Juxtaposition

Im sitting in this little oasis we have found, El Arco. A cafe near our house surrounded with trees overlooking the city. Im sitting next to a woman of my soul, listening to Spanish music, catching up with the world and knowing I need to start doing homework soon. This morning I listened to a talk called "relating wisely to desire" from my lap top in my comfortable bed. I rolled out of bed leisurely and had a delicious breakfast of french toast and tea on the patio with my housemates. Yesterday we spent the day at another oasis, we may have well been at a tropical resort. Palm trees, beautiful plants, grass, a pool, and a river running through the property to play in. We read, slept, swam, played soccer, ate more pan dulce than should be legal, and fully enjoyed ourselves. We ate coconuts fresh of the trees that the gardener opened with his machete. Tanned (or burned) and enjoyed the beautiful scenery. (Pictures to come on facebook). It was the most beautiful day.

During the week we walk to our classes passing by people selling whatever they can on the streets. We learn about all the pain and struggle this country has experienced. The second most homicides in the world after Iraq, nearly 50% of the country in poverty and so many people making way less than is sufficent to survive. We spend two days at our sites where families live in one room houses without electricity and running water, where our comedor serves beans, rice and tortillas to families that cannot afford food. Where we are told when teaching English classes we cannot ask immediately about families, ever about their favorite resturaunts or what they did this weekend. This culture is living a totally different reality.

Oh the juxtaposition.

There is a part of me that feels guilty for this life I return to when I leave those communities. And a part of me that feels like my soul is being taken care of. But something about the fact that my soul needs taken care of after seeing what is the truth for those people every single day tells me that something is seriously wrong with this world.

I am having a beautiful experience. The pain and struggle in this country hurts my soul. And the hope and love ignite it. I am starting to learn something about priorities, about differences, about life. But oh do i have so far to go.

Communicating in a language I do not know very well is hard. Living in a house with 12 people and spending almost all your time with those and 15 others is challenging. Exploring how to respond to extreme poverty and pain is heart breaking. Feeling the things you feel when you are reflecting on big questions, thinking of home, thinking of faith and pain and beauty sometimes doesn't feel like peaches and cream. For the last 20 years my most beloved coping method has been optimism. Optimism that has done me well, but sometimes has also been to a fault. I have learned to make everything feel ok with a big smile, with a constant search for the beauty in things. Yes it is partly survival that is necessary and it is partly hiding from the truth. A week ago I said to Margot "I think I am being too optimistic, I am having trouble really processing all this without seeing the good in it all" Yes there is good, but also there is so so much bad. Pain that must be acknowledged, empathized with and someday in my life, understood well enough to help create a change.

We are taking liberation theology with Sister Peggy. A woman who is a legend at Santa Clara, in this country and likely in much larger areas of the world. She is one of the most dynamic woman I have ever met, and is in her 70s. She has seen pain and love and seems to have such a grasp on life. She tells us she doesnt know all the answers, but definitely more than we do. She jokes about not having a soul until you are thirty, tells us to pig out on life, and calls herself "a prisoner of hope". We read about The Great Turning, Mysticism and Impasse and the Dark Night. This idea of "too optimistic" halting our most courageous and creative form of living, keeping us from seeing life as it is, from being real, genuine and honest. Oh did it speak to me. This is so much of what pulled me here, so much of what I am ready to learn. The articles talk about how we as Americans are educated in rational thinking and not in emotions. For so long I have told myself it is weak to be anything but happy, but to feel emotions is one of the most important human qualities. To see them, acknowledge them and with time, to let them pass. Emotions are what motivate life and change and all things beautiful. We do not know light without dark and sometimes we need to sit in the darkness to see what this all means.

I want to learn what this all means and how to put it into my own life, I want to feel what these people feel no matter if I am sitting on a broken chair surrounded by chickens, getting eaten alive by mosquitoes and hearing stories of pain or if I am laying in a gorgeous tropical oasis tanning.  I want to learn how to put all of this life into something that moves me more than it already does. I want to be present and alive, taking it all in and experiencing with all of my senses as Juancito has taught us too so that our writing can be better. Take me El Salvador, open me, break me, make me laugh, cry, learn and teach me. You are a country of so much knowledge, wisdom and love.

Praxis days are hard and taxing and eye opening. I know that means they are the most important. We come home exhausted. Listening to stories in Spanish takes so much focus and energy, often so much is lost. The kids and adults alike open our eyes to things we wish were not real and we come home without words too explain. This program was geniusly designed and again and again we are asked to reflect in ways that help us see things from a deeper lense. All I can do is try my very best to be present during my days at Cedro, then after my brain and heart have reenergized I can stop and think about all that I saw. My classes, sprituality and community night and just late night chats with my housemates help make it all real. Reflecting is the name of the game, and makes me feel more alive than ever.

Class days although long are almost relaxing. Some are in English and all are with familiar faces. More comfortable than our days at praxis and rejuvenating for our return.  Thursday we played soccer with some of the Becarios(Salvadoran scholarship students) and others that were at the field ready to play the beloved game of futbol. We had a blast. I havent played soccer since senior year and it was so refreshing to be out there. Dust in our faces, slipping left on right on mud, yelling "aqui aqui" over and over again in Spanish since I dont know the correct words. Soccer ball bouncing between my feet, getting smacked with the  ball on bare skin and the adrenaline of shooting or passing the ball. We ran after and almost every day. The air is hot and sticky and sometimes taste dirty from all the city toxins. The views are different but the act of running makes all the challenges of this new world less intimidating. Running is a place of peace. We are starting to get into a routine and so much of this feels so very right. There are moments that weigh hard but so many places of comfort, understanding, support, reflection and refuge.

We are coming on three weeks in and already my brain and heart are on fire. Sometimes painfully so. I am being challenged and loved. El Salvador is fulfilling its promises of opening my soul