Acapulco Sunsets: First After the Murder

Now that I’ve been gone from Acapulco for nearly 2 months I’m starting to feel the aches for the place I called home for 3 years. I don’t envy the heat that my friends are dealing with down there right now but I do miss that city and those beaches, the coarse grained sand. It’s funny how I took 3 years of absolutely perfect sunsets for granted while I had it. Now that I don’t have that view, I miss watching the boats coming and going accompanied with dramatic displays of cloud and color.

So I visit by looking through old photos. Photos I knew at the time when I took them would serve this purpose because I think I knew deep down from when the murder happened that I would eventually have to leave Acapulco, for awhile at least. I’m so thankful for what I shared on Steemit because I’ve been able to relive my life over the last three years because of it.

The photos in this post were taken after the first sunset I was able to watch after the murder. I couldn’t look at the colored skies without mentally hearing the click of John’s camera which was nearly nightly snapping shots, sometimes taking time lapse videos as well. He was addicted to those sunsets more than probably anything. And it took weeks before I could really mentally deal with the idea of watching one.

The first sunset was in Pie de la Cuesta, one of his favorite beach spots right outside Acapulco on the north end. It’s a sleepy little beach town sandwiched between the ocean and a lagoon making it awesome for day trips. I went to the beach alone and watched and took these photos. It was emotional, but I did my best to stay calm and just enjoy what was going on in the moment instead of what was going on in my life. It wasn’t as hard as I expected.

This was when I was still in hiding. The murder sucked, this is true but what was worse was the fact that I had to go into hiding in virtually every way after the murder to protect myself. I feared for my life as well as for legal repercussions for the fact that I was a famous easy to spot illegal person in Mexico. Even worse than that was dealing with news updates like, hey you’ve been robbed of everything by the police. I only came out of hiding for very specific people that I knew I could trust with my life, and those people honestly kept me sane.

These were the days where I was wrapping my hair in a scarf, stubbornly refusing to cut off my dreadlocks. I gave myself migraines for weeks straight because in a lot of ways it was one thing I had control over, that I could keep the same if I wanted to and I did. I’m not interested in change because I’m scared, I prefer change when I actually want it and quite frankly I’m still not ready to cut off my dreadlocks. I’m not sure if I’ll ever be.

Clearly, sometimes things just don’t go as planned. The first several weeks after the murder were a process of telling the story both to other people and myself. Reminding myself it actually happened because, well I couldn’t have made it up if I tried. It’s so surreal part of me expects to see John walking around somewhere although I know that’s not possible. I figured the first step to moving on was accepting what happened and it was harder than I expected.

Watching this first sunset alone was important for me to do alone because in a lot of ways it reminded me who I am and where to go from there. Life doesn’t stop completely just because one gets cut short. I started this website not long after this and steadly have rebuilt my life since bit by bit, challenge by challenge.

Now I am in a place possibly equally beautiful to Acapulco but in a very different way where the sunsets are intense. I capture them but out of paranoia, still, I only sometimes share them privately. Eventually you will get to see those sunsets, just like you’re only just now seeing these photos, nearly 5 months later.

Thanks for reading.