a man from Venice, Florida.
Frances steps to the center of the circle with a basket in her hands. “First things first, would you mind turning off your phones and dropping them in here? I know it’s a tall order, but you’ll get them back in the afternoon.” Her voice is as soft as goose down but full of life. The kind of person who can command attention with a whisper.
Frances takes the deposited phones through a door in the back that must be her office. Returning to the front, she says, “I’m so glad everyone is here. I know it’s a bit intimidating, but know that each of you has found your way here at this exact moment for a reason, and we’re going to do our best to figure out what that reason may be. My constellations can sometimes be uncomfortable, or even scary. Some of you will feel a tremendous number of emotions. Know that you’re in a safe place.”
She lets the promise resonate as everyone looks around the room, as if ensuring her statement is true, then looks at Charli. “Many of you are concerned that you don’t have what it takes to sit in this room and jump into a constellation with me. Let me assure you ... you have what it takes. Today is about faith. I know that’s a hard word to wrap your head around. But let me tell you ... lives have changed in this room, and if you open your heart and mind, the same will happen to you.”
Frances takes a moment to smile. “You may be asked to be representatives in others’ systems. Don’t overthink things. Simply rely on your intuition. You may experience the emotions of others, of those who are no longer living. You may even have strong urges. It’s okay to have these feelings, but I do ask that you avoid acting on any urges.”
“What kind of urges?” someone asks. Charli was wondering the same thing.
“You’ll soon see what I mean.”
Everyone in the room becomes uneasy, muttering and shuffling their feet. Charli is freaked out. In fact, she’s wondering about all this, wondering if she’s in a room full of kooks. And yet something is telling her she’s not. It could be the most real experience she’s had in ages.
“Our past is alive inside of us,” Frances says. “People connected to you, even those long gone from this earth, are still a part of you. And in more ways than one. Think of an oppressed people, any oppressed people. Their children feel that pain in their bones, even if they haven’t been exposed to it at all. My expertise lies in focusing on what the English biologist Rupert Sheldrake calls the morphic field. Has anyone ever seen a flock of birds, like starlings, dart around in the sky as if they’re all connected? Or a school of fish that makes a turn in a second, far too fast to explain by writing it off as communication?
“These animals share a morphic field—as you do with your family. Think of siblings who can feel each other, know when something’s wrong. It’s bigger than that, though. It’s not only your living members who are a part of your field either. This is your grander family. It doesn’t have to be blood either. Adopted children are brought into the morphic field of a family as well. As are those who marry into a family.”
Charli’s father appears in her mind. Oh boy, did he marry into it.
“Right now,” Frances continues, “you exist in a field with the rest of your family, almost a solar system, all of you spinning around one another. You are starlings in a flock.”
Charli recognizes what Frances says from her own research—including Frances’s videos, but it’s nice to hear her explain it in person. “Sometimes, one of the starlings falls from the flock. One of the planets gets knocked out of orbit, which knocks the others out as well. In other words, one of the family members experiences exclusion from the group. When that happens, an imbalance occurs. It can affect everyone in the system.”
Frances moves her gaze from person to person. “You might be suffering from this exclusion. You might be feeling a connection with this excluded person. For example, let’s take a suicide. If one’s grandfather killed himself, an imbalance is created. We might feel this missing piece in us. We might feel his pain. Think of him as lost in the void, his soul floating out there alone. What we need to do is bring him back into the field.”
Images of her father’s potential funeral pass by Charli with such verisimilitude that she feels her insides go dark like a city that’s lost power. No, she has to do everything in her power to keep him alive, and to keep any imbalances from further fracturing her family.
“How do we do that?” an American asks. “My brother died by suicide.” Charli almost chimes in about her grandfather but holds back.
“We’re about to find out,” Frances says.
Another asks, “But what if we’re not out of balance in our constellation? How do you know?”
Frances nods. “You’ll know.”
Wandering around the room, Frances talks for a few more minutes, then stops and puts her hand on Charli’s shoulder. “Would you like to go first?”
Every single head in the room swivels her way. Her heart thumps.
She starts to shake her head. “I ...”
But here comes that part of her again, the part that wants out of whatever she’s in. It’s pushing her along, like a skydiving instructor on a plane urging her to take that leap.
“Okay,” she says quickly, before she can overthink it.
Frances waves her to the center of the circle, and Charli stands with false bravado. What has she gotten herself into?