Monthly Archives: June 2015

gifted shirt

Final tidbits

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Today I finished the science recuperation exams for those who failed the term, hugged goodbyes to the Honduran staff (teared up a bit with Miss H., a beautiful woman inside and out, quién le admiro mucho), and walked my last walk home. On the way I worked on my final list of tidbit observations I’ve wanted to share.

1. Hair gel. Boys are never too young for a stylish quaff, preferably with copious amounts of hair gel. If Costco opened down here, it would sell gel in gallon tubs, because most people of the male persuasion take that shit seriously. A tornado could whip through town and rip out my pigtails, but their hair? wouldn’t budge. One rumor is that the gel is necessary to prevent the hair from getting messed up while playing football. Personally, I prefer a more dressed down hair style, but no one asked.

2. Bellies. On a hot day you will usually find men hanging out with their t-shirts pushed up so their bellies are exposed. No doubt this DIY crop top is cooler, but to my culturally biased eyes, it’s ridiculous. But, then again, if women can wear mini tops and shorts/skirts, men should have their own way of not melting from the heat.

3. Photos. More than once a parent of a child that isn’t my student has wanted a picture with me. I’ve read this happens elsewhere.

4. Selfies. OMG, folks, kids are obsessed with selfies. It’s one thing to read about it, another to experience it. I’ve never been sitting around and thought, “Wow, I really need to record myself in this moment,” but that’s all kids are thinking when they are with photographic device. I have selfied after a new haircut, while wearing a plastic bag on my head, and to upload a photo so I could virtually fit some glasses, but that’s about it. I selfie with purpose. The kids’ selfie-ism, however, is a whole ‘nuther thing and it took up much of the final hours of school and an end of year party I went to on Saturday. I kept telling my kids they were vain. (un?)Fortunately, most of them don’t know that word. That’s it, I’m old.

5. Language. When I first heard students describing another as being “blond”, I was confused. In the States, blond hair ranges from nearly white to yellow. Here, blond means any hair that isn’t black or deep brown, what we would call medium brown.

6. Fresco. “Fresco” is short for “refresco” which is “beverage”, and the only beverage that counts here is soda. It’s sold in 3 liter bottles. A party without fresco wouldn’t be worth attending. You could forget the pizza or cake or chips, but, whoa, You forgot the fresco?! Show your face here nevermore. If I’m offered coffee, I’m surprised to not be offered a side of fresco with my coffee.

7. Adult Children. Outside of school, I rarely see anyone in professional dress, as in non-denim pants, button down shirts, or dresses that don’t say party or picnic; t-shirts or company logoed polos and jeans are the standard work wear. Considering the economy here is agricultural, retail, and production based, I would hardly expect khakis, and I’m a supporter of comfort over conformity to a bizarre dress code. (Why is a tie considered formal? Does it symbolize that we are owned by someone else, like an animal? Do our uncomfortable restrictive outfits prevent us from running away?) Anyway, jeans and t-shirts, I can’t help being reminded of overgrown children.

8. Cavities. More than once the volunteers and I looked at little kid’s teeth and commented, “I’m glad those are his/her baby teeth,” because those black things will fall out and be replaced by new, whole teeth. Blame the ubiquitous fresco, cookies, and super sweet juices, and probably inattention to and inability to afford dental care (a tortillería offers free extractions). By the way, it’s ridiculous that dental care isn’t included in basic insurance or Obamacare.

This is probably my last post from this small town. Sunday I’m off to Útila to learn how to scuba dive, which I didn’t know was a thing you had to get trained for until I came here. At this moment the skies are throwing down rain, which I’m used to from Portland but actually enjoy here. Thunder and lightning (not so very frightening) make any rain so much more exciting, so worth the wet. I will miss it.

Moving on,

theresa

PS. If you are alarmed by the recent plethora of posts, fear not, travel adventures may lead to a temporary drought.

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The Machine (4)

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Prior parts.

[indignation] What the hell kind of advice is that? Return to the water? 

Advising someone to use swimming or bathing or hot tubbing as a physical therapy against forthcoming grief when the nearest body of water requires a swimming permit that costs more than most make in a year month, the public pools are too expensive for the public, and water rationing prohibits use of bathtubs, is like throwing a firefighter an empty fire extinguisher to use on a raging flame. Sure, I considered not bathing for a week and collecting my daily water ration in some type of barrel, but how much comfort can be derived from sitting in a tepid, dusty barrel-bath. Better to recall that we are mortal, with unspoken expiration dates. Better to place the photo in a difficult to reach place beneath the kitchen sink that can be reached only by removing the dishes and soap and the wood cover hot glued over the picture, so that it cannot be held and stared into the long mornings and evenings, until the person isn’t remembered, only the person in the photo, who is someone else entirely, an idealization, a shadow, a moment.
***
The water is climbing higher and higher up my leg
The water is above my ankle and slipping to mid-calf.

The water has slipped above my ankle and is climbing to mid-calf. Crane-like against the dock presses my other (right) and wedged into a smallest gap between planks are my fingers. Any moment (past the knee) gravity will overcome my grip and pull me in, where I desperately want to be, in the satin ice of the water, wrapped in its cocoon.

A barely perceptible whine, shudder of ripples against the dock. I wrench myself up and out, teeth clenched, panting. The patrol boats are white, and this one, it’s too far off to tell, but it could be. But it could also be illegal fishers or someone who bribed the right officials for a permit. I slap my palm against the dock, then the edge of the dock. Hard, then harder. The boat is gone; the water smooth. It’s ridiculous that this water was cleansed if…no, of course it should have been cleansed for the life that belongs there…and for the rich, of course the rich…the beach is barren because no one can afford…I can’t afford…

(Fuck.)

My clothes are off/lumped on the dock and I’m in the air, I’m in, dear God, oh am I in, pouring between the sweetest sheets, skin vibrating/throbbing with a gazillion pricks/an army  as each hair erects, each pore welcomes this cleansing/purification. Surface. Breath(e). Face upward and float. Green earthy tendrils slowly creep from my hair, back, heels, heading/curling/creeping deep into the water to make anchor. I am an island, a mangrove; let fish nestle among my roots and birds and monkeys caper in my branches above. I can/will bring/invite life back into this world. But not human life—we have enough of that. No one has said it aloud—yet—but one day it will be said publicly that The Loss was necessary. We were too many, barely any part of the earth remained without our footsteps and clutter. Now there are open spaces again. Some politicians are calling on followers to replace those that were lost, so, mindlessly, their sheep engage in production sex, but when they hold that tiny human they’ll realize that their grief remains and the child will grow up beneath that shadow.

We get too attached and expect permanence. Attachment limits our ability to accept that the world is changing every second and there’s practically nothing to hold onto. No one is permanent and we shouldn’t convince ourselves otherwise. All that time and energy wasted on grief could be spent on…making really delicious tacos. [seriously?] Okay, that’s flippant, but rather than pointlessly wallowing, I wish I had spent that time…

…those hours…

…weeks…

…making really delicious tacos.

I don’t know. I spend a lot of time massaging the twitch from my clicker finger. Maximizing the space in my miniature refrigerator. Holding my hand over the door handle to the outer hallway, searching for an urge to exit into the public sphere, to move away from the stench of my skin, without a destination. Listening to my lower neighbor speak EXTREMELY LOUDLY to her pet fish, Marbles. WE’RE ALL GLAD THAT MARBLES IS VERY HAPPY ABOUT HIS FLAKES. NO, WE ARE NOT JEALOUS. I don’t understand people who talk with fish.

Some fish still live in the deepest parts of the ocean. Gorgeous exotic fish with neon colors, nightmare fish with inch long fangs, practical fish that make their own light. Every few months I check out a vintage National Geographic photo book about deep sea fish. It must be so quiet down there, and deadly; darkness often brings violence. Many of them haven’t changed since their beginning. Their world is so constant that they haven’t had to make adapt or die plans, unlike the rest of us.

Even with my eyes closed I can tell I need to leave to catch the last train. [too quick?] Skin sodden with water I attempt to propel my upper body upright, but my bones are too soft and my muscles refuse to contract. Evidently I will be sleeping here tonight, perhaps forever, and my neighbor can bring Marbles to nibble my flesh as it gradually peels away. What is the reason for returning to that apartment? Without books I spend too much time watching nonsense on my tablet or dust build up in the corners or peeking into the refrigerator.

But, no, I will be found and fined for exposure and swimming and the fees will be much too high to pay and I’ll have to carry their weight forever. The urge for life is already waning without that additional burden/impediment.

Eyes open to the dusky haze the world has become, its corners softened. I spin around to find I’ve drifted a surprising distance from the dock. I roll over, breast stroke, heave myself up, shake off, dress, lift my leaden feet to the train station. I don’t know if its the dusk or the hours spent with closed eyes, but everything is slightly blurred, as if I suddenly needed glasses, and sounds are muffled. While buying my entry code, a couple passes by to the exit, laughing as if through a bag of cotton. Heavy as my limbs are, they continue to tingle softly. The daily pain in my shoulders and wrists is absent. I shuffle around the room several times before I find the well-marked direction to the platform. I’m just a little bit drunk, I think.

As I wait, I nibble on the ridges of my wrinkled fingers, pass them over my cheeks. Because of the hour the northbound platform is empty. Several southbound trains stop and expel/birth commuters across the way. Chattering, fatigued, bright, dark, only their blank backs glance toward me. I’ve played the ghost today, maybe so much so that the northbound train—there’s the light down the tunnel—will hurtle past and I’ll be left on the platform, staring at the diminishing red tail lights.

Yet it slows to a stop and the doors clop open. Then I board, back to the city.

——————————-

Photo by Tim Laman from National Geographic

Before I forget

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Friday was the last day. Many of my students signed a t-shirt for me (*sniff*). The administrators gave the volunteers plaques and a speech of thanks, goodbye, and eternal welcome. I dripped tears in front of everyone. I received unexpected hugs from certain students and wrangled others into chokeholds before they could flee my affection.

This was all more than I expected. Even if my inner cynic takes into account the fleeting romanticism and sentimentality that comes over many of us during goodbyes—perhaps the fear of the unknown as we depart the familiar—it cannot ignore the love. There was love, a lot and surprising given the challenges I’ve had. I don’t understand love. I never really have. Or maybe I just don’t understand kids. Being a kid is hard.

I’ve been here ten months. In one week I leave this small town for Útila, Guatemala, Belize, Mexico, and Cuba. In a month I’ll be back in Portland, Oregon. I return with browner skin, tighter jeans, and a greater tolerance of spiders near my bed and pitter patter of ants on my skin. While for months my anxiety addiction has been directed at teaching, I’ve too quickly redirected those superheroic powers of worry on my solo travel plans and money making capabilities. (Please, gods of anxiety, turn your faces from me.) Before I get completely caught in that net, I need to do some looking back, some internal analysis. Before it all fades beneath the dust stirred in the relentless push on.

From my first post:

If I take too long of a look, I’m afraid about all of it, so I pick one fear: I want to be a good teacher for these kids! This journey toward selfhood is difficult and I’ve whined a lot. But, despite my fears and doubts and whining, something inside of me believes I’m up to this challenge, that even failure will be a success.

So, was I a good teacher? Yes, for a neophyte. Could I have been better? Obviously, and I was the best teacher I could be. I tried to approach each child with compassion and understanding. I worked hard to create interesting lesson plans. When I could, I let the goof out to make kids laugh. I refused to accept cheating and laziness as okay.

I see my failures and understand them; they’re easier to elucidate. When I failed, I looked for solutions, although sometimes I just gave up for an hour or two. I was never firm enough—damn you, self doubt—which meant that the students who wanted to learn suffered, in particular. I couldn’t cater to all levels of learning, so the brighter kids got impatient. Also, I could have tried harder to get into what the kids were into—a recommended bonding tool—but I couldn’t muster the enthusiasm for One Direction or Frozen or the Fast and Furious series. I wasn’t a typical teenager and am much less one twenty years later. Sometimes compassion fell apart, particularly at the end when exhaustion and frustration led to sarcasm. Every now and then I just waved my hands in the air and wailed incoherently like a crazed muppet. These are failures I can live with, because I and the other volunteers did what no one else wanted to this year. We showed up and worked with these kids.

I am proud of the work I did these past months. Next year my grades, fingers crossed, are getting experienced teachers. Unless they turn out to be scary people, this can be only good news.

And now…

theresa

My gross keyboard

The Machine (3)

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Read (1) and (2). I’ve started including the notes to myself and potential edits, just in case anyone’s curious about my thought process.

Some time ago I went with a friend to a psychic. My friend was—taken in The Loss—a great believer and insisted I try at least once, to the point that she paid the fee equal to ten days of clicking. “I’ll hate you if you don’t,” she said, handing me the damp paper ticket. I didn’t then, but I see now the slight shaking of her hand and the pale amber tint to her eyes. The early stages. We’d been given pamphlets by the government and received messages over the emergency network, and the disconnected had received personal visits regarding the signs. ATTENTION AND TIME IS EVERYTHING. I’d laughed, as you do, as I do when the border between serious and humor is unclear. And that day it was.

Did she know? Because…. No, I can’t give you that, the last of her. Not yet. We’re still strangers and I have too many questions. How did you survive The Loss and how much did it cost? Or did you even know about it, living so far up here? Was it something you only had to read or watch? 

We entered a white, windowless room: that was the first oddity. The second was the lack of incense or candles burning. In fact, the room was lit with bare industrial bulbs and completely spare but for three chairs, one of which was occupied by a man in a brown suit. He faced the wall, away from us. For the first fifteen minutes of our meeting I saw only the back of his head. Black hair, wavy, freckles, slightly jutting ears, and erect posture. I couldn’t see or hear him breathing, but the freckles gave away his humanity. gave him away.

She pushed me toward the right chair, sat in the left and [something about tension leaving her body? or that will happen when he mentions the end is coming.] Of course, my friend had been through this, none of it surprised her. 

She turned to me and smiled (that smile!) then walked strongly/forcefully/boldly to sit in the left chair. Sara grayed early and wore her hair long. Today it was in a single braid, rather than her usual two. As was her habit when sitting, she snatched up the braid and looped it into a bun. How many times had I watched her do this? Why didn’t I see that she could now wrap it five times? [like the implication, but this seems weak to blame self for. Or she now has one instead of two braids, whereas her hair was too thick like that before.] LOOK FOR HAIR LOSS. Why are we so pathetically unobservant? Why isn’t there a billboard or pamphlet or emergency alert for that?

My footsteps twanged/bounced off the walls like plucked rubber band as I crossed to the remaining chair; and an image of me sitting on the tile to remove my shoes flashed, but that was a ridiculous idea, who cared if I made noise, and my shoes stuttered and squeaked as I stopped/halted and continued in the same moment and was sweating as I sat, without scraping the chair, beside Sara. She squeezed my hand with hers. ARE YOU SUDDENLY COLD? But Sara was often cold and her fingers swollen and numb, both from poor circulation and nibbling at her cuticles. She said it was genetic and carried a pair of gloves with her, even in the summer.

“I got laughed at a lot in school,” Sara told me once. “No one ever wanted to touch me during handholding games. Ew, the glove girl. She’ll make you sick. But I had such a great collection. Grandma had saved my mom’s from when she was little and Grandma had made most of those, because gloves are usually so boring. I had stripes and spots and flowers and plaid and every single color you could think of. The hardest part of getting dressed was figuring out which to wear that day. Mom said she could read my mood from the gloves I chose. Now they’re mostly worn out and in a box somewhere, and I’m stuck with the boring ones.”

I mimed putting gloves on, but Sara only smiled and turned to face the back of his head again. So this is the back of a psychic’s head. Looks pretty normal. Is the facing away stuff real or is this part of the hocus-pocus bullshit, to create some air of mystery so we’re sucked in? Sara’s breathing became deep and regular, almost as if she were asleep. Not that I could hear it or anything in that room other than the irregular pounding of my own heart. I attempted to match Sara’s breaths but that just made my heart beat faster and louder, like those torso sized drums in marching bands that keep everyone stepping together. Except this was making me fall apart: sweat started dripping down my face and arms and blackness began creeping in from the sides of my vision until I was just about to lean over and put my head between my knees, like you’re supposed to do in a faint, and he turned around.

Here’s the part where I describe what his face looks like. I can’t. I have no memory of it. I assume all the parts were there, but I couldn’t tell you even if threatened with metal splinters beneath my nails scorpions and the rebirth of my mother. His voice reminded me of a recording I saw about the old candy making process, where people tugged on thick ropes of sticky sugar and folded it back and pulled and folded it back. His voice was deep and strong like that, and as he spoke the sound seemed to be pulling something from me, something I struggled to keep and relinquish simultaneously.

[My weakness at description is painfully evident here.]

“I’m only borrowing it,” he said. As I let go a slow chill spread across my chest and down through my groin. Goosepimples rose; my lower back ached. I leaned closer to Sara and, I realize now, to him. My hand was enveloped in his own—did I give? did he take? all agency had drained away, my head throbbed—enormous hands, with blunt fingernails and fine black hairs on the knuckles, I wanted to pet like a small animal. I flexed my new hands, because they were mine now, both mine and his, and across from me sat Sara and my now empty body but it wasn’t me there but him, staring out from my eyes….

I’ve tried to reconstruct the hours we were in the room, but I’m putting together a puzzle with half the pieces missing, and the pieces that are there, I can’t look at directly, but with a side eye. Most of what I see is Sara’s eyes, practically glowing amber in the falling darkness. And I’m suddenly very sad. His voice speaks from within my body. My/his throat vibrates deeply. “You must return to the water. It will help you deal with what is to come.” I stop breathing then, for just a moment as I let go of the bridge railing and fall forward, as I had so many times before while my finger click click clicked, and gasp only when my body slams into the water, my lungs filling, my arms flailing, my eyes seeing only another’s. And they are closing.

[Note to self: tense issues]