Questions

It is hard sometimes, when you have made tough decisions, to face adversaries. Certain people in my life, friends and family, have opposed my decision to join the Peace Corps. Or at least, they have asked, "Well...Why the heck would you want to do that?" Which is almost as painful because it seems to indicate that they don't know me very well or that they don't share my desire to be of use to the world. And sometimes, yes, I do question the decision myself, but what can you do when you worry that the people you would normally turn to would just try to talk you out of it, or would say, "I told you so," or worse yet would hold some secret little victory over you that maybe they were right all along and your armor isn't as strong as you thought it was? What can you do? Every few weeks I get a bout of questioning. I think, wouldn't it be easier to just marry, get a little house here, and start a life? Wouldn't that at least make it easier to decide the items for the registry?

In these times, something always happens. I hear a news story, or see a movie, or (most often) read a book or article that reminds me I am doing the right thing. It is funny because these things always fall in my lap at a providential moment. Now, for example. About a month ago I picked up a copy of The Hemingway Book Club of Kosovo by Paula Huntley at Half Priced Books for $2.00. It has been sitting on my living room floor ever since, staring up at me while I watch some stupid HGTV show saying, "Why don't you read me? That show is assinine." It had almost gotten to the point that I didn't want to read the damn book because it had been guilting me for so long, but today I picked it up. Today, when I worry I am doing the wrong thing, or that I will hate the Peace Corps, or that the mosquitos will eat me alive and I will want to come home and BJ will want to stay and it will tear us apart. I have only started reading it, only to page 7, and I am pretty sure this is one of those books or articles or movies or songs that resonate with me.

Huntley concludes the author's note by saying:

"It is also my hope that more of us Americans will become involved with the rest of the world. We need to learn about other people, learn what they think of us, try to understand, even if we don't agree with, their points of view. Everywhere in the world, I believe, from our own backyards to the middle of the Balkans, there exist people whose needs and whose generous, responsive hearts, offer even the most ordinary Americans -like me- an opportunity to serve, to connect, to expand our capacity for love."

I wish I could write that eloquently.

Sometime I will write down a list of all the things that I have found inspirational. Not because they will inspire anyone else but just because they will stand as a document of something...I'm not sure what. Some people think of those things as conicidence or perhaps serendipity, if you want to get fancy about it. Other people think these happenings are a Divine hand leading us to the "right" path. Still others think it is just our own minds looking for these moments to validate our lives. I don't know. I am just glad I notice them.

Off to read now. Good night.