Letting the Light In

Learning to inhabit a life, one space at a time

It’s in the 5 o’clock hour, and I’m sitting in my little study with coffee and music. The light is still soft, and a thin gauze of clouds hangs in front of the volcanoes.

This room used to have a large TV mounted to the wall, but I asked for it to be removed when I first viewed the space. I wanted this room to be for books, for stretching out on a mat, for something quieter. A big screen didn’t fit the aesthetic I was trying to create.

Now I’m left staring at the evidence of that decision—holes in the cement walls, cords for the Wi-Fi dangling. Soon enough, I’ll figure out what to hang there to hide them.

I’m an early riser, though here it hardly matters. The birds and roosters would wake me up anyway. I’ve spotted a few humming birds flitting through the purple flowering trees just beyond my window.

My apartment has a glass inset that cuts into the space. It takes up room that could have been used for something more practical—more floor, larger rooms, something easier to live in. But instead it offers light, and the feeling of letting the outdoors in.

It reminds me of Geoffrey Bawa, whose spaces in Sri Lanka blur the line between inside and outside so completely that you stop noticing where one ends and the other begins. This is more contained, but it gestures toward the same idea. It’s space that doesn’t seal you off from the world. It creates an in-between.

When I began my apartment search, I wanted access to outdoors and light, and I found both here. There are six doors in this apartment, and five of them slide open to outdoor spaces–a balcony, a small yard, a rooftop terrace.

It’s a beautiful space, but I’ve quickly learned that closing a door doesn’t give you the privacy you think it will. Shades need to be drawn. I hung drapes I bought in the U.S. and found a down comforter for my bed. I’m waiting on an outdoor patio set and a strand of lights for the roof, so I can take in the volcano views with my morning coffee.

I don’t know when the delivery will come. They said within two days when I ordered it, and I haven’t heard anything since. There’s always a little guesswork when you’re setting up life in a new place. The unpredictability adds a quiet layer of uncertainty to a week that’s otherwise gone smoothly.

A technician is coming this morning because I have no hot water, a minor inconvenience. You can’t live in some of the places I’ve lived and expect them to operate the way life did in the U.S. You adjust. No hot water, bueno. Mosquitos, you buy plug-ins to repel them. No trash can in the bathroom yet, you carry your toilet paper to the kitchen until you buy one. No car, so you walk to the grocery store, carrying heavy bags back home.

You adapt. You inhabit what’s in front of you.

The other times I’ve set up a home–in Mexico City, Paris, and here, I never fully committed. I bought only what I needed and then stopped short of making the space mine. I kept one foot slightly lifted, as if I might leave at any moment.

This time, I’m trying something different. I’m not just arranging a space, but allowing myself to settle into it. I want to feel a sense of home in a way that I haven’t before, even if it’s only for a year. I’ve stopped trying to map what comes next.

I messaged a former Airbnb host who runs a small library in a neighboring community. She opens it a few days a week so children have access to books. She provides story hours, programming, and even an evening empowerment group for women. I asked if I could help, and she said yes immediately.

I want a yoga studio, so I signed up for a yoga class yesterday that ended up being canceled. The message was apologetic. It’s okay, I wrote back. I’ll come Thursday. Then I carried my mat home.

Next is finding someone to help me move my Spanish along.

For now, the cords are still showing. The hot water isn’t fixed yet. The patio furniture hasn’t arrived.

But the doors open, the light comes in.

And I’m learning how to live in the space between.