Se fue de vacaciones

That means, "She left on vacation"... a common phrase here, it seems, to explain the inexplicable absence of that person you really needed to be there for a project, a meeting, a workshop, or to approve something. It generally is the expression of choice to imply ambiguity of start date and end date of this extended vacation the person in question is on, intended to frustrate you to high hell in the face of sublime inability to DO anything about her being gone. And that's what people have been saying about ME for the last month. Can't tell you how wonderful it felt to be the one on vacation for once!!
Yes indeed, it was a good month to be home in Minnesota. In time to see the tulips in their splendor, the lilacs come and go, and the apple trees blossom, leaving their perfume on every breeze that blows by. In time for that crazy string of weather (record tornados? 101 degrees one day, and 67 the next?), but there were enough beautiful, sunny days to get in lots of biking, running, paddling and even sailing! I remember that when the plane finally lowered enough to burst through the last bit of dreary Minnesotan cloud, and a dark and rainy cityscape became visible, the first thing I noticed was that lovely spring green…! That green newness doesn’t happen in Guatemala, and there’s nothing like watching that big oak out back of the cabin – that large, commanding, tough old edifice! – bud out with teensy new leaves like babies’ hands, as if it were time to show the world the tenderness lying within.
And there was business to attend to…there were three graduations to partake in, three birthday parties to bake cakes for, a grad party or two, a 60th anniversary party (for two people whose marriage means I exist, so it was important to be there!), and then there were the extra-curriculars. The Roske Family Sauk River Trip was once again organized on a beautiful Saturday to see all the sights there are to see on that stretch of gentle current from Rockville, Minnesota to Waite Park. You know, trees newly-fallen in the water to make the obstacle course more interesting. New lawn ornaments or docks which the riparian property-owners have put out. Barns. Silos. Bridges. New models of farm machinery working in the fields adjacent to the stream’s course. Fun stuff!
But you Nebraskans out there, I have to say those canoe-trip sights were a fair bit more interesting than the stretch of highway between Dakota/Iowa and our destination state of Colorado on the 2011 Roske Family Go-West Trip. (Lots of random traditions, you’ll catch on one of these days.) I mean I guess you Nebraskans try to mix it up, as I recall, via the bizarre statues that have been erected along the freeway just to make people wake up from their driving stupor, swing their head around and think, “Did I really just see a huge bull’s-head statue back there?” causing all kinds of lane-crossing mayhem, maybe some accidents. It’s a start, Nebraska.
Colorado kept the mountains out of view for a tantalizingly long time, and we only had a good view of them on our second or third day there! Denver is, as most of you have already known for quite some time, a quite agreeable city. I wish my freshly-graduated brother and his sweetheart lots of luck with their move out there, but it doesn’t sound like it’s going too poorly. They’ll be fine, in as fine a city as Denver.
We were invited out to my good friend Oliver’s house for dinner one evening – yes, WE, all six participants of the Roske Family Go-West Trip – and met his very gracious parents, an aunt, and some other friends. It was just generally a feast and catch-up time, and I suppose also a way for the recently immigrated residents (brother and sweetheart) to get a read on housing options in the area. Karli, Oliver’s mom, casually comments,
“So, you guys are looking for a place to live out here too, huh?”
“Well, that’s the idea,” says my brother. “We’re still sort of looking around, checking out the options.”
“Huh. Well, yeah, you should be able to find something nice,” she finishes absently.
“Yeah, that’s the hope…”
… a long pause, other side-conversations carry on, and then Karli bursts in, to her son Oliver:
“Hey, wait, don’t Billie and her husband need somebody to house-sit for them? I mean, they go to Aspen every summer and leave the house in Denver for a few months… [to my brother:] Want their number?”
“Um… well yeah, that’d be great!”
So you see it never hurts to mooch off your sister for people to talk to about jobs, housing, etc. But it seems restaurant options are just no longer something you consult with locals you know. Smartphones, being far smarter than me, apparently have a corner on the restaurant rating and location market. I was made to feel stupid and useless more than once by those things! But yes, my brother’s smartphone led us to a few delectable little places, so there’s no reason to complain about the human brain being technologically obsolete, I suppose. Except in the wilderness. Thwarted by lack of cell signal in Rocky Mountain National Park, I think we all regained our sense of worth in that snub little victory over the smartphone! Haha, I had also spent three of my days in Denver renewing my Wilderness First Responder (WFR) certification, but with the advent of these smartphones, the ubiquity of personal GPS car units, and the possible power a satellite-based hybrid of the two could have if it’s invented and marketed on a commercial level by the time I move back to Minnesota next March, of what good will my high level of wilderness first aid training be if all that info is accessible online even in the wilderness? Hm. The plus side of renewing my WFR is that I met about 30 interesting outdoorsy-type folks from all over Colorado. Ski guides, kayakers, hikers, bikers, rafting guides, canoeists, horseback-riders, sailing guides, outdoor educators, mountain climbers, National Park Service employees, you name it! My kind of crowd. But I don’t know anything about skiing, kayaking, and rafting which seemed to be the top interests of everybody there! Yeah well – let’s see them portage a canoe :) One thing I couldn’t help but take away from that course, was a sense of awakening the part of myself that used to thrive on guiding wilderness activities, that hasn’t been around since… well, since I moved to Guatemala. The part of my character that pushed me to go work in Alaska, to be a Voyageurs guide, and any number of other activities in which I used to excel and through which my heart used to feel set free. I realized I miss it all so much. Everything around me in Colorado reminded me of a more populated (and tamer?) version of Denali, and I began to think back on and miss the wonderful people who were my life there. I began to crave an intimacy with every mountain and moraine I saw too, like I had felt in Denali and not since.
And it’s funny the way we can feel a connection with places on this earth, for entirely different reasons. I thought the familiar mountains, valleys, ridgelines and volcano peaks of the Guatemalan highlands held that kind of special chest-swelling significance for me, but neither these nor the breathtaking scenery of the Colorado Rockies will ever compare in my eyes to the woods and lakes of Minnesota. There is nothing in the world that could ever compare, in my ears’ opinion, to the call of a loon. No small pleasure like catching sight of a red fox or sandhill crane in the woods, watch a beaver diligently go about his business – even better if the catching-sight-of was the work of not one but two people, out for a walk or a paddle or a bike ride. There is something admirable in going fishing on a rainy day and catching nothing, but coming back to the cabin a few days later for the fish fry anyway, with aunts and uncles, cousins, and a night bonfire and s’mores to boot. And there is something so heart-warming in having a delicious rhubarb-based desert for the 8th time this week! (WHY is rhubarb so tasty??)
But when one can’t go take a loved one out to enjoy the Minnesotan outdoors, what then? Every time I visit home I am reminded of the tragedy of aging, a seemingly non-applicable specter in my life in the subtropical highlands, because everyone I know here has only aged two years, so they’re mostly the same as when I met them. And everyone I know back home gets older without me realizing it. In some sense, my heart breaks after an entire month at home, because a major part of what I did is become appraised of just how different (and in many cases how much more difficult) everyone’s lives have become as compared to when I left. Grampa and I ended up not being able to go fishing because his general fragility interfered with his self-reliance. Will I ever get the chance to share an experience like that with him again, or will he not be around anymore? Living far from family is like being medicated by the drug of complacency into assuming the well-being of the loved ones back home continues as normal. It doesn’t always.
So I sit long hours with him, just chatting. Sometimes we go driving. There was a time when he could write me a 25-page letter in spite of his arthritis, to arrive like the best Christmas present EVER in my PO box in Guatemala, but years have passed and he can’t anymore. I long to go for a walk with him through the woods, where I ask anyone I love to come walk with me and just talk for a while about the world as they perceive it. But he can’t make the walk anymore either. He could tell me so much, but instead of the woods to draw the memories and the poetry out of him, it’s just me in the chair across the table from him to entice them out. I feel I am a poor substitute, but he seems to appreciate it nonetheless. I like to think there will be somebody in the chair across the table from me when I am old, to entice the memories and poetry out of me too, when I’m no longer able to go seek refuge in the woods.
I felt so emotionally useful back home, as though people really needed me. It is this that makes taking up the yoke once more here in Totonicapán all the more difficult, because I’ve never felt as needed here. I’m not, to be frank. The work I was so excited to get started on with Rainforest Alliance to the benefit of the 48 Cantones of Totonicapán Communal Mayors’ Association, has only been confusion and poor communication, and I feel like the one-person-too-many in the assembly line. Some people in my town are surprised to see me now that I’m back, so I sense I wasn’t missed nor did people maintain hope in the gringa fulfilling what she said about returning to finish the job. They don’t need me.
But in my last post I wrote about what Peace Corps means, and Peace Corps does not have to mean making oneself irreplaceable and necessary to the people with whom one lives. That would undermine the whole point of a two-year commitment… they’re not supposed to need me forever! And as far as being emotionally useful goes, I think I am still that. There were enough people who called me the night I got back, or whom I called and whose reactions to the call were of such joy, that I did actually feel pretty loved. I've already had two welcome-back dinners, was invited on a hike today, to a birthday party and two meetings this weekend, to go stay the night at two different homes, and to a parade next week. And I’ve only been home for two days! Just goes to show, we can cultivate loving relationships no matter where we are in the world. Even if it’s not Minnesota.
And I wonder how many of my Guatemalan loved ones were saying, “se fue de vacaciones” when asked about me, and whether they felt any of the uncertainty that normally accompanies the phrase, regarding my eventual return. Did anyone worry I wouldn’t come back? I wonder if any of my colleagues missed me…Did anyone need me for a work-related question, to weigh in on an issue, to provide my input, to write up a quick report of some kind, but instead met that frustratingly ambiguous and unchangeable response? It sure is nice to go on vacation, but it’s funny how we as human beings want to be missed too – we feel as though we have some right to be missed if we’ve worked hard at something. But in the end, let’s throw in a dash of humility and reality: who cares if Rainforest Alliance and 48 Cantones don’t miss me, if host families and Guatemalan friends don’t end up missing me much? Actually, I should hope they’re just fine without me. I like the people back home in Minnesota best anyway, so if there’s anyone I hope misses me a little bit… I think they already know. Yeah, you. Miss you, too. Can we go for a walk in the woods next time we see each other?