What I Have Become

It’s Saturday night. It is the first time in over a month I am able to sleep comfortably indoors and that there is electricity so I can have the simple joy of a fan. I have spent the last couple hours grading papers.

I was walking home today after my French lesson and as I reached down to adjust my bag, I was reminded of the beads under my skirt that are tied around my waist. The wind was blowing my skirt against my skin, as I strode, thinking how I was walking less like I used to and how one day I will win the ongoing battle of keeping my feet clean. Then it occurred to me; what have I become?

Sometimes the most exhausting part of my life as a volunteer is dealing with the life I used to have and comparing that to where I am now. The first day we were in Benin one of the staff members told us to be wary about keeping one foot in the States and one foot in Benin. If we were going to be volunteers we needed to be committed one hundred percent to Benin.

First, I can’t say there have been many things I have not committed to one hundred percent and second, I would vehemently argue with anyone who dares to challenge my commitment as a volunteer, and yet I constantly feel I am playing this game of hopscotch. I have not figured out the best way to explain this.

It would be selfish for me to believe nothing was going to change with me gone, and I knew that, but I never anticipated how the changes would make me feel. And it isn’t the changes alone, it is going on facebook and seeing everyone living a life I can’t relate to, but used to relate to, and will go back to. It isn’t that I look down on anyone and to some degree I am envious I don’t have that, but I also can’t imagine doing anything else and being anywhere else but here. In some ways I feel like I am getting left behind, while also being the one going ahead.