The Space Between

This month has been a lot about me coming to terms with being back in Africa, and being comfortable in that space. Much of the adjustment is second nature at this point. The fishbowl stares when I walk down the street; fumbling through local language; tolerating the heat and unforgiving sun; meeting new people and seeking harmony in beliefs and experience; navigating public transportation. And being mindful of my expectations, leading to the ever-forgiving lessons of: Patience. Tolerance. Acceptance. Nothing in Africa happens quickly. Nothing. I should know better by now, I’m fully aware of this… but I have learned that just by acknowledging the difficulties of a situation, or even predicting potential pitfalls doesn’t make working through them any easier.

I have never consumed so much tea. I’m not even entirely convinced that I like tea, but it takes up roughly 45 minutes of my seemingly endless nine hour work day. As a dear friend noted this week, this period of adjustment feels a bit like swimming through mud. I sleep ridiculous amounts. Nap at lunch, nap after work, in bed by 9:30pm. I make lists. Compulsive, overly-detailed lists. Small tasks that will make me feel remotely better about my daily existence. Many days these efforts prove fruitless, others are slightly more successful. And I start over again the next day. I have no other choice. 1. Shave head: today, this took roughly two hours for an otherwise effortless ten minute activity. Solution: take off the guard and avoid sun at all costs until any hair grows back. Awesome. 2. Check email: uh, no comment. 3. Laundry: while the guesthouse maintains a washing machine, its functionality is quite the mystery. Some days, the cycle finishes in a reasonable 45 minutes. Other days, three-and-a-half hours later and it’s still stuck in spin cycle. 4. Finish 750 page book (that you started yesterday). 5. Nap. 6. Eat Ramen noodles. 7. Revamp failed exercise routine. 8. Drink another cup of tea. 9. Pluck eyebrows. 10. Paint fingernails. 11. Watch six hours of Glee. 12. Take a shower. These are the things that are currently consuming my schedule. It’s discouraging at best but I just keep telling myself its temporary. It’s the adjustment period.

Three weeks after arriving at work, I am still patiently awaiting permanent housing, driving lessons, Swahili classes, finance tutorials, and basically any remotely useful activity that doesn’t make me feel like I’m getting fatter by the mere act of sitting at my desk. I love my colleagues. I am inspired by the work that we do. Honestly. But right now I just don’t feel like an asset, like I’m contributing, like I’m being utilized in any way that makes me feel valued and excited to show up to work every day. And that’s the hard part…the waiting. I know sometime very soon, I’ll turn that corner and suddenly be swamped with project proposals, site visits, and meetings. And I very much anticipate that time. It’s the space between that’s the killer. The big downer. The self-doubter. Because if I’m not here for the work, what the hell am I doing here? All the sacrifice wouldn’t be worth the trouble. And all those seeds of doubt would blossom into trees. And then where would I be?

Tilt-A-Whirl

Whirlwind, whirlwind, whirlwind. It’s incredible to think about where I was a week ago, and the week before that, and the two weeks before that. More amazing is our capacity to shift from place to place, city to city, mental space to mental space, and come out seemingly unscathed on the other side (a bit bruised and battered nonetheless). In the past month, I left my beloved city of New Orleans, spent a week soaking up the comfort and loving space of family and home, spent an exhausting week of fellowship training in Baltimore, and sigh…here I am again, on the continent of Africa. Don’t get me wrong. This month was riddled with mixed emotions: fluctuating between being robotically numb to desperately heavy-hearted and trying to manage my ever-changing feelings of doubt, guilt, excitement, sadness, and acceptance. I guess it’s easier to coast through difficult transitions, as a survival mechanism to allow us space to adapt and breathe, hoping that a few weeks or months down the road, we’ll actually be able to take a deep breath and process what the hell just happened to us.

Leaving New Orleans was hard, but in a really affirming sort of way. I was feeling conflicted about leaving the city, felt like I was abandoning it in some strange way, not sure I was ready to walk away from my life there and the energy and comfort that physical space gave me. But as a friend recently counseled, it’s pretty incredible that I am at a point in my life where I’m choosing between two loves, and that I have multiple places on this glorious planet that make me feel that I belong. Granted, it didn’t stop my mind from ricocheting; recognizing that I am quite possibly just one of those people that always misses what I don’t have.

Time spent with family created a generous space for reflection, allowing me to digest my departure from New Orleans and my impending move back to the continent of Africa. It was days of creeping fear and tugging guilt of leaving my family and once again facing the unknown. It was the joy of welcoming a new niece into this world. There was the purity of spending time with my nieces at the pool, or sharing meals with my parents, or laughing over holiday memories with extended relatives. I felt heavy-hearted at times, wondering if I was making the right choice, wondering if I could continue this kind of life.

And just like that, I am in Tanzania, where adjusting to day to day life seems almost secondary, natural. And without much effort, your day to day existence settles in, and you realize that while this lifestyle polarizes the world you knew in the dirty south, it is still your life, and you are pretty content and familiar and comfortable with this space, too. And maybe it’s a blessing to realize that after all the questions and worry and fear, you come to the conclusion that quite possibly your quest for balance can be achieved in more places than just one…that quite possibly you’ve reached a point in your life where the world you left is equally appreciated to the world you’ve just arrived in. Perhaps that’s happiness. Perhaps it’s peace. Perhaps it’s just your home away from home for this moment in time.