Pellets

9 de marzo 2015.  Change. It's an incredible, inevitable force that can confront you like a hail storm in the middle of December. Or pass through you like a soft spring breeze. Arriving in this country two years ago, it was like a hail storm. Climate. Language. Food. Culture. Relationships. Job. Expectations. And the concept of the change we seek that doesn't come as easy as we would like. It was constantly hitting me in pellets until I couldn't see and until I lost sensation in my skin.

But I have to say. Through these two years, the storm calmed and though change continued to happen, I became less affected by it. It hurt less. Shocked me less. And I've almost stopped recognizing it. 

Until now. Last week I went to the capital for our Closing of Service Conference. Three days of resume writing, learning of non-competitive elegability, and talk of how in the world we go back home after these crazy two years of change. I'm not going to lie, I checked out for most of it. And could only think of the change that I'm going to be seeing. Sooner than I'd like.

Campo to Capital. Paved roads. Anything I need, right around the corner. Transportation like it's everyone's business. A structured job (moreso anyways). Running water. 24/7 luz (almost). Salsa classes (hopefully!). Free workout center outside. 

I could probably keep going but the truth is? The tears have already started streaming down my face. Why? Because between all those things that I'm trying to see as positives, I think of all that I'm leaving.

The mountains. The cool air. And the cold nights. My sister. The twin boys and the fight against cancer. Baseball. My kids in and out of my house all the time. The hugs. The nights without luz where the stars become countless. The stillness. The coffee on the many porches. Teaching kids. Teaching adults. The lucha for the damn library. Meeting so many people daily. Riding in the back of pick-up trucks. Tina and her family in the middle of nowhere where coffee is always made upon arrival followed by whatever leftover food was made that day. Moto rides. Going to the colmado with munchkins and buying them a dulce. More hugs. My little house made of wood. My Dominican mother. Have I mentioned my kids? 

...

I know I made the right choice. And it's not like I can stay here forever. But imagining leaving them and only being a visitor rather than one of them? A part of them? I don't know how to do it. This change I no longer know how to face. And I don't know how I'm going to handle it. Because as of right now, I'm not doing such a good job.