There really might be more than corn in Indiana...

... but, I'm not willing to stick around long enough to find out. I'm starting BVS, (Brethren Volunteer Service), for a minimum of 2 years. This is such a swift change in direction... I can't tell you the wasted days spent in sweat pants and hoodies... gaining pounds and pretending I actually could eek out happiness in my home town... well, I realized I can't.


I'll be flying to Florida for a three week orientation in volunteer service with 12 others. There, I will decide what project I'll be serving for six months before I leave for Chiapas, Mexico in the Fall. I'm apprehensive about Florida, but, I'm very excited to get started. Florida has never really been something amazing to me... alligators, pastels, orange juice, Golden Girls, Cubans, Republicans... sure. You know that Rufus Wainwright song, California? Yeah, its like that, just substitute California for Florida, and you have my general sentiments... Really though, at this point, I am open to everything.


LIFE. I'm looking forward to it. I'm looking at placement sites in the Bay Area. San Francisco, Oakland, and Fremont are all possible locations, with work ranging from case-work, to alternative pesticide use advocacy. Packing... is rough. I usually end up throwing everything into a bag and calling it a masterpiece. Voila.... Packing for 3 months in one night seems daunting, but I must be finished by tomorrow... MUST FINISH PACKING. I'll update y'all sometime in-between.

It's been a while! So much has happened since the last post!

• I survived the Christmas season. I did precisely what I had said I'd do. I ate cookies, drank the nog, sang some carols, all the usual, but...

...what made this Christmas different was that I named the things I didn't like about it, and I changed them. Yeah, it was annoying to watch blatant hypocrisy in the name of all that is good and holy, and yeah, I was bitter and snarky, but, there were definite highlights and advantages to the season. I got to spend some excellent time with friends and family I rarely get to see. Visiting with people who make me feel sane was a good reminder of what I hold close. If you're one of those people, and for some reason are reading this blog, THANK YOU! You restored me, mind and soul.

I also just plunged myself head-on into the Christmas goop... I think one of the things I was most dreading was the Christmas Eve service at my parent's church. Every Christmas, its more of the same thing... contrived and for the most part uneducated conjectures on the significance of christmas... Always, this service exists as a confluence of worn-out carols, patriarchal and exclusive scripture readings, the kinds of inspirational chain letter stories you usually delete from your inbox before reading, and this year, a special Youtube photo essay with Josh Groban wailing something about the meaning of life... (this is my perspective, and having had a part in this community for years, feel like I can say these things... I'm sure Josh Groban Youtube photoessays really bring inspiration to some people... I just like to be critical.), like the ones before, I survived only with the help of Sarah (long time, and similarly disenchanted friend) at my side, writing sarcastic comments on bulletins, but alas, for the first time I presented something from me. I wanted to contribute to this ritual, and I sang "Dona Nobis Pacem" in a three-part round. Sarah played the djembe, and I gave an introspective and heartfelt, introduction. All in all, I felt addressing an audience with a call to peace was justice... I felt a part of something, even if the message wasn't welcome in the midst of their normal rigomaral, I needed to say it. God, I needed to hear it!!! Constant self-preservation is a bitch. I should leave...

I was thinking about the incredible feelings of discovery awaiting me everyday while I was studying in Barcelona. I miss waking up in my small, little-cubicle-of-a-room; no natural light source, grabbing my café con leche, and feeling like there was the greatest possibility for happiness in the new day. The opportunity for adventure, being ever-present in the most mundane of actions pervaded my every moment. Walking down Las Ramblas after classes and watching sunlight dance across the face of a stranger; dodging and weaving in a sea of people of all shapes, and all colors; running to the beach; or just walking around the neighborhood; these things provided me a sense of living life to its depth, and fullness. I really felt connected.

In contrast, I am here. Bremen, IN USA. The snow falls outside my window right now, and I wonder how I can possibly drudge through another holiday season. Perhaps, the antithesis of everything I loved about Barcelona is represented in this Christmas season. Everyone is preoccupied with huddling around formality and tradition... contrived and stale mockeries of what goodwill and openness are supposed to be are ever present. These principals are often only ever spoken with words, and as a whole, hardly ever worked out by hands. Even when goodwill and openness are totemized in candlelight services, after those services, when the burning wicks of the nativity candles are snuffed out, middle class families go home to warm houses and open presents they worked all year to save up money for... When Christmas is over, and all the presents have been unwrapped, we go back to our daily, and for the most part unfulfilled lives. We abandon goodwill, and settle for survival, and normalcy. I don't blame anyone but our system... Of course. We live in a culture saturated with the idea of material happiness and security, it is our true totem. Our happiness is the happiness we see, broadcast from boxes lighting homes with pale blue light. Maybe I'm being too cynical. Maybe I'm just angry. Maybe I can't find meaning in this holiday, because I feel isolated in this little town. I have lots of time on my hands to think about why I'm sitting in a house alone, while those around me are working hard to give their families the "perfect" Christmas. There has to be something redemptive and gratifying about this time and place, right? If Christmas is as meaningful to everyone as it is supposed to be, I'm sure I can come across something for myself...
... I think if anything, the season is supposed to be about spending time with family and friends, and cherrishing each other... I think? At least, that's what it should be about. I think that's why there are so many advertizements for things families will need to make "the perfect christmas"...


Maybe I should budge a little; eat a cookie, drink some eggnog, sing a carol, light a candle. I'll do these things with intention, in the spirit of goodwill and openness. Be the change, right?

... in Barcelona, children huddle around a piece of cloth, covering their wrapped gifts (which is supposed to be Santa Claus), hitting him with a stick, chanting something about scaring him enough so that he defecates their presents...
Maybe I should hit Christmas over the head with a good-vibe stick until it poops me some presents... (figuratively speaking, of course). ... wish me luck... being blissfully optimistic in Bremen, IN has not been easy.