Teakettle Village, April 2008
By Belizean standards, Lou’s house is quite large – a series of simple but spacious and airy rooms with high ceilings, ceiling fans and large windows on either side of a cool breezeway that divides the house.
A veranda, painted white, framed and supported by dark brown stained tree limbs, runs the entire length of the backside of the house. With its sheltering eaves, its view of the Belize River and the jungles beyond, this is where we will spend many peaceful and cool hours in the days to come – punctuated each day by 5 o’clock rum & cokes with Lou.
Mornings begin early, while the air is still relatively cool, with breakfast on the veranda.
Our first morning, Anna, Lou’s housekeeper and wonderful cook, serves us biscuits with banana jam, tortillas, scrambled eggs with onions and tomatoes, refried beans and juice. The kids are in jungle heaven.
After eating, they sprawl on the veranda – Leif in the porch swing and Zoë, her long blonde hair swept up against the heat in a knot on the top of her head, in an old Adirondack chair next to Lou’s snoozing dog. Both kids are under strict orders to spend an hour on the homework they promised to do in return for permission to take a holiday during the school year.
They try to comply, but are easily distracted by the new world all around them.
[To be continued…]
Kristin Fellows 