Wednesday, April 3, 2013

going

Semana Santa was last week. I visited three families, rode my bike 43 km to the closest large town, and went to see a fantastic waterfall near my site. Next week my training group swears out. About a month after that I'll leave Natalio, to go visit Nueva Germania for a week before leaving Paraguay from Asuncion. I'll travel three weeks in Argentina and Chile and then fly to Seattle from Santiago June 7th. I'll get in in the evening (though the sun doesn't set until like 9:30pm in June, doesn't it?) on Saturday the 8th. My younger brother graduates from college June 15th and, if Facebook is to be believed, is hosting a music festival at his house called "Return of the Dagobah Sound System" on the 29th. There is a family reunion in Pennsylvania in July. I'll be looking for a job. I'll be riding my blue Schwinn. I intend to ride around golden Maury island with a tub on my rack and pick blackberries. I'll jump in the cold green water off Tramp Harbor dock and at night it will glow like green fire. On grey rainy days, of which I'm sure we'll have this summer, I'll get fresh coffee at the Roasterie along with herbs and roots for my máte. I'm going to walk in forests, smell the moss and the mud and look up at tall trees. I'm going to be with people.

I want to engage with family and friends, but especially family, more earnestly when I am back home. I've spent two years with other people's families, I've talked about other family members, and many of these families have taken me in as one of their own. My own family doesn't even exist as a unit, we're four people with relationships with one-another, who all live in different places. My social life of the last ten years could be visualized as a series of explosions. First our family splits into two houses. I graduate from high school and leave home to go to college. My friends and I attend schools all across the country. I made fast, deep friendships in college, then in a few short years we graduate and move all over the country and world. I live in Portland another year, work in Americorps. My housemates move to New York, I join Peace Corps. I live in Guarambare four months, Nueva Germania for ten, and Natalio for fifteen. My fellow volunteers are constantly arriving and departing for parts of the US I can only vaguely imaging visiting. I am so damn tired of meeting people. I would like some stability, in these next few years.

I've got a lot to do before I leave. Finish work, sell my things, ship a box home, visit everybody, give gifts, plan my travels. I'm working on getting a CommunityEconomicDevelopment volunteer assigned here, but I won't know the verdict until after I've gone.



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