The season of storms and continuous rains has all but passed and virtually endless sunshiney days lie ahead here in Panama.  Besides the challenge of tropical sun and heat, the single largest contrast now is the hours of sunshine--almost 12 daily here already, while back in Cleveland we were enjoying but 8.  That means the day here is 50% longer! And that means that I can spend 50% more energy getting 50% more tired!

The trickstering aspect of it is that because it seems like summer, it doesn't feel at all like Christmas. So I'm not in the gift-giving mode--which is good since I didn't  pack any with me anyway.  But I am having fun and the sun is kicking my ass on the run...and I think I'll get blasted at a huge extended-family-type Christmas party in the countryside tonight.

 ...from a week ago, while running in a cemetery stateside-a Very, Very Silent Night

“The morning comes to consciousness of faint stale smells of beer from the sawdust trampled street with all it’s muddy feet that press to early coffee stands.”

Well, T.S. (Elliot) had the coffee stands right, at least.  But here in La Chorrera, Panama, consciousness resumes with the rising of the hot tropical sun, and the street-markets re-assembling on Avenida Central, and the smell of hot bread baking from panaderias (bakeries) scattered everywhere about town.

The markets, stores, and restaurants here in La Chorrera are a shopper’s budget dream.  A cup of coffee is only 25 cents, 30 cents if you take it with crème (the sugar’s free!), you can pick up 20 oranges for ‘one dollah’, a six-pack of beer costs $2.60, and a decent pair of running shoes goes for $20 to $40  with a 30% discount from that (unless you wear the ‘ungodly’ size of 12 as I do, and then. 'no discount, man').

The morning should also soon come to sizzling consciousness with an hour and a half run into the countryside.  Though I had traveled on only three hours rest from the night before, when I arrived here in Panama yesterday my first inclination, after settling into my Spartan accommodations, was to run a route I’d run daily 19 years ago.  And so at 5 P.M. yesterday, I took to the streets and let my feet carry me through memories of the interior countryside.  And I met the challenge of the sweltering heat and total humidity without cutting short a single stride (in other words, I didn’t stop until I returned to home base).  But the real challenge will lie in running under a higher sun today.

Now a day of new adventure awaits—and I’m off without delay.

Entourage scene from La Chorrera.  My daughter is the Panamanian in the center with the sunglasses on!