Reflections December 29, 2012

I’m looking at photos of my students from the Christmas program and it feels like another lifetime ago.

The more I stay in this frigid artic, the less I want to leave. I’ve become as entrenched in this environment as the ice clinging to the ground. I don’t want to be uprooted again, I don’t want to be gone for so long. Six whole months. What if I become homesick?

Well, then I become homesick. And I move on.

Mom says I’m different. She says I’m calmer, that I don’t fly off the handle so much. And something else—she says I’m happier.

I ask her what she means—I want examples, specific instances to identify—but she can’t explain it any further.

I came with a checklist of items I wanted to bring back to Honduras. Shampoo, quinoa, socks, nail polish, shavers, a hair dryer—all have been filling up my suitcase until I realize this morning that I have less than ten pounds to spare.

I have a different sort of checklist now, a list of experiences I want to devour and savor before I’m whisked away. I want to see Les Miserables in theatres several times. Go ice skating at Rosa Parks Circle. Read a book. Lesson plan. Chase my dogs around at the park. Catch the eye of a cute boy. Drink wine with friends. And so much more.

I said before and mean it still—I didn’t leave Michigan to run away. And I didn’t leave Honduras wishing never to return. But 

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And that's where it ends. I don't know what was supposed to explain the "but"-- how I would have connected these thoughts in my mind. It wasn't something I planned to share. But... why not?

My Life was the Size of My Life

My life was the size of my life.

Its rooms were room-sized,
its soul was the size of a soul.
In its background, mitochondria hummed,
above it sun, clouds, snow,
the transit of stars and planets.
It rode elevators, bullet trains,
various airplanes, a donkey.
It wore socks, shirts, its own ears and nose.
It ate, it slept.  It opened
and closed its hands, its windows.
Others, I know, had lives larger.
Others, I know, had lives shorter.
The depth of lives, too, is different.
There were times my life and I made jokes together.
There were times we made bread.
Once, I grew moody and distant.
I told my life I would like some time,
I would like to try seeing others.
In a week, my empty suitcase and I returned.
I was hungry, then, and my life,
my life, too, was hungry, we could not keep
our hands off    our clothes on   our tongues from

Jane Hirshfield

being the hands and feet

This left me misty-eyed by 11 AM.

Take II, Mustache

that's about as far as my photoshop skills will take me.