I have now been back in the States a little over one week, after a near ten-month absence. A number of things have changed while I was away: a black man became president, the economy went down the proverbial toilet, Twitter became an obnoxiously ubiquitous force in popular culture, and, most notably, my beloved Conan moved west to L.A. and an hour up into television primetime.
Also, my sister has been married nearly a year. This isn't a change so much as a cold hard indicator of time that makes me sweat a little, and sad a little.
Overall, I don't feel quite like the alien I imagined myself being in the transition from Africa to Suburbia. I'm not sure if I should be comforted by that, or disgusted. Occasionally, an incredibly-mundane-yet-forgotten element of American life will catch me off guard, and I'll shout out nouns like interjections--"Paper TOWELS!" "Water Fountains!" "FAT People!" American/summertime life in general, though, has lazily resumed its pace from August 2008--a morning run, followed by black coffee, followed by nothing-in-particular, really.
As for my future plans--well, that is the topic over which I am simultaneously internally-obsessing and cerebrally-avoiding. To make a long, strange story short: I won't be returning to KICS next year, nor will virtually any of the 08-09 staff. However, nearly all of my colleagues/friends WILL be returning to Rwanda, via a new school that is opening in September. Due to low enrollment in the secondary program, however, this new school does not have a position to offer me. Without sounding too melodramatic, it feels a bit like being dumped by my life--my most current life, anyways--one that I had fallen in love with. Or that I didn't get an invite to some hip new secret club. It's no one's fault, and I don't want to sound like a child, or overly bitter. I'm almost through feeling sorry for myself now, but I'm not too proud to admit that I spent many of my last days in Rwanda feeling adrift, and irrelevant, and more than a little heartbroken.
So. The future. There's a chance that enrollment will increase, and I'll have a job, but it's kind of a pipe dream, and nothing to bank on. I could theoretically return to Rwanda and find a lesser-paying job somewhere else, but part of me wonders if this is the universe's way of nudging me elsewhere--no, not nudging; slamming a door. Which makes me more than a little peeved at the universe, or God, or whatever it was that brought me to Rwanda in the first place. (Pardon my passive voice construction. I'm fully aware that I need to evaluate my locus-of-control). I know I gained more than I can now realize from the past year, and I'll cherish the friendships I've made forever, but with "the next step" so indistinct there is the nagging question of "what it all meant." I'm terrified of losing it, of forgetting; of the past year fading like the dream it so often felt like. I feel a bit like a character in some sci-fi movie, who enters some weird parallel universe, undergoes some life-altering reality, then returns years later to his previous existence to discover that he's only been gone a few hours. Or like Ulysses in Tennyson's poem. After years of pining for Ithaca and Penelope, battling gods and monsters, sailing the world with his men, and feeling utterly exhausted but alive, he finally returns home, only to find himself. . .well, older and bored. An "idle king," administering law to a "savage race, that hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me." Only, I never wanted to go home that badly in the first place.
It's strange--this summer is in so many ways identical to last summer that at times I feel like the last year didn't happen at all. Which terrifies me. I'm certainly not the exotic, tanned, toned, benevolent orphan-cradling "back-from-Africa" Jess that I imagined at one time I'd probably be (should be?) by now (but then again, when have I ever transformed into my expectations?) If possible, now I only feel even more confused and anxious about the future.
Oh, and now I can drive a stick shift.
3 comments:
Mer Bear, your entries are a work of art. I love reading them. Don't worry too much about the future right now. Just chill for a bit and then move to China. TRUST ME.
See, the stick shift. Proof that you *actually* survived in Africa. Nothing could be more solid. And don't worry about figuring out what it all meant...it's just a part of you now :)
Man, I didn't (but should have) learned to drive a stick in Spain. I had one lesson! Keep us updated on your future. I'm in super duper limbo with you...and feeling very similarly despite the fact that we lived on different continents for a time.
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