da blues

Pacific Ocean, from Coronado CA

Oh, it’s Wednesday again. It seems like the past couple of Wednesdays have been slumps for me. It’s like I’ve climbed to the top of the hill and am still huffing and puffing before I can enjoy the slide downhill to the weekend.

It’s been a rough stint. I really don’t know why. (Which I know is not helpful or analytical.) But I am calling it the “midterm blues.”  It’s about halfway in the long three months between swearing in and IST, and I’m feeling the stretch. At this point I am getting easily frustrated and annoyed, as if I’ve been treading water just long enough that now my muscles hurt and I don’t know how to keep going through the pain and cramps. Just trying to keep my head above water. Sometimes I just want to see what happens if I let go, if only for a moment.

Last week was a four-day weekend due to Malian Independence Day. It was like slow roasting torture. Part of me loved it. I didn’t have to sweat and walk to and from school and the office four times a day, I was able to read and hang out with the family, which is really crucial. So it was supposed to be good times. FALSE.  I had the worse case of homesickness I’ve had since maybe the very beginning of PST.

I’m blaming the internet.

See, I am totally spoiled. I get internet at my house, the school I work in, and the office. It’s truly a blessing and keeping me sane. (And now every PCV can roll their eyes. I get it. I get it!) Ergo, my Mom and I get to talk a lot via skype, and that keeps me going. It eases the feelings of being away, of being left out. I get to be part of her day no matter what time it is in Mali or what kind of day I’ve had. And it’s wonderful.

But this past week the internet has been on the fritz, in need of something, and I was without all weekend. No venting sessions, no outside, no Mom. Just me and my thoughts. Which, if you know me, you know is sometimes the worst pairing. Like. Ever.

So I buried my head in books. I read three and something like four fashion magazines. I slept a lot.

Still I couldn’t shake it.

It has something to do with the weekend. I would dream about home, and just as I would open my eyes, it would be like I could feel myself there.

I am a sleeper. Always have been. When I was itty bitty my parents found it a blessing. When I was a tween and teen my father found it obnoxious and a waste of time.  At home in college I got to blame it on the lack of sleep I usually got while at school. Anyway, at home, I am sometimes the last one up. Saturday mornings have a rhythm. At our old house my room had windows that faced the front yard and the door that opened to the landing of the upstairs where you could hear anything in the whole house. Sometimes I would lie and bed and just listen. I could hear my Dad talking to the TV, yelling at the football highlights or repeating the lines of some old black and white, whining about how many commercials are on TV these days. My mom would be on the floor decked out in running clothes with the newspaper sprawled out in front of her, her handy green and white mug of water or crystal light next to her pushing my dog Archie out of the way. (Archie always felt in competition with the paper for my mother’s attention. Soon she would get over it and curl out somewhere else. Rejected if just for the moment.) My mom would read some of the headlines out loud, only to repeat the good ones and the girly ones later to me when I finally came downstairs. I could smell the bacon from Dad’s breakfast. Hear him offer it to either my brother or sister. Laura usually took him up on it. Bobby sometimes did but was always happy with his equally flagrant frozen breakfast pastries. I never wanted; I always preferred cereal. I would finally crawl out of bed and plod down the stairs to find them all just like this. The boys discussing sports, looking straight at the TV. Laura making silly faces at Archie and eating her bacon. Mom holding the edge of the paper in one hand and her cup in the other. There would be a slight pause when I entered, a polite offering of breakfast, but I would already be standing in front of the pantry reaching for my cereal. Mom would start reading me the headlines, the movie reviews, the wedding announcements.

These past few days I can’t get those images out of my head. I wake up and for a moment I think I’m there. Some smell, some noise, the muffled voices, something triggers it and I have to wake up and stare at my mosquito net forcing focus and repeating over and over “This is Mali. This is Mali.”

Sunday I couldn’t take it and broke into tears. It was the ugly cry. It was the first time I’ve cried since moving to site. I knew it would come; I’m not so naïve to think I would make it through these first months unscathed by the emotional roller coaster that is my life right now.

I wish I could say that I felt so much better. That after a relief came over and I was able to move on. But that’s not true. Some days the greatest knowledge is admitting that there are some things I can’t fix, I can’t bandage, I can’t talk myself out of. Some things I just have to move with.

Loneliness, homesickness, missing people, longing for significant others, wanting good food, and a really clean bathing area—these we learn to deal with. Sometimes we can laugh about. Sometimes it doesn’t bother us as much. Sometimes though, it becomes our greatest obstacle. We hurdle it the best we can. But sometimes we trip on the hurdle, and fall flat on our face. And in the moment, no matter how long the moment lasts, we have to eventually get up.

So I get up. And the loneliness and homesickness becomes part of the baggage I carry with me. With each step throughout the day I hope the baggage gets a little lighter, a little more manageable. Sometimes it really does.

With Monday came a chance to get online at school and work. I did briefly have internet at the house but another storm came along and with one fateful zap internet a bana.

I’m trying not to let it get to me. I’m going to try to have it fixed because I have people coming this weekend who yearn for my internet accessibility and it would be great to share with them. Plus, I have promised my siblings that we could “see” each other soon.

I’m fighting the blues as best as I can with what I have. Waiting to slide down the hill toward the future.

In the meantime, I put one foot in front of the other and take it one day at a time. One day at a time.

And I’m really beginning to hate Wednesdays.

(But in case you were curious, I am going home for a visit in less than 15 months. I’ve already started counting.)