What the Storm Revealed

Welcome to my first newsletter.

I’m so glad you’re here. I wanted to start with something real from my life here in the mountains of Colombia.

In February, a bad storm came through, and it made one thing painfully clear: I was not prepared for disaster. In a matter of moments, that storm turned everything upside down. It brought emotional turmoil and damage to my glamping place, and my community in El Meson was hit hard, too. We were all suddenly in the same situation, trying to deal with what had happened.

In the aftermath, I’m still waiting for the man who handles all the work here at Villa Migelita Ecolodge to arrive, along with the insurance adjuster to assess the damage. Living high in the mountains has taught me many things, patience being one of them. There’s no rushing repairs when your options are limited. I can only do what I can, and stressing about it won’t change the outcome.

For now, I explain the situation to my guests and keep moving forward. I need a new balcony roof, but the room is still rentable — as long as guests don’t mind skipping the balcony if it rains. At the moment, the damaged roof is being held up by one very strong wire, which feels both slightly concerning and very real life here.

Thankfully, my workers removed the fallen trees right away— they know this isn’t just my home; it’s my business.

So while I wait, I’ve started removing the trees near the house that could cause future damage. One worker finally wrote me and said he would be arriving. Hallelujah! And honestly? There’s a bright side. The sunlight pouring into the property now is incredible. I’m seeing light and views I haven’t noticed in years. I’m planning to turn the leftover branches into bird feeding stations and use some for my orchids.

When disaster strikes, all we see at first is the damage —until later, when the positive side begins to reveal itself. My views are now incredible from every side of the property. The trees that fell on the neighboring land opened up the mountains in a way I haven’t seen in years. What once felt like destruction is slowly starting to look a lot like perspective.

As my mom always said, make a plus out of a minus.

Sometimes life clears away what we didn’t know was blocking the view.