April 11 I woke up in the Caracoral Hotel in Valle de Anton, Panama. It had been a quiet night; quite a contrast from the previous night spent in the Intercontinental Hotel in Panama City. The cars and motorcycles raced through the city until maybe 1:30 in the morning, long enough to snatch a couple hours of sleep and have breakfast before cramming into a van for the drive to the Pacific beach. My room at the IH was cold and I couldn’t get the temperature adjusted so I had to just turn it off. The beach was cooler than the city but just as clammy. Got to see Manuel Noriega’s house and dip my toes in the ocean. I don’t remember much about the drive to Valle de Anton because I had gone numb but I’m pretty sure it took a while.

March 1 Rebecca and I were standing in the kitchen after church when Rebecca pointed out the kitchen window. At first I couldn’t see what she was pointing at; then I saw Abigail on the 2005 side of the driveway. We were waiting on her and Kennedy to join us for breakfast. Abigail had her back to us and seemed to be kneeling on the ground. Rebecca said she was about to cry but I couldn’t see anything to cry about. I thought maybe Abigail was petting one of the cats which she is prone to do. I was sort of wishing they would stop fooling around ‘cause I was ready for breakfast. They finally got to the house and that’s when I learned that Kennedy had stopped on the way over to propose to Abigail and apparently Abigail accepted his proposal. Anyway, she was wearing an engagement ring and smiling.

January 11 After a long spell of relatively warm weather, January reasserted itself with cold wind, sleet and overnight lows in the teens. Abigail and I trimmed and delivered a load to the brush site this past week before the weather turned. Now the forecast is for afternoon highs in the sixties in the coming week so we should have another productive week grooming SA. We’re going to tackle the garden and flower bed cleanup.