Continuing Freedom

A lot of times I'm afraid to blog because I feel like my thoughts are incomplete or unimportant. Perhaps sometimes they are both. Today, though, I'll temporarily set fear aside for a short anecdote.

I'm training for a marathon. By training, I mean, I'm running double digit long runs every weekend, attempting to run a mediumish long run during the week, and when I don't feel 90 year olds, I try to pick up the pace on my short runs around the local high school. I call it training, but its a sort of sorry attempt at that. Regardless, I'm running and I love running.

Realizing genetics has given me less than amazing muscle tone, I've been trying to incorporate more strength training into my regimen. So, yesterday, as my roommate and I watched Matilda (yep, the movie most of us haven't seen since we were 5), I squatted and lunged, pushed up, and dipped my triceps until I felt shaky. Today, I did a similar workout with my tennis kids to commence practice. A ten mile Sunday run, two strength training programs, and a tennis practice later, my body hurt to say the least. Nonetheless, the nearby track begged me to use it and my, previously reluctant to speed work, body conceded quickly. As the last tennis kids slothed out of practice, I threw on a sweater and jogged a mile and half warm up that led me to a bare track at the rear of my school.

Immediately the dreaded days of high school track workouts flooded my memory. My insecurities about quickly circling the track seemed to weigh heavy in my worn shoes. Despite my self-doubt, I started running. First an 800. Then a 400 and a 200. I wish I could say the wind took me over the track like a gazelle, but that certainly wasn't the case. In fact, anyone who saw me probably thought, "Oh, that poor teacher, trying so hard to be like the kids with limber legs." I knew I must have looked snail like trotting around the track, but I didn't mind it. With each stride, I felt free, I felt empowered, I felt strong.

As I finished my first set of 8, 4, 2s I mentally prepared to run back up the track ladder (2, 4, 8). Perhaps it was the book I'm reading about running or my desire for change that led me to do what I did next...

I took my shoes off. I took my socks off. It was my bare feet and the earthy red track.

I ran.

At first, I worried that I might cut the soles of my feet open, but as my stride and the track conversed ever so evenly, I just ran.

Running barefoot wasn't amazing triumphant to me nor was it an undeniably blissful experience. It was, though, natural. Naturally simplistic. Naturally thoughtless. Naturally freeing.

I like freeing.

A Long Time Free

After trudging through three or four security check points at PAP, my journey home has officially commenced. I’ve done an awful job of maintaing any communication with people at home. My deepest apologies to those of you who were expecting more. Whereas last time in Haiti, I enjoyed the lull time I had to write, this time I tried to avoid it entirely. I wanted Haiti to take me, consume my time, my conversations, my activities. Now, however, as my stomach gurgles as it attempts to digest the plantains I devoured from a street vedor, I am able to reflect on my time, my experiences.

In Haiti, I feel free.

Anyone who knows me well knows I don’t like to swim in any open body of water because I am frightened of fish and any other sea like creature.

In Haiti, I am a fish.

We spent two days at the beach. The first, I was battling fatigue and most of my time was spent snuggled in between friends on a lawn chair. The second beach adventure, New Years Day, my time was spent primarily in the water or chasing down our server to bring more food or take us on his boat (as arrogant as that sounds, I promise we paid him well). There was another girl staying at the compound who matched my free spirit perfectly. We swam and laughed and laughed and swam. We met people and quickly veered away from creepy UN policemen spending their day off at the beach. It was so nice to have an adventurous spirit to meddle with.

Free and spirited. Its my favorite me, induced by a beautiful Haiti.

After stopping at a birthday party for a friend’s niece, New Years Eve was spent cruising through Haiti on a moto (a scooter-motorcycle). Although I cringed as Sam weaved in and out of traffic, I loved seeing Port Au Prince from seat of a moto. Sam and I walked through a park and stopped to see the still crumbling White House. I never felt worried or threatened, I only felt free. As we sewed through the bumpy roads of Haiti, I felt romanced. Romanced by a country, by an entire country, by the trash that still litters the street, the stray dogs that attempted to knock us off. Romanced by it all.

Romanced and Free.

My second to last night was spent with a local family. Throughout my stay, they invited me into their home many times. The newly finished walls still sang of earthquake. Despite their home’s need, despite the fact there were near 11 of them leaving there, they welcomed me as if I were a honorary guest. Repeatedly they told me they were happy to share their home, their food, their conversations, their everything with me. I tried mercilessly to thank them in Creole, frustrated by my lack of words. I am baffled at the reality they are faced with. In the states, mansions are built in months. In Haiti, it takes two years to change rumble into an incomplete, very modest house. Funds and services by geographical location is infuriating to me. Because I was born in a middle class community in the US, I’ve been given ample opportunity. Because this dear family was born in Haiti, they are forced to work to survive. In America, it seems near ingrained in us to want more. In Haiti, it seems near ingrained in them to give thanks for the smallest of things.

Freedom from greed. Profound.

My last night, we piled into a truck and went out to celebrate a birthday and the departure of many people at the compound. We ordered chicken off the street and indulged ourselves with pizza. The night ended with packing and goodbyes. It was much harder saying goodbye this time. I’m not sure when I will be able to come back, I don’t know when I will see these dear people again, and that breaks my heart.

I feel caught between two lives. A life in the US that exhausts me and traps me, at times. But, a life that deeply satisfies me. A life where 14 year olds are writing my story and educational inequity is molding me into a lover of policy and an agent of change.

And then, I have a life in Haiti. A life that is hard because my stomach is Haitian food’s enemy. A life that leaves dust in my hair and dirt in my pores. But, nonetheless, a life where people are my energy. A life that makes me truly happy and pulls me in like a magnet. A life where in a week, lasting friendships are made.

A satisfying life, a free life.

As I leave Haiti with a drumming headache and gurgling stomach, I seek to reconcile the two lives. A merger between educational inequity in the states and service to a people who have captured my heart in Haiti. The form this merger will take is unknown, the steps are cobblestone and crooked at best. Perhaps, the merger is already happening. Perhaps, it is my job to only merge, not form a merger.

A Long Time Free. Perhaps It Is Simply Me.