Being back

It's now been a week and 5 days since I've been drinking from the faucet and flushing the toilet paper.

What's it like being back? Has there been reverse culture shock?

In a way the transition back surprised me by requiring little processing, maybe because I was returning to certain ingrained patterns (the grad student house, the cover crop research), and also because the last 2 weeks of the trip were cold and rainy. So it wasn't like I was directly leaving sunny tropical beaches or anything. And having two months away allowed me space to reflect and muse in the many moments there, although I know that the bigger impact of this trip may not surface for me for months or years.

But I know I have become more assertive, in asking for what I want. The Vietnamese were stubborn and to get my needs met I had to put in some work. I've also picked up unkempt and brazen bicycle habits: bicycling wrong way in round-abouts, up one-way streets, sidewalks....  Finally, now I have seen cultures where superstition is strong, where families are The Most Important Thing, where floors are nearly sacred and you remove shoes before entering. Values so different than ours out here. I've seen that the world can function without hand-sanitizer, without endless complex forms, without guard-rails.

I miss the cheap prices of food; I miss riding my bicycle every day; I miss the resounding appetite I had.

I still dream of markets and caves though, apparently two things which really clipped onto my unconscious.

I am happy to make eye contact with people passing on the street (without being sold sunglasses, donuts, or cigarettes). I am happy to not be so toweringly huge, happy to be a little more anonymous and a little less stared at. I like being able to understand what people are saying. Bathrooms have soap AND toilet paper AND paper towels.

Driving a car on the roads here feels unsettlingly fast. Because there is so much less traffic, much  more space, and far fewer potholes. The bicycling dynamics feel markedly different. Cars wait for me at intersections, give me heaps of passing space or even wait for a spacious break to pass. 

Since being back I've been once again discussing the existential properties of cover crop mulch with one of my advisors (I'm getting a little money to write an extension bulletin). I sat on a Seattle coffee-shop balcony in the blessing of sun and watched pale bearded men on commuter bicycles whiz down Seattle's capitol hill. There are bike lanes and I want to live in a place like this.

Also I slept in a tree-house on Bainbridge island, relishing the birds, wondering what is so compelling about the stillness, the looming pines, the moody waters of the Puget Sound. In the forests there is green from every pore. That which would feature brown color is instead covered by ivy and moss and thus all is green green green. Even when gray here, on the Puget Sound, there is something beautiful. That sorrow is beautiful here, contemplation is right and good; melancholy can be fulfilling instead of depressing. And then, when the glory of the sun does flood down, oh then: this is the most delicious magnificence.

I visited my old Episcopal church to wide hugs and smiles, although I have been replaced by a new organist. "That you are back, proves that there IS a god," stated one of the church ladies, one of the more openly opinionated ones. "Our new organist is terrible," she added. I had to explain that I could only visit for 2 Sundays. Mr. New Organist, who I didn't even get to meet because he arrived just before church started and left right away, doesn't offer a prelude or postlude, so I had an opportunity to play a little bit for everyone again. I sat in the front pew, didn't know the appropriate times to stand for the hymns, and involuntarily started at the lines Father Priest says just before the Sanctus and the offertory.

After the service I sat at a round table-clothed table eating biscuits and gravy (fundraiser for a new furnace) and felt like I was holding a sort of court for a group of unhappy subjects. All around me people were sharing their unhappy stories of this new organist. The time he played his violin at the pulpit was particularly noted, "it sounded like a room full of rocking chairs and a long-tailed cat," stated one. "We at least got 2 of the 5 verses of the gospel hymn today," noted another. Father Priest said he was having nightmares. It was almost comical how disgusted everyone was, but sad too, because I could offer little suggestion and, how I wish I could return!!!!, but I haven't been able to find a position in the area to keep me here.

So, yup. This brings me to job searching. Which I have been doing. I have an interview at a soil-science/environmental science company which manufactures research equipment. And there is also a possibility at a seed company. And maybe some other things....

I am not under stress about finding a job. I can float for a little while (I'm heading to Moscow ID next to play Easter for my other favorite Episcopals) and I know I can find something somewhere.

But thinking critically about setting up the next chapter of my life... Knowing what you want--what you really want, what will serve you in the future, what will nourish you in the now--is extraordinarily hard. What kind of job I want. The kind of place I want to live in. Who I want to be near.

All I can really get at now is that I want to be in the sunshine, drink strong tea, and ride my bicycle. To make food for people. I want to contribute and feel productive. I want laughter and love and curiosity and wonder. I want someone I cannot have. I want Mt. Rainier. I want to be near my family. My Wise Friend tells me I cannot get everything I want, and that this is a good thing. That there will be other things, unimaginable at this point, which I will receive and want then.