the ordinary

5 April 2009
This is a good day. Yesterday the sky looked dark. I asked if it might rain and a man told me no, its not time yet. This afternoon the sky looked even darker. My counterpart told me the first rain of last year was on April 5th. As I was walking home from a meeting, the wind began to blow. Its raining right now. I just made some popcorn and hot chocolate and was going to watch a movie, but I can’t hear it over the rain beating the tin roof and the windows banging open and shut in the wind. So I’ll write a blog instead. Wait, I am going to shut the windows… Ok that’s better. It’s the first rain since October and it has come rather arrogantly. I have always loved storms, especially when I watch them from behind sealed windows and under a tight roof. This is a bit different. I am not afraid the electricity will go out. I am listening to the downpour alone instead of with my family or roommates. I am thinking of the hours I will save tomorrow because I don’t have to water my garden. I am taken off guard.

I had been planning to write a post about the ordinary. The routine has been nice, but it has also been, at times, unwelcome. I didn’t come all the way to Africa with the Peace Corps to get into a routine, did I? I came for the adventure, the unexpected, the unknown. But the unknown has become known. I am slowly less and less surprised by what I see. Life has started to feel ordinary. More importantly, the work I am doing seems ordinary. But maybe that’s ok. Maybe life catches up to you. There are dishes to wash, floors to sweep, and groceries to buy no matter where you are. At first things seem new and exciting, but then they stop feeling that way. We get used to things and sometimes even stop noticing them. I am sure there are people who wake up everyday and can see the big picture of their lives. They can see the direction they are going and follow it with purpose, but for the rest of us, the trees hide the forest. The notion I held of Africa has disappeared, or at least it’s not where I am. I live in Moudawa and the kids with missing, or broken shoes have names, like Vaigi or Gita. I am not doing international development work; I am trying to get my friends to plant trees. It’s still possible to get caught up in routine even when you are among huts, dirty (and very cute) kids, women in yards of pagne with babies strapped to their back and buckets on their head. And then it rains. The wind has stopped, but the rain is still loud against the tin roof. There are bugs flying around my computer screen and I am sweating, so maybe I am still in Africa.