Insignificant. In a Good Way.

I love being reminded of my insignificance. There's a much needed clarity to the whole ordeal and my emotions become so human. So trivial and disconnected from just pure existence. My feet sink into the sand and I step back and watch the ocean erase the evidence of my standing there at all. I watch the water while others attempt to shout to other continents. Other families. The air is refreshing and the ocean noise drowns out silence. I am reminded of how vast existence is. It's more comforting than any idea of some all powerful being could ever be. The feeling of not being watched over, looked after, by a higher power is comforting. It connects me, rather than disconnects me, to every rock, plant and animal that is here. We are all just here. Existing. And that feels great. Every feeling that I have is necessary and yet somehow unimportant at the same time.

Then I pick up a crab, and with sand between my toes I bounce merrily to new friends, and think of everyone who has had an impact on my life. Friends, family members, lovers, past and present. And moving away from this family I have just settled into is not the end of the world after all. I can miss them and love them, and keep on making new connections. Everything is so much bigger than I am. And I am insignificant. In a good way.

Well…this is unfortunate.

I’ve sort of landed myself in a sticky situation, and I’m not going to pretend I didn’t have control at one point in this whole ordeal.  But it’s come to the point of the Peace Corps forcing a site change upon me, not that I’ve done anything wrong in the role of a volunteer.  Come Tuesday, I will know whether or not I have to leave the home that has cradled me so wonderfully for the last six months of my life.  I will know if I have to leave the family I have come to love.  Leave the children who have made me realize that yes, I do want children.  Leave my learners who have driven me crazy yet made me fall in love with them.  The learners that bring me baobab fruit and help me hoe and rake my yard. Leave the tree that provides me with hours of shade during the hot afternoons.  Leave the projects that I have only just begun.  Leave the region that is abundant with flood waters during the rainy season, and birds so beautiful that they almost take my breath away.  Leave the long strip of road that I have to journey on to reach most of the other volunteers within the country that surprises me we elephant sightings.  Leave the culture whose dancing and traditions I’ve come to deeply admire.  Leave the language that I can’t really speak but that has become soothing to my ears.  Come Tuesday I will know if I have to leave the place that has challenged me in so many ways but that I have come to love with the entirety of my being.

 

I am just hoping this is not happening.  While I am sure I can find happiness in another place, I don’t want to leave my beloved Caprivi region for someplace located closer to the center of Namibia. Sadly, I am almost 100% this is happening.

This is unfortunate.