Aceptando Ayuda, With Love...

So it’s been a while without an update.  And I’ve been pretty bad at writing emails, too.  Sorry about that.  I have an excuse!  And a good one, too.  I’m getting ready to spend three months in a Guatemalan jungle with 250 children. 

It’s funny, because it sounds like a joke, but it’s not.

Getting myself prepared for my summer plans has actually turned up quite a few more challenges than I thought it would.  But now that I think about it, it’s kind of a miracle there haven’t been even more.   I want you to imagine something: you are going to the jungle for three months.  You need to buy certain supplies that are not commonly needed in every part of the world (super-strength insect repellent, for example).  You need injections and malaria pills, and you need to decide what to bring to a place where you will have no electricity, no hot water, millions of animals and critters, and no department store just up the road.  Got it in your head?  Now do it while living in an Eastern European country where you have the language skills of the average 2-year-old, at best.  Not that I’m complaining.  It’s actually been a bit of an adventure already.  And it’s given me the chance to let other people help me, and therefore made me appreciate some of the people in my life even more.

There have been several friends who have offered me help with their encouraging words, assistance with Spanish, priceless advice, phone calls to friends to get information, etc.  I hope you know who you are, and that I’ve thanked you enough.  Some of you have quite simply been life rafts on days when I’ve been scared and felt lost. 

There is, however, one person I simply can’t thank enough, so I want to mention her by name.  Natalia, who works at Bell as one of the administrators, is, to use a Spanish expression I just learned, un alma de Dios.  (This is a person who is incredibly kind and for whom there can be no harsh words.)  When I told her what I was doing, she went straight to her computer and her telephone and started asking everyone she could think of what kinds of vaccines I needed and where I could go to get them.  She got the people at medicus to order the rabies vaccine specially for me, and when my doctor was lecturing me for not knowing exactly how many malaria pills I would need, Natalia spoke to her on the phone and made it better.  When I overpaid at the doctor,  she took care of everything again.  I’m pretty sure I would’ve quit halfway through the medical process if I hadn’t had her to help me.  Now I’m one rabies shot away from being vaccinated, and just waiting on a package from England with my malaria pills in it.

With just over three and a half weeks to go before the “real” adventure begins, I’m sure I’ll be pretty busy right up until the moment I get on the plane.  I’m sure I’ll be some combination of scared, excited, stressed, and humbled.  And I’m sure I’ll keep being touched by what wonderful people I know (and in fact, some I don’t know – I’ve been helped by total strangers).  I wrote about responsibility a while ago.  About taking responsibility for both the good and bad that I’ve created in my own life.  And it feels amazing to be able take responsibility for having such people in my life, but I think I get to share the credit with them for a lot of the magical turns my life has taken, because I couldn’t have made any of them alone.  And the more I think about it, I wouldn’t have wanted to.  It feels better to share the experience with people who care about you.

Gracias, mis seres queridos.

Sorry, I guess I'm feeling quite sentimental today.

Todo está en su cabeza

Sometimes  I get the sneaking suspicion that the things I write about in this blog – especially the ones that seem like great revelations to me – are not remotely new or interesting ideas, but are rather painfully and embarrassingly obvious.  In fact, this suspicion is strong enough and appears frequently enough to make me consider that maybe it’s a waste of time to write it - or at the very least that I should change the name to something more apt, like “A Complete Idiot’s Painfully Clichéd Guide to Life…”  I have, after all, proven myself to be capable of trying to glean wisdom from the most obvious of sources, and from my most moronic decisions.  Some of which, I might add, I seem to make again and again without ever learning any better, as I have ostensibly been endowed with the memory span of a hamster (apparently, fish have much longer memory spans than is commonly believed, by the way.  Thank you, Stephen Fry).  So, why don’t I do it?  First of all, fear of a copyright suit from Penguin Books.   And second, I guess because I’m trying to forgive my foolishness.  Isn’t this what we all do?  Stumble from one thing to the next constantly discovering, forgetting, and re-discovering the essential?  Sometimes we need the obvious to hit us over the head with the force of a heavy wooden baseball bat.  Many times.  So I keep writing, just like I keep learning.

This weekend, through various conversations, encounters, coincidences, and the secret magic of samba drums, the oh-so-obvious lesson seems to be one of attitude and perspective.  When everyone you know is going through similar struggles, and some remain cheerful while others are miserable, you can see how attitude makes a huge difference.  When positivity makes you try something different for a change, and it works to make you feel better - or when it makes you appreciate something nice instead of wondering when it’s going to start to go bad - you see it.  When 3 lines of drummers stand shoulder to shoulder making the same brilliant music, you can see how the lively, laughing, goony-looking man becomes so much more appealing and eye-catching than the beautiful but dour woman next to him.  And how the middle-aged mom who’s dancing and laughing looks funny, but much happier than the cool young couple next to her who are nodding their heads drowsily.  It’s very easy to fall prey to the idea that life is about your circumstances.  And a little bit of it is.  But mostly it’s about the joy, isn’t it?  If there is absolutely none to be found anywhere, then maybe your circumstances are making your life.  But for most of us, we can choose to mine out the enthusiasm and enchantment from what we’re already doing, in the place we already are, and then continue to follow it to wherever else it may lead us. 

I’m going to try harder to remember that this time around.  Like usual. ;-)

Something I've been thinking about for a long time: this city looks much prettier
 if you look up.
These are the same buildings, at street level, and above.

Mother's Day

A mother is a person who, seeing there are only four pieces of pie for five people, 

promptly announces she never did care for pie.  ~Tenneva Jordan

The older I get, the more of the world that I see, and the more people I meet, the more I understand that probably the most extraordinary person I have ever known is the first person I ever met: my mom.   I was talking to a friend last night about my mother, and I told him that I have never met a more loving, patient or supportive person in my life.  That if I ever met a person who honestly didn’t like her, I’d probably die from the shock of it.  That my greatest hope is that I have been able to learn enough from watching her to be even a fraction of the mother  she is when my time comes to have children of my own. 

So, on the eve of Mother’s Day in America, here are just a few of the millions of reasons I love mine:

• OK, I’ve got to say the obvious first: she gave me life.  She made me, carried me around in her body for 40 weeks, and then underwent surgery to bring me into the world.  It’s so commonplace, people having children, that I think we sometimes forget how remarkable an act it really is.
• She always encouraged me and my brothers to choose our own paths in life, and always supported whatever we chose without reservation.  I know that most parents try to do that, but so few truly succeed at it.  They’re only human, after all.  It must be maddening to be worried about your children’s’ futures but to bite your tongue when you see them making decisions that you think may be mistakes.  My mother always seemed to understand implicitly that no mind was ever changed by nagging.  She could guide, she could set an example, but she could not choose for us.  She could only offer her support as we went about tying and untying our own knots in life.  One perfect example: despite the fears I’m sure she must have about my summer plans to live in the Guatemalan jungle at an orphanage, the only things she has ever said to me about it are “I am so proud of you,” and “How can we help?” 
• She did, however, impress us with the great importance of really trying.  Quitting was frowned upon in my family.  That’s not to say it never happened, but usually not without a fair amount of discussion and thought given to whether we were quitting because something wasn’t right, or simply because it was challenging.
• She read to me.  All the time.  And when I learned how, she sat patiently and let me read to her.
• She made hard decisions and stuck to them.  Even when we told her we’d hate her for it (oh, adolescence!).  In the time I’ve spent working with kids in my life, I’ve learned only one thing: discipline is the hardest part.  When you see their sad little faces you just want to hug them, tell them it’s ok, and back down.  But if you do that, you hurt them more than you help them.  My mother made the decision to help us be better people, even if it hurt sometimes.  That said, she rarely yelled at us and never made us feel stupid or small.  I’m sure that sometimes we must have annoyed the hell out of her.  But I don’t remember her ever making me feel it.
• She’s smart and funny and, now that I’m old enough to let her be, a great friend.

Having fun in Zakopane

Like I said, that’s only a few reasons.  And of course, I wouldn’t be the person I am now without my Dad either.  His was a different set of skills and sacrifices.  But that’s a whole different holiday.

Responsibility is the watchword.

I know.  Who am I kidding?  I’m aimless and often obnoxiously resistant to the status quo.  Who do I think I am, anyway?  Well, it all started with Easter.  I had five days off work, and the flat to myself.  I like my flatmate, but the alone time was nice, too.  I wandered around in various states of undress, sunbathed on the balcony, and moved all the furniture and cleaned under, around, and above it.  I went for long walks at whatever hour of the day or night I felt like without worrying about disturbing anyone.  And while walking, I did some thinking.  I realized that in the last year, I’ve done everything I said I wanted to.  I am out in the world.  Living in a country where every day is a learning experience and I don’t take any opportunities for granted.  And it’s a pretty great life, most days.  But (there’s always a but) I also felt it, how everyone else was gathering around the table with their loved ones, celebrating the holiday, while I’d moved 5000 miles away from my family and the friends who’d known me my whole life.  And how I do not feel even a single step nearer to building a new family of my own than I was when I left my parents’ home ten years ago.

So I did what anyone would do.  I spent a few hours sitting on my bed with a dozen old issues of National Geographic spread out around me.  I looked at all the photos of far-flung corners of the earth, all the things I still want to see and do.  It usually helps me, to see everything that’s out there in the world for me.  But this time it just made me feel small.  Like one little ant crawling through the vast desert.  A speck.  Yeah, going it alone in the world is exciting.  It affords you the opportunity to feel a part of the whole world, instead of just the corner of it that you happened to be born in.  But it also means that you have more opportunity to see just how small you are.  How fleeting.  And last week, it made me wonder why I wasn’t at home (wherever home might be) building something.  Carving my name in one solid place and leaving behind a procession of people who will look a little bit like me.  Why I haven’t, at the very least, pulled someone into my orbit and together decided to share the open road with them.  I knew that the easy solution would be to say that I simply haven’t met the right person yet, dust myself off, and carry on as I was.  But it’s not true.   I’ve probably met a lot of right people.  But I never chose them.  For a variety of reasons.  Either I was busy choosing the wrong person, or I didn’t feel the need to choose anyone at the time they came around.  The point is, I brought myself here.  And I wanted to know why.  And I wanted to know if it had all been a mistake.

When life isn’t what you thought, or when things fall apart again, or even when you’ve got mixed feelings about where you’ve found yourself, it’s easy  to find something else to point your finger at.  Your job, your partner, God, circumstances, fate, the world.  And, yeah, some things are out of our control.  But it can’t be that many things.  It can’t always be something else.  And furthermore, is that really reassuring?  Does it really feel better to tell yourself that your life hasn’t been up to you at all, but rather a long string of fate, happenstance, and other people’s choices?  To kick and scream like a child and say, “This isn’t what I wanted!”  No, it’s not really fun to think about what you did to contribute to your difficult moments, to your doubts about your life, but if you force yourself to do it anyway, you can do one of two things: appreciate the choices you made because you had good reasons, or recognize your mistakes and do something different next time.  I’m not sure which one I’ve decided on yet.  Maybe a little bit of both.

And here’s the good news:  Taking responsibility has a pretty significant bright side, I’m learning.  I went for a drink with a good friend a few nights ago.  We were having a heart-to-heart about the state of our lives: the beautiful, the ugly, the confounding.  I told him that whatever else happens, I do feel pretty lucky overall, because I’ve recently been on the receiving end of a virtual cascade of love from my friends: invitations, care packages, offers of assistance with my plans for Guatemala and beyond, and unbelievably kind words.   Basically, tangible reminders of how many people I have in my life who care about me and support me.   And then my friend , in his wisdom, said this:  “Yeah, maybe you’re lucky.  But maybe there is something about you that all these people respond to.  Maybe this has something to do with you, too.”  Would you believe I’d never really considered that before?  When everything goes wrong and I feel so impossibly adrift that I just want to lie down and give up, I don’t hesitate to wonder what the hell is wrong with me.  But did you know you can take responsibility for all the good things in your life as well?  That you’ve brought wonderful things upon yourself just as surely as disappointing ones?  That taking responsibility can be more than just an act of accepting blame – it can be an act of validation, too?

Taking responsibility also means telling yourself it’s ok if things are going to be difficult.  That “easy” is not the measuring stick you should use to decide what you should do next.  For example, since I arrived in Szczecin, there have been one or two people in my ear about how difficult it is to make friends here, and how most of the teachers tend to stick with one another’s company because this isn’t the same kind of young, outgoing, friendly city that others may be.  Well, of course I ignored them.  And I got off to a fairly promising start.  But then I ran into a few walls and I, too, gave in and began to accept it as true.  And maybe there is a grain of truth in it.  But there is no such thing as a place where you can’t make friends.  There is no such thing as a place where you have nothing in common with anyone else who lives there.  You just have to find those people. 

And this is where responsibility comes in: it’s not easy.  You have to let people in.  You have to be willing to walk into rooms full of people you don’t know, who speak a language you are struggling to even understand, and let it roll off your back when they find your accent funny.  You have to laugh at yourself and simply accept the fact that you won’t understand every word of what’s going on around you.  It’s intimidating.  Scary, even.  It’s a million miles from a life where you pass comfortable days and nights with people who know you at least as well as you do, if not better.  But one moment you’re having heart palpitations about just how long a barbecue with people you don’t understand could turn out to be, and the next you’re sitting around a table with 8 Polish people and a Mexican man, drinking vodka, laughing and chatting in French, English, Spanish and Polish.  Sometimes all four at once (and yeah, ok...some more than others).  You’re making plans to go kayaking.  Receiving invitations to Barcelona and Berlin.  Happy just to be where you are.  Sure, you could have a nice family and beautiful children at home.  And maybe it’d be wonderful, life-affirming, solid.  But it would also be hard, at times.  And it doesn't even matter what it would be like, because you didn’t choose that.  You chose this.  And this is something special, too.  Something not everyone gets to do. 

And that’s what taking responsibility for your life gets you.  That’s what happens when you start from wherever you happen to be, ignore your fear, and try anyway.  You see that you’re never going to be alone if you don’t let yourself be, that for every awful day, there’s an extraordinary one, and that your life can take an infinite number of shapes, each one beautiful in its own way.  Could anything be more amazing?

Le Mal du Pays

I’ve been kind of homesick lately.  Here’s the thing, though: I don’t really miss my life in the United States.  It was too easy for me to take things for granted when I lived there.  I was talking to a friend yesterday, and he said that he thinks living abroad can become kind of an addiction, in a way.  And it’s true.  Even when you’re going about your mundane chores, there is something about all of it that is interesting and challenging and requires you to celebrate small victories.  Calling a taxi or asking for chicken at the butcher’s counter (and getting exactly what you wanted) become huge successes in your day.  Most of my friends here speak at least two languages and can tell me great stories about countries I still want to visit.  And being a bit isolated from society (both the one you left and your new one) makes it easier to step back, look at all of the millions of choices people make because they think they have to, and ask why.  [Just a few examples: Why do I need to join a gym to be healthy?  I keep healthy here with all the things I do outdoors.  Why would you continue to pay taxes in a country where there is a private police force for rich people because it is assumed that the regular police won’t do their jobs?  Why would I want to eat something that smells like that? Why do I accept it as natural that doctors (and medicine) are supposed to be expensive?  Supposed to make a profit from my health?  There are plenty more questions.  Some serious, some incredibly not serious.]

Milwaukee from the edge of Lake Michigan at the end of winter.

Anyway, back to the point.  I’m not homesick for the lifestyle I had.  What I’m homesick for, quite simply, is people.  For one thing, I miss the sheer variety of people back home.  Poland has an interesting culture and a pretty incredible history, but they’ve somehow ended up with a country that is not particularly racially diverse.  (You’ve never seen so many shades of white.)  On top of that, you rarely seem to see someone walking toward you on the street who is tattooed and grungy and has purposely messy hair, or who thinks she’s a Japanese school girl, or that it’s 1966, and it’s ok to be barefooted in a flower-print skirt while walking down a city sidewalk.  You mostly see slim, fashionable women and muscular, conventional men.  I really do miss all the colors of the people in Milwaukee.

Much more important, though, are the people I love.  Starting, of course, with my family.  There is no doubt that families are tough.  No other people on earth will ever be quite so honest with you, quite so harsh.  But if you ever need anything, no other people on earth will jump through quite so many hoops to get to you, even if they’re angry with you at the time.  No one else will tell you they miss you even when you were a huge asshole the last time you saw them.  Also, no one else could provide you with a tiny person who runs to the front door when you come home for Christmas shouting, “Auntie Rachel!  Can you sleep with me tonight?”  And that feeling is worth more than every material possession I have ever owned or hope to own. 

And then there are the friends.  The ones who’ve known me for ages and seen me from every possible angle and somehow love me anyway.  I’ve got friends back home who had to drag me off the couch and force me into the shower after a bad relationship ended.  Friends who went roller-skating with me for my 26^th birthday and then sang karaoke (and sat through my rendition of “Pussy Control” again). Who will never say no to Mexican food, and who send me pom poms, glitter and a harmonica in the mail.  Friends who told my near-suicidal lawyer-self to stop whining and quit if it was really so bad.  Friends who are really really funny.  (I just have to remember Evie asking John if he thought she was Mr. Peanut, and I still laugh until I cry).  Friends who would never tell me to come home if I’m happy, no matter how much they miss me.  

Well, I may not be coming home, but I miss you, too.  And I thought you should know.

P.S. Happy birthday, Evie!

Happily 'Til the Next One

“When you tell [grown-ups] that you have made a new friend, they never ask you any questions about essential matters. They never say to you, ‘What does his voice sound like? What games does he love best? Does he collect butterflies?’ Instead, they demand: ‘How old is he? How many brothers has he? How much does he weigh? How much money does his father make?’ Only from these figures do they think they have learned anything about him… you might say to them: ‘The proof that the little prince existed is that he was charming, that he laughed, and that he was looking for a sheep. If anybody wants a sheep, that is a proof that he exists.’ And what good would it do to tell them that? They would shrug their shoulders, and treat you like a child. But if you said to them: ‘The planet he came from is Asteroid B-612,’ then they would be convinced, and leave you in peace from their questions.”  --Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

 I went for coffee with Kate yesterday, and we realized we were both having similar fears and doubts about what we should do with ourselves.  We talked about our attempts at making the "right" choices in our lives, and how when you're afraid of making the wrong choice, it's generally due to the belief that there is a right one - that just around the corner, there will be a decision that will set off the grand chain of events that is your real life, and it will define who you become.  Do I want to be a teacher or a writer?  Speak Polish or Spanish?  A traveler or a mother?  And poof!  That's what you are.  But if you make the wrong choice, then you are (forever) the wrong thing. 

 But that's not the way it works, is it?  There is no final decision, the one that sets everything up.  One choice flows into another, and another, and another.  The most you can say, really, is that making a decision  is better than just letting things happen to you.  And that you really can't make more than one major choice at a time, make some master plan, and expect a good result.  Because the world you create with your first decision will change how you look at the second.  But despite all the pressure, does it somehow bring us comfort to believe that this majestic moment, this imposing decision, is out there, waiting for us?  That once we get it out of the way, we'll be all sorted out?  We'll know what we are?  Or to put it another way: Are we that ludicrous grown-up in our own lives who insists on knowing only the most inessential facts about ourselves? 

 For all I might say about not letting other people judge me, it has still been me, telling myself that I'm trying to become something that causes me most of my heartache when I try to slap some kind of label on myself and figure myself out.  Because even if I am a teacher, or a mother, or a traveler, what else does that say about me?  Does it change what my voice sounds like or what games I love best?  Or the fact that my best friend can still make me laugh so hard I snort?  Of course not.  Things change when you make any decision, but things change every day anyway.  A decision doesn't put me in a box where I have to be like all the other teachers, mothers, wives, single women or travelers in the world.  

Anyway, I guess my point is this: maybe it's not so comforting to think that I'll never quite be properly figured out, but it's more realistic and more forgiving.  And frankly, it feels kind of good.  I'm free to do whatever I want - I don't have to think about what it will make me, besides happier, or wiser, or at the very least, someone with a good story to tell.

Little Reminders

How many times do I have to learn the same thing over again?  I keep forgetting.  I've been stressed for weeks, trying to figure out what exactly I'm doing, where my life is heading, and how it's going to "turn out."  Then I was walking home from doing the shopping (and Spring has finally come to Szczecin, which brings me no end to joy) and I was listening to Iron & Wine, and I remembered the thing I don't want to have to keep learning the hard way:


Fuck happy endings.  It ends when you die.  
I'm gonna have a happy life.

Anyway, just thought I'd share, in case anyone else needed or wanted reminding.

A Guatemalan Summer

Casa Guatemala is a home and school for orphaned, abused and abandoned children.  The Children’s Village is located in the jungle on the banks of the Rio Dulce near the Caribbean coast in Eastern Guatemala.  It is accessible only by boat.  They care for over 250 children, relying on volunteers from around the world to do so.  Last week, I sent them a letter of application  to be a volunteer for the summer, and on Thursday I received a reply.  They want me to come.  I looked over their orientation guide for volunteers and today I wrote back, confirming with them my desire to go.  I will be spending three months there this summer, as soon as the school year is done here at the end of June.  It is an amazing organization that has been helping children for over thirty years in a country where many of the children desperately need help.

I don’t know for sure what my work will consist of, but probably I will do a variety of things.  They need people to do all of the things that parents usually do: wake the children up, get them ready for school, make sure they brush their teeth, eat, do their chores, etc.  They need people to help at the school.  They need help with their farm, and with the small hotel down the river that helps them to fund the Children’s Village.  I do know it won't be easy.  I’ll be living in the jungle.  Cold water, no electricity after 8pm, wild animals, simple living conditions.  Most of these children will have seen trouble I can’t begin to imagine.  And there are a lot of them.  But I think it will be incredibly fulfilling.  And even if it wasn’t, I’d still think it was important for me to do.

The decision to do this has been incredibly easy in some ways and incredibly difficult in others.  There has been no doubt in my mind about wanting to work with these children, notwithstanding the challenges I mentioned above.  But it’s not without sacrifice.  It will cost money to get all the way to the Rio Dulce from Szczecin.  It will cost very little to get by once I’m there, but I am also foregoing the possibility to make money this summer.  I’m leaving a comfortable flat, friends, and the relative safety of Poland behind for something unknown.  It might turn out to be better for me – I have been awfully skeptical lately about just how much “developed” society has truly done to improve the quality of peoples’ lives – but it will certainly require adjustment.   All of that in mind, I’m genuinely excited about this.  It feels right. And if you know me, you know that though it may take some time for me to make up my mind, once I’ve decided on what I want, it takes something awfully strong to get in my way for me to give up.  So I will do this, whatever it takes.

I once read an interview with someone who had done amazing things to rebuild a small village in Africa that had been ravaged by war. He was asked how he’d managed to do as much as he had, and he said that it was thanks to all the help he got from friends and family, from strangers, from all over.  They asked him how he got all these people to get involved, and he said, “I asked them.”  Well, asking for help hasn’t always been by strong suit, but this is really important to me, so I’ve decided to start.  

Here goes: I could use some help.  So far, nearly everyone has been really supportive and positive about this, and I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for that.  It’s probably the most important thing you can do to help me.  Honestly. 

But here are a few other things I’m concerned about:

• Airfare/living expenses:  This is probably my primary concern right now.  My plan is simply to save up money from work, and throw in my small tax return from 2010 to make up as much as I can, and make do with that. But you can help, too.  Maybe you (or someone you know) has airline miles you’re not using.  Maybe you know of the best website in the world for finding cheap travel deals.  Or where I can get some freelance writing or translating work on the internet (I can’t just wait tables here – my Polish isn’t good enough).  Or maybe you’ve always wanted to give me a birthday or Christmas present and never knew what to get.  Maybe you’d like to get me this year’s presents now, and have one less person on your list come December (I know, I know, it’s only March.  But I’m happy to forego gifts when these events come around in exchange for this opportunity.  There is nothing I am really lacking that can be wrapped up in paper and put under a tree.)  If you want to help me out with money, I have a paypal account under the email r.studinski (at) bellschools.pl.  Now, I know times are tough for everyone, especially in Wisconsin, right now, so I’m not expecting a lot of financial help, but I think it’s better to say this than leave it unsaid: in the event that your help (airline miles, money, etc.) allows me to come out of this with more than I need to get there and have my basic needs met, I will turn any leftover money into a direct financial contribution to Casa Guatemala.  It will not go into my bank account for beer or new shoes or whatever.
• Spanish lessons: I have exactly one year of junior high Spanish and a few months at a Milwaukee Community Center class.  I know at least some of the kids take English lessons, but they communicate in Spanish.  I’ve been working on brushing up (and learning new things), and my roommate Angela has been very encouraging and helpful, despite not speaking the language herself.  I know a few of you speak it, though. Maybe you want to write me emails in Spanish, or skype with me.  Maybe you don’t mind if I write you with random questions about the language.   Maybe you could come up with a list of useful expressions for me – you know, things like: “Give that back to him!” and “Take that out of your nose,” and “We don’t bite our friends!”
• A backpack: I will need to travel light, but I’m going to be in Guatemala for 3 months, and there are certain things I need to take.  I think a real backpackers pack is my best bet.  They are expensive.  I’m looking into buying one second-hand, but perhaps one of my readers has one I could borrow for the summer instead?  If you have to mail it to me, I can reimburse you for shipping, as it will still probably be cheaper than buying one.  I don’t mind if it’s not in brand-new condition or anything.  In fact, that’s probably better.  I don’t need to walk around looking like I have a lot of money.

OK, those are the main things I can think of right now that I have been concerned about. I’ll keep updating this blog as I make plans.  If you can help in any way, I’ll be forever indebted to you.  If you can’t, maybe you know someone who can, and you could pass this link on to them.  But as I said, the most important thing I can get from you is your support.  I'm sure this is the right thing to do, but it’s very different from anything I’ve ever done before.  So I'm a bit scared.  Maybe you have some experience that you think would be helpful for me to hear about, or you have some inspiring music for me, or you know of something that always makes you feel better when you’re nervous.  Maybe, somewhere along the way, you’ll just have a kind word for me when I get freaked out.  So far, you’ve been wonderful, and I couldn’t love you more for that.

So, thank you.  Again, and in advance, for helping me live my dreams.

Open Letter Home

Sat. 12 March 2011
I wrote this entry Thursday afternoon, just after I read the news from Wisconsin, when I was in the full swing of my rage about what's happened there.  As a result, it is full of anger and sarcasm.  I can think of one person I know who would almost certainly say it is downright bitter. 
Firstly, that's not necessarily who I want to be.  And secondly, I know a lot of my readers back home in Wisconsin are probably getting plenty of rage and hatred and spewing, both on the news and in personal conversations.  So I've considered taking it down entirely.  But I felt it, I wrote it, and a lot of you read it, so instead I'm putting it behind this warning: It's pretty angry.  
The end is hopeful, though, I think.  So, if you're up for it:

Llego a ser alguien

The last few days, I’ve been talking to people about my desire to go to Guatemala this summer to work with the orphans at the children’s village I’ve been learning about.  I’ve been congratulated, and I’ve been scolded.  I’ve been offered support and encouragement, and I’ve heard questions and suggestions.  Why Guatemala? Is it safe there?  You should try to find a safer country, a position where you’ll get paid to do good things.  Wouldn’t it be cheaper just to send them money?  I welcome these questions, because it is an  exceptionally difficult thing to do, and I should be damn sure I really want to do it before I get on that plane.  I should make sure I’ve thought of things that could go wrong.  I should make sure I know why I really want to do this.

And in all of this, it’s occurred to me that Evie’s been right all this time, going on about the self-esteem movement gone too far.  I think a lot of people in my generation grow up expecting that by the age of 30 they will either be Bill Gates or Ghandi.  So many people I know who can’t decide what to do with their lives – not even because they don’t know what they want, but because they can’t decide if it’s what they deserve, or what is the best use of their many talents, or if it’s “good enough.”  Like if they can’t do the exact thing they want to right now, they might as well not even try.  Myself included.  Maybe myself most of all.  But it’s pretty obvious to me when I see Wisconsin assemblymen and women holding meetings out in the freezing cold and snow,  or when I see how my grandmother cooks and bakes for her neighbors when they’re ill, or how my brother and sister (in-law…psh) have gone about raising my niece to be such a beautiful, caring person – and my young nephew well on his way – that there are so many ways to make a better world.  And these are only three examples of the many things we all take for granted.  Not just when other people do them, but when we do them ourselves.  I know sometimes each of these people I just described must feel like they haven’t done enough.  But if there are a million ways to make things better, we should do the one that feels right on us.  If we try to force ourselves to do it in a way that “looks” right, we’ll never be able to do it well.

So why do I want to go and do this?  Because if it’s about my perception of myself as “loving,” or “giving,” then I need to think harder, because that’s not going to get me through the tough days.  But I don’t think it is.  In the end, I really do want to do this because some very basic part of me believes in re-kindling the inherent trust and innocence of children.  Not just giving them concrete things like food and clothing and an education (though of course you can’t do much without those things. You must begin, as Lewis Carroll said, “at the beginning”), but also showing them that someone cares about them.  That they have worthwhile hopes, familiar fears, and achievable dreams.  That even as relatively powerless children, they have value and they deserve to be heard, and there is something in them to love.  That their best is nothing short of miraculous.  And there are a million ways to do this work.  The best way I think I can do it, with my temperament and my abilities, is to be there.  To look them in the eyes and be with them while they eat breakfast, get ready for class, do their chores.  To scold them when they lie, or fight, or steal.  To tuck them into bed at night.

Why does it have to be Guatemala?  It doesn’t.  But reading about this place struck something in my heart, and I haven’t been able to let it go.  Why three months?  Because it’s how much time I have away from my job.  And because kids need some semblance of stability.  Not just a week here and a week there.  And after a few months with the children (because you have to compromise, and I can’t live there full time) I will come back to my work for a while.  Be “reasonable.” Pay my bills.  Maybe save up for a chance to do it (or something like it) again next summer.  Is it safe?  Parts of Guatemala are, parts aren’t.  Like any country.  Also, see my last post.  I don’t have all the answers, and I know it will be hard, but my conviction gets stronger by the hour.  If there’s any way to make it happen by the end of June, you’ll know where to find me then.

And hey, don’t worry, Mom.  Maybe I’ll come home someday.  If Scott Walker gets his way, I’ll be talking about helping all the needy people in 3^rd world Wisconsin soon.

Too far?