Leaving soon...

I leave in a day and a half for Panama with the VIDA group. I look forward to these trips the way I always used to look forward to going to North Carolina -- and for the same reason: I always have felt that my life - my real life - was there. I felt like my real self there. Being at the beach, feeling the sand beneath my feet: cool and hard by the water's edge, hot and falling on the shore, grainy on the wooden stairs, ticklish in my sheets. And the shower...outside...shielded by glistening soft dark wood walls, but not cocooned. Air and sand at my feet. Open sky above my head. Diving into the ocean at night, its dark, frightening waves making love to me before bed...the roar and lapping in my head all night long, its caressing sounds in my ears as I wake, and slip out to meet it, to wait by its edge in the morning and be alive as the sun rises.


In India, I wear flowers in my hair, and loose clothing that's light as the wind. And I walk gently, demurely, my back straight but not proud, and I put my hands together and bow and smile gently in greeting. I feel safe there. I feel like a woman there. Like no woman I've ever been here. Just soft. Every woman should feel what it's like to be that soft. And I wake to the sound of turkeys and roosters and the humming of the people and the bugs and the water in the air. The air has weight there. It's smell and texture wake me up, and I follow it outside to the veranda where I find my way through a labyrinth of brightly colored clothes that hang in the still air of the morning.


And in Mexico, I awake on a hard cement floor, cold and stiff, to the sound of chickens pecking and dogs barking and shouted calls for "plantanos y tortillas!" over the loudspeaker of the van that drives the dusty streets every morning at 5 am. And it was hard to get started in the mornings in Mexico: stiff from the cold and the work of the day before, but you keep moving, and the sun heats up, and the dust begins to rise, and work begins again. And soon, I'm dressed in a mud-splattered t-shirt and work pants, surround by children and mud and straw, and though it hurts, my hands keep working the adobe. Working the adobe. Arriba...abajo... up... down. The straw stabs at open wounds, but then one batch is done and the next is started and the dry airy dirt is shoveled into the barrel, and then the cool water pours over your aching hands, and then as you mix it, the heavy wetness eases the cuts and scrapes and and the soreness, and the work continues...you sing and you talk and laugh with the kids and each other, and you keep working. It goes on.

It's the children, more than anything else. I love the children. And then it's the waking up early. Waking up unafraid. Knowing that I'm alive. That I'm doing work I love. That I have people to love, and that will love me. People who don't even know me as well as people I've known for years back home...they will look at me, and they will see something that few people at home seem to see. And I can love without fear and without reservation.

I'm afraid to go to Panama. I'm always afraid before one of these trips. What if it's different this time? What if the magic fails? What if I feel like a foreigner? A stranger? Will I know who I am then? When I'm in India or Mexico...like at the beach...I feel the self I never could be back home. I'm afraid: what if I go...and I'm not there? Will I ever feel at home then?

I sat out in the hammock tonight for a while, just staring at the stars...listening to the leaves shiver in the breeze. It was a nice night. I should have been in bed. There's so much to do tomorrow before I go. But I just couldn't. And there's so much I'm not saying. This work/these places/these people are close to my heart, but there are other things closer. And in these areas, it's not so clear what I'm doing, whereas on these trips I know what I'm doing. Maybe that's why I love humanitarian work so much. It's not so full of questions.

As I lay there...my heart aching for who knows what reason...the sky spoke to me. Peace covered me like a blanket, settling on me from somewhere outside myself, interrupting my thoughts and objections and cries like a gentle hand to my lips. It was a peace I couldn't deny...couldn't ignore, and my soul was quieted.

I kept thinking: "Whom do men say that I am...?" "But whom say ye that I am?" (Matt 16: 13-16)