High and Low, Hurk

There are several phrases that are used in Peace Corps so often that they are staples. People saying things like “just taking it one day at a time”, “when I get home I’m going to eat so much (insert awesome food here)”, or “I have diarrhea.” They span across countries and volunteers so that any PCV, Returned PCV, or staffer can relate to what you mean.

Yet of all these choice words of wisdom the one I think is perhaps the most cliché is the variants on “I’m doing alright, you know, ups and downs.” “Highs and lows.” “Good moments and bad.” This particular comment is made so often that, while it is a nice sort of group unity and badge of getting through the tough times, it’s almost a running gag because of how many situations it can be applied to here. Yet despite being overused, it is so true. Sometimes there are good days, sometimes bad, and it is ridiculous how often it can even change from hour to hour. Do you wake up well-rested and motivated only to be worn down by midday heat? Do have a class go poorly and you just want to crawl away, only to swing back with a nice interaction on your dust road? We end up laughing about it half the time because no the idea of having “plans” or “expectations” is an exercise in futility. Anything that can happen does, and you just have to roll with it or you will go more than a little crazy.

So anyway, I wanted to write about one of my biggest highs as well as one of the larger lows. You know, because after talking about the overuse of this phrase, I figured I would just beat a dead horse. In case you needed that, haha.

My low is pretty blunt frankly, though I think it will be something that revisits me from time to time for a long while to come. My friend and fellow volunteer Molli Barker, an Iowan girl of passion, intelligence, a bitingly dry sense of humor and a huge heart, resigned last week. The details of her departure and her reasons for it are private (to the point that I don’t think all the volunteers even know she is already back in the states), so I won’t go into them. However it does seem that it was a good decision for her, who she is, and what she wants out of life right now. Not to mention the fact that, in my opinion, it takes a tremendous amount of courage to admit that things aren’t right and to change gears away from this experience. Still, I feel terrible for the loss this represents or her community. Her co-teacher seems to be a really awesome guy (he’s the one who calls me “Rhino”) and to have prepared/hoped for a two year volunteer and have it change so quickly must have been a tremendous disappointment to many people in her village. And, of course, it was a tremendous disappointment to me and to the volunteers in our province as well. I have already written about the feelings of “wow, I could go home too…” from when Ryan left, but this was closer to home for certain. Part of it was losing a person that I hit it off with since Night One in San Francisco and had come to rely on and I knew she had my back as much as I had hers. But something Nora said that struck home even more was “I am just going to miss my friend” and that is the biggest thing. Forget pillars holding me up, I wanted to share two years of camaraderie with that girl because I loved who she was, and now that has changed drastically. It wasn’t the first and it may well not be the last, but sure makes you think of so many things… Yar.

Ok, ANYway… let’s end on a high note.

My high occurred in an unexpected way (unexpected?! What a surprise.). As a preface, I believe I have perhaps mentioned how hot it has here. If I haven’t, it is hot. I could say “scorching”, “boiling”, or “sweltering” but there really is no superlative to describe the fact that it feels like you are living on the surface of the sun. Autumn told me her thermometer was reading 102 degrees in the shade the other day… probably the same day I was sitting under my house with my brother and just said “wow, it is getting hotter. And hotter. How is this possible” and just started laughing uncontrollably. Of course I said this in English, but I think my brother got the gist since I did a personal remix of a Khmer song singing about how it was so hot I was going to die. It has in fact become a source of professional curiosity how I manage to sweat as much as I do. You would think I would eventually just revert to a liquid and sleep in a bucket, but so far it seems like my skin is satisfied to never, ever be dry. Ever.

ANYWAY, now there has finally been a break in the wall of heat – rains have started. Halle-freakin’-luiah. I typically am extremely vocal about how much I love the rain, talking about how I miss it and I want to lay in the mud with the pigs. My family tends to get a kick out of it, which in turn I find funny because I’m only partially joking. Storms often come up off the patties in the late afternoon and absolutely open up for at least thirty minutes. Often I stand around in the rain with just my kroma on singing “Thunderstruck” by ACDC and air-guitaring furiously while my brothers crack up. One of the local guys joined me in this one days, and while he was singing Khmer... it was a moment of true rock and roll.

So, on this particular day I had just finished working out and came down from my room as the rain started to pour. I am always eager for a chance to stand out in it and cool down/shower off with running water off the roof. My two biological (of course they aren’t really, but I find myself saying that out of reflex…) brothers and one of the lodging students were under the porch in dry clothes and just were laughing as I stood out Shawshank-Redemptionesque in the downpour. It was awesome, cold, and beautiful with the massive thunderheads shaking with lighting passing over us. I was quite content, and then suddenly my brother Tee said “do you want to run?” At first I didn’t get exactly what he was asking, but then as he gestured out over the fields with his hand with a broad smile on his face I said..

“Hell yes!”

So Tee and Tee-ah whipped off their shirts, we ducked the bamboo fence and the three of us went tearing across the patties in a dead sprint. Laughing and gasping we ran and ran and ran across the fields of Southern Cambodia through the sheets of cold rain, thunder, and lightning. I am almost ashamed trying to capture it in words because it was an experience that existed only in feeling and emotion. I thought to myself “was this somehow contrived? Or am I in a dream?” Language, culture, politics, money, the world passed away into a sense of raw being. All the down time, the various struggles, the times to think (or overthink…) anything and everything – it was all leveled by embracing this lung-burning sensation of connection. Connection with the weather, the land, my brothers, all of it. It couldn’t have lasted more than five minutes, but was one of the most purely perfect moments of my life.

After all the ups and downs there is only life. And, man… who could ask for more?