Dear Readers
Took a trip up to the capital today. Tomorrow I have to get my green card. This means I've spent a cheerful day passing the hours in the Peace Corps headquarters. Bought some ice cream and checked my mailbox--no letters. Sad day. But, happy day, visited with a bunch of volunteer friends from training!
Eventually I may swing up to Pantoja again, to visit my host family there, but I am giving it time. Sounds like the guy I dumped is feeling like shit and miserable, so he needs lots of time to forget me. I could feel bad about this but in a way I am just letting it slide. Time will heal him far more than I could at this point. Things happen. I've changed and my heart changed with me.
This is a mistake I regret, and one I will not make again. I know my facebook posts have been cryptic and a little schitzo, but really, things are very smooth going in the site with the guy. I'm just frustrated with myself because I know I need time, but there are moments when I am ready to start up with the one person right now, even if I shouldn't and even though I WILL NOT. So yeah. That's that. He is unbelievably patient, or unbelievably in love, or a little of both. He's willing to wait for me. In the meantime, I spent time with him as a friend. It makes me very happy, and I teach him English and he explains as much as I need explained in Spanish, multiple times if necessary, so all is well.
I've been in the capital not even half a day and I already miss my site. I miss the quiet, broken by the occasional roar of a motor. I miss knowing people as I walk down the streets and calling salutations to the Doñas. I miss visiting the river and talking with the restaurant owners. I miss the roar of the waves crashing into the beach, over and over again, so loud I can even hear it during quiet moments at the house. I miss the wind which blows off the sea and the heavy greenery in the forests and the mountains. I think it is fair to say that even if I am holding back my heart from men, I am unreservedly giving it to the land around me. I can only think of one place in the world I love more, and that is my home in the pine forests of northern Minnesota.
At this rate, I hardly know how I will leave in two years. My friend has told me that when the last volunteer left, the entire town threw a party for him and he sobbed all night. I could believe it. I've never met him, nothing more than stories and a single photo from the volunteer magazine last spring, but he sounds like the sort of volunteer every volunteer dreams of being. He knew everyone, he built cool things, he had the total respect of an entire pueblo, and he gave his all to his work. I cannot even imagine what it will be like to build a life for myself over the course of two years, and then have to say goodbye.
For right now, I am constructing that life. There is no time to imagine deconstructing it. I'll be starting up week after next, when the school exams are finished. Need to get the Center up and clean, remove all the dead bugs and lizards and cobwebs and dust, and then start up the literacy program with the high school students. We'll be teaching kids who are about to repeat third grade. It's good work, and I am pleased to be doing something constructive. I feel once I begin working I can start to have a more steady grasp of my life in my site. And I have to run the diagnostic. That will be an activity all its own. I'll need to talk to my co-teachers about it. They can help, or know people who can help.
This is the Dominican Republic. There is always time, just as there is always space on a guagua, or more rice, or another mango. Sometimes I forget and become impatient, but in time, I may become less American and more Dominican about time. Who knows. That's for the future to know.
Dominican Wolf
Took a trip up to the capital today. Tomorrow I have to get my green card. This means I've spent a cheerful day passing the hours in the Peace Corps headquarters. Bought some ice cream and checked my mailbox--no letters. Sad day. But, happy day, visited with a bunch of volunteer friends from training!
Eventually I may swing up to Pantoja again, to visit my host family there, but I am giving it time. Sounds like the guy I dumped is feeling like shit and miserable, so he needs lots of time to forget me. I could feel bad about this but in a way I am just letting it slide. Time will heal him far more than I could at this point. Things happen. I've changed and my heart changed with me.
This is a mistake I regret, and one I will not make again. I know my facebook posts have been cryptic and a little schitzo, but really, things are very smooth going in the site with the guy. I'm just frustrated with myself because I know I need time, but there are moments when I am ready to start up with the one person right now, even if I shouldn't and even though I WILL NOT. So yeah. That's that. He is unbelievably patient, or unbelievably in love, or a little of both. He's willing to wait for me. In the meantime, I spent time with him as a friend. It makes me very happy, and I teach him English and he explains as much as I need explained in Spanish, multiple times if necessary, so all is well.
I've been in the capital not even half a day and I already miss my site. I miss the quiet, broken by the occasional roar of a motor. I miss knowing people as I walk down the streets and calling salutations to the Doñas. I miss visiting the river and talking with the restaurant owners. I miss the roar of the waves crashing into the beach, over and over again, so loud I can even hear it during quiet moments at the house. I miss the wind which blows off the sea and the heavy greenery in the forests and the mountains. I think it is fair to say that even if I am holding back my heart from men, I am unreservedly giving it to the land around me. I can only think of one place in the world I love more, and that is my home in the pine forests of northern Minnesota.
At this rate, I hardly know how I will leave in two years. My friend has told me that when the last volunteer left, the entire town threw a party for him and he sobbed all night. I could believe it. I've never met him, nothing more than stories and a single photo from the volunteer magazine last spring, but he sounds like the sort of volunteer every volunteer dreams of being. He knew everyone, he built cool things, he had the total respect of an entire pueblo, and he gave his all to his work. I cannot even imagine what it will be like to build a life for myself over the course of two years, and then have to say goodbye.
For right now, I am constructing that life. There is no time to imagine deconstructing it. I'll be starting up week after next, when the school exams are finished. Need to get the Center up and clean, remove all the dead bugs and lizards and cobwebs and dust, and then start up the literacy program with the high school students. We'll be teaching kids who are about to repeat third grade. It's good work, and I am pleased to be doing something constructive. I feel once I begin working I can start to have a more steady grasp of my life in my site. And I have to run the diagnostic. That will be an activity all its own. I'll need to talk to my co-teachers about it. They can help, or know people who can help.
This is the Dominican Republic. There is always time, just as there is always space on a guagua, or more rice, or another mango. Sometimes I forget and become impatient, but in time, I may become less American and more Dominican about time. Who knows. That's for the future to know.
Dominican Wolf
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