Little Homesick

If you are reading this post now you are a privy to a very unique, time sensitive post. We are experiencing real-life, hard-core home-sickness. And minor culture shock. It really hit me tonight when we were driving home from the restaurant. Let me set the stage...

Last month we bought a car. After a few necessary repairs, the car is running great and I think it will prove to be a great vehicle to transport us back and forth to school and all over the country and beyond. One of the last repairs to be made was to replace the stereo, which went on the fritz on our road trip when we drove up to the coast. E has been wanting to get the stereo replaced, but, because we are in Honduras, it wasn't simple. After two days of driving around after work, talking to people, getting parts and then going to a shop where 7 guys worked on the wiring, we have a stereo!

Now, to the meat of my story. We were driving home tonight from Las Tejitas, our favorite outdoor eating place. A bunch of teachers were meeting there tonight. There is a play structure for the kids and lots of good food and drink for the adults and we always have a good time there. Driving on the way home with Colin and Elisa, we were listening to music on our new stereo. "Kamera" by Wilco was playing. This song seems to hold significance to all of us because we were all singing along or appreciating the song in some form or another. Such a familiar song with so many memories/connections/feelings tied together. We were driving back to our colonia up a street that has no name other than the street that leads to Las Lomas del Guijarro. We passed the rotunda in front of the American School and tears came to my eyes. Two months ago, this rotunda was so new; such a landmark. It was the center point of our new life and world. We came here because of our new jobs. We came here to teach. But of course we came here for reasons much more grand than that. We came here to grow, to learn, to expand our vision of the world.

So I was caught in a moment of awe where I was listening to a song that is SO unconsciously tied in to my old, Sebastopol, California life and my "new" surroundings that just a short time ago seemed so new, but are now so strangely familiar.

As I write this in my dining room, there are dogs barking, loud motorcycles driving by, music and people singing along from a party somewhere near our house and loud popping sounds. The sound might be the sound of a gun firing, or not... I hear them too frequently for them to be actual gunfire (that's what my rational mind says). But it's a loud bang or POW! sound and I hear it all the time. My point is that all these new and frequent sounds are such a part of my everyday existence that they are no longer novel.

I am in cultural limbo.

My apologies if you are still reading. This may have become a cathartic, self-serving ramble. I miss our family, Milo, our friends, the neighborhood, Sebastopol at large, and familiarity. Bottom line - I'm a little homesick.