I heard someone say recently that “graduation is right around the corner.” And I thought about that, for just a second. I thought…no, not really, it’s in 11 days and I’m scared shitless.
But I thought harder for a second longer and in a rare instance of me agreeing with strangers and giving them credit, I understood that they were right. They didn’t know the truth they were saying, but I’ll give them some sort of approval.
You see, when something is “right around the corner,” you instantly know two things. One, you’re on a journey of some sort; you’re moving and thus you’re able to be around the corner at some point in the future. Two, you can’t see what it is that is around the corner.
Graduation is this big idea; it’s this overwhelming event and process and experience that culminates four years of study and training. It represents those four years. Most of me loves that. Part me thinks it’s not enough.
Like, really? I walk down a row of chairs, shake the university president’s hand and walk off. I pose for some pictures, go home and get drunk with friends. When you strip it down to that level, it in all honesty sounds like an average weekend.
That thought came out through a terribly pessimistic filter, but it was an honest filter.
Aren’t four years worth more than a ceremony? Shouldn’t the hours of keystrokes and pencil marks and late nights and early mornings and cross country trips and published articles and jobs and volunteer work and classes and tests count for more?
I feel like part of my “problem” (Quote marks added for subjectivity and for the realization of my privilege) is that I don’t have any plans for after graduation. I think that if I had an idea of what I’d be doing and where I’d be living, I could get excited about the next chapter of my life. Not knowing, however, is creating this gargantuan black hole of uncertainty into which all my happy emotions are draining.
I’m hopeful that I’ll get things figured out; but until that point, I’m doubting the worth of a bachelor’s degree in a world that generally, and closetly, despises college students while requiring that people have a college education.
I don’t know. I guess that’s the bottom line. After four years of a college education I’m saying “I don’t know.” I’m not sure if that’s a testament to a failing higher education system or an indicator of me actually being smart enough to admit when I don’t know something.
What I do know, though, is how completely worthless it feels to get rejected from entry-level jobs even with “BA Degree” on my resume. I guess I know now, in some way, how some 8.8 percent of Americans feel. Jobless.
Awesome. Maybe not.
I know I sound terribly bitter. Probably because I am. But somewhere in my heart of coal, I know graduation will evolve into a good thing for me. It has to.
I might just cry if it doesn’t. And I hate crying almost as much as I hate not having a plan.
Here’s to you, Humboldt State. And to hoping that my next post is much more upbeat than this one.
Grandma’s rosary clinks as it tumbles out of her hand. For a minute Jesus falls, still crucified, until the string of purple beads hang him, suspended in air, swinging slightly. Her fingers fumble purposefully over the beads as she tells us about how she worries a lot lately.
I want to tell her that she always worries, and always has. But doing that might add another worry to her list of worries, thus making her worry more, and I don’t want to do that. Not now. Not on the way to a hospital. Not on the way to see my dad.
She says at another point during the day, this time in the hospital room, this time with Jesus slipped safely and reliably in her purse, that “tomorrow” is her new thing. Quite literally, she says that.
“Tomorrow is my new thing.” Her Filipino accent crushes the “th” in “thing,” and I smile.
She says, “Today might not be so good, but tomorrow will be better. I have to tell myself that, you know. I tell myself that.”
I think about it for a moment as I watch my dad. He grimaces as he pushes himself up in his bed to eat the soup they have brought him for lunch. A grimace. Completely out of character. Worried. Completely out of character. Not invincible. Completely out of character.
But I realize, leaning up against a window with a view of nothing that Grandma is right. She is normally right about these things. Tomorrow can be better. 2011 can be better, not because 2010 wasn’t, but because there is always the hope for improvement. For me, for you, for our families and friends, for the human condition. It is that hope that can make 2011 a good year. And it’s one of the only hopes we can really hold on to.
I think of my dad sitting in his hospital room. The Discovery Channel plays some repetitive reality show while he bounces his knee. Nurses walk in and out. Everything is so orderly. And I think of the nameless feet I can see through the propped open doors of the other hospital rooms. The white rubber tread on the bottom of the socks is the only interesting thing about that view... save for a stray balloon. Even that... even the most ridiculous of the ridiculous... is mundane in a hospital. And I think: Tomorrow is all they have. And most of them are happy for tomorrow. I am happy for tomorrow. And I think, friend, that you should be, too. We all should be.
Deception Pass is touted by visitors, writers and promoters as the most-visited state park in Washington. It's milky blue-green waters that rage beneath a bridge of the same color draw in spectators who, maybe by accident, stumble upon the used-but-deserted trail systems that the park boasts. Rock heads covered in Ireland-green grass and small, scraggly wind-abused border the park with views of the bridge. These sentinels are look out points, improvised picnic areas, places to nap and they themselves are places to explore.
The park is, for the most part, overwhelmingly immaculate with few traces of people on the right day. Since winter weather in Western Washington isn't unlike weather during most parts of the year, a little rain and cold wasn't a problem for the day's adventure.
Our group started by walking Rosario Point, which, from the Bowman Bay parking lot (before getting to the Deception Pass Bridge on SR-20) is, looking at the water, to the right. The short trail is well-manicured and direct, but has awesome views and several places to detour and look around, including beaches, climbing rocks and bluffs. Rosario Point itself is a small peninsula with tall cliffs that fall straight down into beds of kelp. We were able to see a few whales and seals there while we ate lunch on the grassy hill that makes up the Point's far side. Making it back to the parking lot in a few minutes, we continued to Lighthouse Point, which, despite its name, doesn't have a real lighthouse.
A green beacon with the number 3 stands on the far side just north of the bridge-viewing area, but it is a far cry from a lighthouse. Regardless, the Point has spectacular views and a large amount of trails for exploring. Some of the heads that jut from the point are covered in grass that are perfect for taking breaks.
Exploring is perilous, as we found out. But it is extremely worth it, especially at Deception Pass.
To Arrive:
Head north on I-5 to exit 230 and take a left onto SR-20 and follow signs for Oak Harbor. Turn right on Rosario Road and then 100 yards after, turn left to Bowman Bay where the parking lot is. To get to the Deception Pass Bridge, continue on SR-20 instead of turning on Rosario Road for a few more miles.
It has been a long while since I've posted on this blog, but considering the given circumstances of my life, which I hope to go in to some detail later, I decided to attempt to use this space adequately. I can't promise that posts will be regular, but I hope to update as often as possible with information and writing that you might find relevant and interesting.
For now, I'm posting my experience on my dad's kidney transplant from my aunt who was a living donor. He has Polycystic Kidney Disease, and this new kidney has already helped him to feel much better.
Here's to your health, right?
In an operating room, I imagine the surgeon standing over the brown body, the Filipino body. It is motionless on a table and there are lights on above them... the light might even reflect a little off the skin. The lights are white and clean, just like the clothing and the walls and the instruments… like the knife that the surgeon holds in their hand. It is cool and steady as it approaches the body. The flesh seems to part on its own as the knife effortlessly opens the skin, the muscle, the tissue. It gleams as the surgeon’s hand moves like artwork over this body. My father’s body. My aunt’s body. That kidney. Whose kidney? In a hospital waiting room, a small group of people sits in a circle holding hands, praying. Their heads are bowed and their knuckles are white. Their tears hit the floor as they repeat the name, the prayer, the question, the object, “God,” “God,” “God?” “God.” Their faith in the Creator may be unshakeable, but their reliance on human hands is more easily doubted, more easily questioned. They thank Him for letting Them do their work. They say things like “Thank you,” and “Please,” but not in that order. They all seem very polite about the thing, using good manners to ask this God for things like life, if life were a thing. And if you could ask for it. And if it could be given or taken. In a lonely hallway, there are people crying; their faces are in their hands and they sob in a language I don’t recognize. No- they speak in a language I don’t recognize, but their sobs are a language that we all understand. They stand in the corner of a hallway, looking through the lenses of their sadness out the lenses of the window into the grey endlessness of the Washington skyline. Their tears streak their fingers and their cheeks as they eye me as I pass. Their eyes prod me; they simultaneously tell me to keep walking and also to offer some sort of reciprocal emotion. Maybe to tighten my cheek muscles, motioning to smile, but not quite making it. It’s the sign you give people when you sympathize with them, but don’t want to connect too deeply. Then there is crying in the waiting room, but their tears aren’t the hot, confused ones of the hallway. They are the relief of letting out a held breath. They are the happiness of possibility. These tears are good tears. This operation was a good one. Again, they say “God,” but this time, they only say “Thank you.” The smiles that creep upon their faces seem foreign to the envious people around them, who smile in their direction because they’re supposed to, and because it’s all too real and because they want to be able to do this thing called praise. Or prayer. The owners of the tears pick their bags off the floor and walk for the door with heavy legs and tired eyes. Their sacks are full of magazines and nibbled bits of crackers and fruits, they feel victorious. But the real victors are lying on hospital beds waiting for the Doctor, the real Champion, to pump a syringe full of something into their brown arm so that they can wake up. The Doctor, He walks around the room in his clean, cool, crisp clothing. It’s still white. He exits and walks the halls, not white, but cream and He feels good. Elsewhere, He looks down from above or from all around or from wherever He is and I imagine Him smiling His ethereal smile that, if He opened it, could gobble up this planet and all of those around it. God does what He wants. Today, I’m just glad He did what He did.
Coming back from Chile was originally too easy. I knew it the moment I stepped off the plane. It was all too easy to be true.
A whirlwind summer of reunions, of unions, of meetings and parties and outings made coming back to the United States an experience of many different sorts. You, friend, could say that maybe I didn’t allow myself time to adjust or to really process my “home”coming. I feel like maybe I’ve been somehow avoiding the chore of dealing with my feelings towards having to leave Chile by maxing out my schedule this fall.
At times, I feel like that’s a good thing. Idle hands won’t have time to pick at my idle heart; idle fingers won’t sort through the emotions of missing a home and a routine that had been normalized to the point of being… well, normal. But then, when I let my guard down, Chile creeps back onto my radar. It sneaks into my dreams, silently turning knobs and nudging open the doors to my mind and my imagination and Chile tip toes through my thoughts, pushing memories of friends and places into my vision so that for a while, a short while, all I can think about is last year. Chile has this sly way of penetrating my being so that I can taste one of Amira’s sopaipillas, her famous salsa arabe dripping off the edge of the bread. I can feel the grease on my fingers as I reach into my wallet for my BIP! card, scanning it and pushing my way onto the bus, nestling into a spot shoulder-to-shoulder with other people making their way up Irarrazaval to the comfort of their homes.
I miss Chile, friend. I do. I miss it terribly to the point that I want nothing more than to go back for just a bit and revisit everything and everyone.
But I realize that Chile was an experience. It was a time in my life that has shaped me and provided me with an endless source of energy and inspiration. And I love that. But I also realize that maybe missing Chile, maybe the acknowledgment that I’m not in Chile anymore and the pain of accepting that, is part of the process of coming back. Maybe, friend, I should have given myself time when I got back to think these thoughts.
“Reverse Culture Shock” is the term they use, I think. It’s the idea that, after having experienced culture shock upon entering a new place for the first time, you can experience the same feelings when coming back to your original culture some time later. I can’t say that I’m at all or in any way “shocked” by the United States. For the most part, the country continues to be the same one I left. We continue to believe that we are THE “America.” And by “we” I mean White Male America. We continue to be a country where everyday citizens can consider themselves poor despite several television sets and sofas in their house. We continue to be a country that oppresses and denigrates and marginalizes minorities. We are the America that can preach against yet simultaneously practice colonialism and cultural genocide. We are the few, the proud, the Red, White and Blue.
I’m not shocked by these things. I am shocked by how easily I came back to them. Maybe that’s part of the process, too. I’m willing to say that to just about anything right now, friend. In thinking about readjusting to life in California, I can’t imagine there is one right or wrong way of doing things. I can, however, see there being guidelines, and one of those, I’m sure, is to be open to new things, as was my policy in going to Chile.
So far, friend, I have to say that this approach has worked quite well and that, in leaving a country I grew to love and identify with, being open to new things has made coming back to “familiarity” a surprising and welcome adventure.
Chile will be forever, but it never was forever. I’ll never forget it. I’ll go back. I’ll dream of it always and often. But I have to do me. I have to do what I do, where I’m at. And I have to learn to create, seek and welcome happiness here.
I’m not sad over Chile. No. I don’t want you to think that. But I do want you to know that I’m working through whatever one would call my feelings about last year. I’m readjusting quite nicely. I’m happy. And I’m happy that you are a part of this adventure that we call “living.”
This is the story of a boy. It is the story that began over a year ago and has endured ever since. The story is a fairytale, only understood by the dragons and princesses that lived the experience. The story takes place in foreign lands with strange languages and customs. And there is magic. There most definitely is magic.
And like all stories, this one must end.
Happy endings and ever-after’s in any context are subjective, and so it is that saying goodbye to Chile is a process filled with mixed and varied emotions.
For the past few weeks, I have painfully counted down the days, the parties, the final exams and the goodbyes until now. I have a few days left, but I do want everyone in Chile to know how much they mean to me. Especially, amigo, how much you mean to me.
With a wave of the finger, I put off this moment for as long as I could, refusing to acknowledge the wrenching emotions of being uprooted and torn from a life I have come to enjoy and normalize; of a life built and lived and enjoyed here in this city.
“It must be weird to go back to normal life,” said our program director last week. “This is my normal life,” I replied.
I can’t pretend like I haven’t noticed the smiles over the past few weeks, the ones that so obviously concealed a hint of pain, of knowing that whatever moment we were in would never be reproduced because I am, by no fault of my own, transient in this country.
Transient, yes. But not fleeting. You see, it was tempting and at times easy to treat my time here in Chile like a vacation, or as if I were merely visiting this country of extremes. Understanding that I was here with limited time was never something I had to struggle with; however approaching it as something more than a tourist’s destination was what made my experience (and that of many of my friends) different, I feel like. Being a resident, albeit foreign, made being in Santiago for the last year much more rewarding in the sense that I was (am) able to integrate to some extent into a society which generally is very guarded towards outsiders.
A foreign resident. I guess that would be an accurate way to sum up this year. My status here has always been that of a “foreigner,” no matter how accepted I was in a given situation. People calling me “the gringo” or “the immigrant,” were endearing most of the time.
You see, friend, ever since the excited restlessness of “going home” began to leak into my bloodstream, making my body tense with anticipation and dread, I have been caught between two extremes of my experience: I’ve wanted for a while to see my family and friends, to drive down Soundview Drive with untied running shoes on my feet and a pair of $10 sunglasses on my face. I’ve longed for 6th Ave. and the Narrows Bridges and rocky beaches with cold waters. I’ve also missed desperately towering giants called Redwoods, cracked roads that stretch into the Bottoms and the Westwood neighborhood.
But despite all of these things pulling me back “above” the equator, there is absolutely nothing pushing me from, and out of, Santiago. I cannot bring myself to imagine saying goodbye to anyone for the last time. To realize that a single handshake, hug, kiss on the cheek and look in the eye could be (and probably will be) the last time I see many of my friends here is something that is impossibly difficult to grasp, not only because of its magnitude, finality and unfortunate truth, but because it is something that I have, like many people, never had to deal with. It is arguably something that shouldn’t have to be dealt with.
For a while, I will admit, I was worried about how I was dealing with leaving. While many of my friends told stories of crying while looking through pictures from this year or of plans for extending their trip by a couple weeks, I was starting my 10-day countdown, so far tearless, and making plans for the summer in Washington. I felt like maybe I wasn’t as connected to Chile or its people (my friends) as I thought I was. In all honesty, I would have rather spent a night crying while looking at parties from my first days here than being pumped on going home because that, to me, would have been an appropriate, understandable and healthy reaction to my present circumstances. Being excited to leave Chile was inappropriate, I thought. Let me rephrase, it was being excited to go back to the United States, not necessarily to leave Chile.
However, with 9 days to go, I shut down physically and emotionally and entered a 12-hour depression slump which, after some careful examination, was/is my response to dealing with leaving a place and an experience which I have loved. It wasn’t an outright breakdown, there were no tears, but there was a desire to not have to deal with the goodbyes or to face the fact that this, like everything, must end.
I had always imagined that weekend being epic- crazy parties that lasted until mid-morning and tribute songs and empty bottles and walks through the city at night. That’s how it was supposed to be. You see, in a twisted and dark context, all of this seems rather romantic. People hugging and saying goodbye, a tear falling over the edge of an eyelid, music in the background and balloons on the floor. It’s an ideal way to leave a country. However, as I must realize, that isn’t the only nor necessarily the right way to leave a country. Returning the USA might be as simple as packing my bags and getting on the plane. And is that a bad thing? Would that be a bad thing? For a while, I thought so. I still dislike the idea. I’d rather go out with a bang and leave a positive and memorable mark on Santiago, but I have to also be happy with this year as a whole and not base my “success” in studying abroad on one party in one weekend.
An example of this realization came last night when I went grocery shopping for the last time. For a few months, (Baby) Tay(lor) and I have had the tradition of going grocery shopping at the local supermarket every Sunday night. We’d meet on the corner in between our buildings and then walk under street lamps by San Borja Park where gender-ambiguous teenagers would meet, as if that park was a designated refuge from the judgmental eye of the conservative streets that surround it. We’d wheel our red baskets through each and every aisle, every week, starting with produce and ending with buying bread and maybe even some cookies. But last night, I didn’t meet Taylor. I normally catch her online sometime during the afternoon and we make plans to meet; but because of school, she wasn’t online. So, I slowly stumbled down the street in my sweats, past the park and through the plaza and around the corner into the fluorescent lights of the doorway of the market where a merchant was selling hats, flags, scarves and banners for the next day’s World Cup game against Switzerland (later won by Chile 1-0). Clumsily and with heavy eyelids, I grabbed my basket and began the shopping routine that I had countless times repeated with Taylor, recounting the adventures of the weekend. But this time, I was alone. A nondescript song played from my iPod as I weaved through the aisles, thinking about all the things I would never have to buy again in Chile. It was a somber experience. While looking at the chocolate, I felt a tap on my shoulder. As I turned around, I pulled a headphone out of my left ear and then saw a red-faced Taylor.
“I’m so sorry. I totally spaced,” she said, with watery eyes. “I just ran here.” I gave her the customary kiss on the cheek and hug and told her that it wasn’t anything to worry about and that I understood.
“It’s no big deal, really. We can just go shopping next Sunday before my flight.”
Pulling away, I saw that the tears had started.
“No, I feel so stupid,” Taylor said, wiping her cheek. “I love shopping with you!”
You have to know, friend, that this was a ritual for us. And this last day was an important one for both us that, for many reasons, meant a lot.
It was in that (not-so)romantic movie-scene moment that my last week in Chile officially began. And it is because of friends like Taylor and many others that I’m so happy with my year abroad.
However, I can’t pretend that the past few weeks haven’t been enjoyable or that they haven’t brought relief. Ending this semester in school is, like always, a relief- to be done with this semester marks the end of my junior year and the beginning of my senior year, a transition which, also given its finality, makes it seem like a big deal. Today being the first day of winter (or summer, depending on your hemisphere), it makes sense that I/we discuss change and its significance and inevitability in life. But as much as change has been a theme of this fairytale, as they say, some things never change.
So, just like our first night here when we stumbled upon a riot in Plaza Italia, it also makes sense that I should experience another riot in the same place today, but after Chile’s win against Switzerland in the World Cup. I would be lying completely if I said that standing amidst thousands of people in red soccer jerseys wearing red, white and blue face paint jumping up and down, waving flags, lighting fire crackers and throwing confetti (and throwing bottles at police cars, cornering a group of riot police against a building, fighting, pick pocketing and vandalizing buildings) is something I wouldn’t miss. In fact, if you put the word “Chilean” in front of anything, it’s quite probable that I will miss it.
Sadly, this could quite possibly be my last blog update from Chile. And if that is the case, my friend, know that this year has been the most memorable of all. Know that I don’t take anything back. Know that I have grown and changed and evolved in indescribable ways. Know that, in this fairytale, I saved the princess and killed the dragon. Know that this story does have a “happily ever after” ending. And know that you have made it all significant and important.
There are things you wrestle with, you know. Things that are life decisions, or that change your daily life. They are decisions that you don´t take lightly and they are ones which require a lot of thought. Wrestling with these options and choices and alternatives and pros and cons and why´s and why not´s and what have you is difficult. It´s tiring. But it is always important. What I have found, though, is that God speaks to me in impulses (Side note: The problem with this sort of communication is separating ¨divine¨ impulses with normal ones, if the two are really even that different). So, when I not-so-accidentally received the Humboldt Cross Country meet schedule yesterday, my aching longing to again run for that team and my impulse to E-mail the new head coach were the answer to the question that has been bothering me for the past several months: should I run next fall or not? I urgently sent out a few E-mails to friends seeking advice, even though I already knew what I was going to do about the situation. Deciding to run Cross is the right choice, I think. It does change my outlook on this coming semester and how I was approaching it. But, in the end, I do think that it is a decision that is truer to who I am than the decision to not run. Going back to Humboldt will be interesting. Not only will I have been away for a year, but also it is my last year; additionally, Sandy won´t be there as a coach and a few of my best friends have left Humboldt. Running then, isn´t just something that makes me happy and that I want to do, but it is something that familiarizes a place that, upon return, will be completely different. But change is something that must be embraced, just like Primetime TV shows have told us for years. Change isn´t something that happens on occasion but it is a state in which we live constantly and inescapably. A process of elimination leaves optimism and opportunism as the only two logical and healthy reactions to what is now going on in my life. Less existentially, as I ran today, I ran a normal distance on a normal route, but I felt better. I felt like me. I felt purposeful. Running alone in Chile for the next month will be difficult and boring, but it will be a lot better than not running, and it will be a lot better now having something to run for. So with this difficult decision behind me and a whole season of possibilities ahead of me, I´m excited. And most of all, I´m happy with the decision I made.
