Volver

This is my first post since March that was written in the United States.  Yes, I'm home in Richmond for 12 days to celebrate Christmas with my family and enjoy all of the riches that America has to offer.  There are a lot of feelings and things to discuss, so I'm just going to start writing and see where it takes me.

You know that feeling when you're thinking about what you want to eat and you just can't decide, but then, you come up with the perfect thing.  You think, "Yes! That's exactly what I want."  Then, you make it and eat it and you say to yourself, "That was it.  That really hit the spot."  Well, I feel that way towards every single food in the USA right now.  It's a constant feeling of "that's just what I was looking for".  The other day, I did the Costco free sample relay and I felt like Jim Carrey in Yes Man.  At first, I just wanted to say yes to everything to see what wonderful things would come my way.  At a certain point, however, I realized that I couldn't have said no even if I wanted to.  I didn't necessarily miss all of this food when I was in Senegal nor did I love it or eat it often when I was here last.  It's just like I'm trying everything for the first time again and the novelty of it all just seems to make everything more desirable.

One thing that I knew that I really missed was the cold.  I've always been a cold weather person.  Back in high school, I used to look at the weather every morning and I would only decide to wear long pants once it dropped below 40 degrees.  Walking out of the airport in Washington, I took my first deep breath of American air in over 9 months.  As I exhaled, I saw that cloud of condensation form in front of me and I couldn't help but smile.  Seeing my breath recalled so many memories for me.  It brings me back to so many places, so many times.  It's amazing how something so simple can be so interconnected between different areas of my memory, but it's one of the simple pleasures from America that I missed.  Just standing outside breathing the cold air and watching your breath appear and fade away.  I often just let my mind go blank when I do that.  I just focus on feeling the cold air in my lungs when I inhale.  I watch the cloud as it forms, expands, and rises because clouds, like snowflakes, are never exactly alike.  I see it as it dissipates back into the air from which I drew the original breath.  Then, the cycle happens all over again.  That's life, I suppose.

I'm also amazed by how quickly I fell back into old habits.  The last 9 months of my life almost feel like a dream.  I'm back exactly where I was just as if I had taken a long sleep instead of traveling to another continent and back.  I don't feel different, things don't look different.  I don't know if I expected things to be different, but it's just weird to have gone through so much in the past 9 months then almost go back in time to before I was ever in Senegal.  Come to think of it, I also don't have a phone or a car, have no friends in town, and eat all day.  Am I 13 again?  Did I go back too far?  Oh well.

Anyway, I'm only a couple days into my vacation, so I'll save a few thoughts and observations for my next post when my vacation will be over.  Happy Holidays to everybody, especially those of you celebrating in Senegal.