love and thanks on a sunny October day

Exactly a month ago, I was sitting in a Denver coffee shop, trying to eek out words to describe what I was doing and everything I was feeling, trying not to let my fears and anxieties show through too much.  It’s hard to believe I’ve been here for a month now.  Where has the time gone?

In the month I’ve been here, we’ve had two sessions of students at the Ranch (yes, Ranch.  With horses and goats and alpacas; and I wear jeans and flannel almost every day.  So far, I’ve resisted wearing a cowboy hat; sometimes I wear my baseball cap.  More often than not, I wear my boots, especially with the daily rain we’re now getting).  At the Ranch, yes, there’s the barn and the Lodge (and lots of mountain trails all around), and mostly we spend our time at the Lodge, where we eat all of our meals and sometimes have “academic time” because the students earn elective credit while they are here.  And they do learn, about the natural history of the area, about animals living on the Ranch, about leadership, about the culture of the West, and, oh yeah, about themselves. 

Mostly what we do here is tell the students how much they are loved and how much they matter and how they mean something in this big, confusing world.  These kids come from all across California, mostly from inner-city neighborhoods, where they spend their days out on the streets, or taking care of younger siblings, or trying to escape homes where “love” is as far away as the belief that they can make something of themselves.  At the Ranch, we try to change that. 

It’s not summer camp.  It’s not vacation.  We have fun, no doubt about that, but it’s not all fun and games.  It’s a lot of tough love.  The tough part comes with 10-hour days, and living with the same people you work with, and I want to help you, but you’ve got to learn to help yourself.  It’s when they wish they could stay here forever because it’s the first safe place they’ve know in their 18 years of life; it’s when the biggest smiles and most outgoing and loving hearts cry into your shoulder awful stories of abuse and neglect.  The love part is the only response. 

Of the students that come out to the ranch, many have just flown for the first time, most have never been out of California.  All of them, in lots of different ways, believe the lies society has told them about their lives, their worth.  When the students leave the Ranch, they will have completed 5 academic units, but they walk away with a lot more than that. 

I had no idea what I was getting myself into when I moved out here, out to a small haven on the side of a mountain, and I don’t know if I could have found a better place to be.  Yes, the days are long, exhausting physically and emotionally, but I don’t want to be anywhere else. 

On the last night of each session, the students write letters to themselves.  We mail them three months later, once they get back to their lives outside of the Ranch, in hopes that they remember the things we did at the Ranch, the love, the courage, the change, remember that the joy is as real as the struggle.  Las week, I wrote myself a letter.  Mostly, what I write I’m too self-conscious of to share, but as it sits next to me, I want to share it here; I can’t take it back, can’t dismiss it as false, now that it’s out to the world.  Before a bad day makes me want to throw it into the fire.  Before I, too, succumb to the doubt that threatens to chase the love away. 

October 1, 2015

Dear Bridget,

            Session 2 draws to a close.  Never doubt that you matter, here and now.  Whatever emotions threaten to bring you down, know deeper than that that every moment, every expression of love, every embrace, this here is real.  The love that emanates, radiates from what we do here, this is real, these expressions of love different than what you’ve known in the past, different than the fairy tales, but no less important, no less valued, no less needed.  You love so hard.  Because so many people have poured into you, and that matters.  You could not love like you do without all the love poured into you; it changes expression, but never the strength, the passion.  Your story isn’t the fairy tale story, but the love you share reaches the ends of the earth.  On days when it’s hard, remember to also love yourself.  You are radiant.

Love,

Bridget

Thank you, all of you, for believing in me.  You, who tell me, in all your beautiful and unique ways, in some way or another as we’ve shared our lives together, “I love you.”  I wouldn’t be here without you.  Wouldn’t see the sun’s radiant light as a daily shower of love over the world, wouldn’t know deeper than words that this life is something special, wouldn’t know the daily joy that manifests in more ways than could fill a book.  Thank you for making me who I am today, I wouldn’t be here without you.  Sometimes the doubt and shadows threaten to block out the sun.  Thank you for all the reminders, for all the little manifestations of your love.  I hope that this can be a reminder to you, on those days for you.  You have poured so much into me, I hope that I can but give a fraction of it back. 

Love, love, love,

Bridget

catching up

It’s been over a year since I’ve updated life in cyberspace, and life has been full in these months of absence.  Most notably, I graduated from Wooster, my home away from home for the past few years.  Moving into a cinder-block door room as a freshman, four years seems like forever; then graduation day comes and you realize how short that time really is.  Or I guess re-realize it; “the time is short and there’s so much to do.”  Been hearing those lyrics every summer since I was 10 and they’re as true today as they were that first Thursday night in June 2003.  But that’s a tangent for another day.  I graduated.  And now that I know all the answers to everything, thanks to my liberal arts degree, I know that there will never be satisfaction in answers; living is bigger than answers, and so armed with more questions I’m off again.

The funny thing is that two years ago, September 7, 2013, I was also on the brink of a journey, traveling across the ocean to try to re-kindle meaning in a life that had gotten so full of routine I wasn’t able to see the richness life held in a small town in the middle of Ohio.  Two years later, I re-read through all of the anxieties, all the passion cursing through my veins and my words, and smile, remembering that person who seems so far away now.  So much has happened in two years, and the adventure is still continuing.

I’m getting ahead of myself again.  I graduated in May with a B.A. in life, and the world a blank slate before me.  And so I did what I love best, I went to camp.  Spent the summer, summer number 12, at Camp Joy, making camp happen for over 1,000 campers and staff- little kids and big kids alike.  Two weeks of training and ten weeks of camp… life was a sprint, (every moment matters!) and while some days I felt too tired to even get out of bed, I went to work at a place where smiles greeted me every morning and hearts and lives were changed for the better.  Physically and emotionally exhausted, I ended the summer with a few mandatory days of rest, thanks to pain pills and recovering from surgery but I’m still cancer-free!!! and healing, slowly but surely.

And so, two weeks out of the hospital, what am I up to?  I’m currently sitting at a coffee shop in Denver, Colorado taking advantage of free WiFi so that I can keep my promise to my family and friends that I’d let them know how life was going, not across an ocean this time, but across the continent, as I once again pack up my life in Ohio (my first and always home) and see what life brings in Colorado.  I’m moving to Lyons tomorrow morning, leaving the city and the comfort of my sister’s apartment for a camp I’ve never been to and where I know no one.  And I’m thrilled.  Excited beyond explanation.  Last week was one of the hardest weeks of my life; saying good-bye to people you love more than words is really really hard turns out (and I’m leaving it at that because I’m in public and despite the fact that crying is ok, crying in public isn’t something I want to do right now).  I said good-bye to one chapter in my life, and tomorrow begins another.  Maybe we’ll call this one trying to see; trying to see what things are, as they are, trying to appreciate each moment of love for what it is, miracle of life, every moment of every day. 

Maybe it’s that leaving makes you see things in a different light, maybe it’s that I stopped wanting to see.  Anyways, now I’m here.  For better, for worse; only time will tell.  As for now, this is me, writing to stay alive, to stay connected, to that light within me and to the lights of innumerable souls who have made my life better because our paths crossed and they chose to smile.  Chose to ask a wandering soul to do quiet time in the morning; chose to rescue crazy college kids from being drenched in the April downpour; chose to watch Baraka, and hold on tight; chose to let me learn from my mistakes and my own writing; chose to be excited for me instead of letting me see how much it hurts to move across the country.  I wish I could tell you all exactly the impact you’ve had on my life, but words fall short on so many occasions and this is no exception.  For someone who loves writing so much, sometimes I have to leave the black and white on the page and send my love through the stars.  So wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, my you see the stars and know the love that cannot be extinguished.  I pass it on, but it not mine.  I hope you continue to know it, and continue to pass it on.  My life is better because so many of you chose to say yes to this infinite love and pass it on to me.  Thank you.  With your love in my heart, I now travel on. 

Until next time. Love, love, love,

~Bridget

thoughts from the library

The last month I really remember all of living through was October.  What happened?  I was in Guinea, struggling but living, with so much energy, so much life.  Over-filled with weaving, bogolan work, building friendships, running around town, and trying to figure out the meaning of all of this, November flew by.  In December my feet made the transition from chacos to snow boots and back to chacos, the dirt of three different continents beneath my toes.  Even though January contained 32 sunsets and the longest day of my life, it passed by in a blur, and the rest of spring semester right along with it.  Now it’s the Sunday before exam week, four months later.  

What happened?  I’m just beginning to feel comfortable again in this space I call my own, and in just over a week I’ll be leaving again.  Is life always coming and going?  Will I ever know myself in one place for longer than can be measured in weeks?  

Yet even as I write this, it terrifies me to stand still.  If I’m wandering at least I don’t have to be still long enough to look in the mirror, to look at things as they are right here and now.  If I’m running everything remains a blur and I don’t have to focus on it if I don’t want to.  

But have you ever tried to embrace and continue running at the same time?  Running hugs always end in spinning in circles, caught in each other’s momentum when hanging on was more important than continuing on.  You can’t embrace and continue to run blindly.  Arms open wide, you have to stop and let that person fill you with the entirety of their being, their direction, their love.  It catches you off guard sometimes, can change your direction completely.  And yet, when you’re caught in that embrace, eyes close.

Shut.  But not shut out.  Shut because at that moment, what can be seen is insignificant to knowing that at this moment, arms wrapped around and tears flowing in torrents together, sight is insignificant.  I feel your love, I know it deeper than anything I could ever see.  Eyes close, not to further ignore the blur that is life flying by, but to fully embrace everything that it is, everything that could possibly be.  Caught up in this moment, the eyes close and the heart opens.  Did you realize how long it’s been?  

The heart opens slowly, scar tissue stiff from years and years of disappointments and misunderstandings and loss without reason.  It’s slow, but once it’s started, it’s hard to believe there was a time when it was shut tight, shut to keep out the world.  With the eyes open, life was flying by in a blur, body tight, breath weezing, heart clenched shut to protect, but frozen ground never grew flowers.  

I’m thawing.  Slowly but surely, not without struggles, and you better believe I’m fighting against it.  But I’m tired of running.  Tired of trying to run other peoples’ races, trying to fit other peoples’ expectations; tired of pretending I have answers when I know I never will, pretending I’m something static when I know I’m constantly becoming.  The world smiles in sunshine; early morning breakfast with the birds as the sun crests the top of the canyon, and streaming through the library window as I sit with everyone else trying to get papers finished in time for finals.  The world smiles and all I can see is miracle.  

You smile and all I see is miracle.  The flowers open up, miracle of color.  The rain falls in sheets, numbing and chilling to the bone and I know I am alive, miracle of self.  The breeze feels cool against my skin, but it carries with it the sweet scent of the trees, waking up after too long a sleep, miracle of life.  Your love catches me off guard, Papa.  I am left breathless.  Tired of running, you catch me in your embrace; my eyes close to all that distracts, and my heart opens to miracle of love, of life, of being.  

What do you want to be when you grow up?  What do you want to do with your major?  Where do you see yourself in 5 years?  When I grow up I want to be in love with life, and I want to use my major to live with convictions and questions, and in 5 years I don’t care where I’ll be because wherever I’ll be I’ll be with God.

a little about what I've been up to

Well, it’s been a while.  I’m now back in the States, back in Wooster attending classes and trying to figure out how all the new fits into all that I left.  As of June 2013, I hadn’t lived outside of Ohio.  I was born and raised here, and while I moved three and a half hours away to go to college, I’m still in the same state.  Which I love, don’t get me wrong, but 20 years living in the same place, and the world felt like it was calling me.  I’ve been on occasional trips to other places in the states, and even overseas, but what I felt last winter when I began thinking about all of this, this felt different.  I wanted to be out of Ohio.  And not just for a few weeks, but really live somewhere else, spend time walking around and staying around even when the novelty was gone.  And while part of me was terrified of this, another part of me knew I had to do it, because I was more afraid of doing nothing, of staying here, than I was of going away.  

I spent last summer in Oregon, working at Camp Namanu.  Even though I missed Camp Joy, where I had spent the past ten summers, I was excited to be able to experience something I love (camp) in a totally different and new environment (Oregon).  The change of scenery alone was enough to remind me I wasn’t in Ohio anymore, but I also found myself missing (and craving) the family I had at Joy, the community that knew me and loved me and supported me through everything.  As much as I love traveling, I forget how long it takes to create community, and I found myself in an interesting place at Namanu, full of passion and love for camp and for the work that we were doing, but surrounded by faces and hearts unknown to me, and mine unknown to them.  Before long however, these unfamiliar faces became friends, family; these hearts full of hopes and dreams not too different than my own, and pieces of which remain with me today, even miles and months away.  But even as much as I’d like it to last forever, camp came to an end, and I soon found myself packing up my suitcase and preparing to fly back, if only briefly, to the state I had finally been able to get away from.

I was home not even 5 days when I left again, this time, on my way to something even more unknown.  Four airplanes, multiple cars, and one suitcase less than when I started, I finally arrived in Kankan, Guinea.  I wish I could say I fell in love with the city right away, that it was everything I imagined it to be, that I knew right away it was going to be such an amazing study abroad experience that I could go home and tell all my friends and family about and everyone would be jealous of all that amazing-ness that I got to do.  In fact, what I knew right away was that it was going to be a struggle, what I didn’t know was just how much of a struggle it was going to be.  Kankan was nothing I expected it to be, full of things I saw as contradictions and frustrations (least of which being that few people spoke English).  When people ask what I did when I was abroad, I say simply, “I lived” because that’s what took the most energy, what I spent most of my time thinking about.  It’s not something that is easily articulated because it’s just life, it’s what my host family and my friends did every day without thinking about, but for me, I found myself in a place I had never been before.  I knew nothing.  Absolutely nothing.  What to wear, how to eat, how to get from point A to point B, how to go to the bathroom, how to shower, what to wear, what to do upon entering a room, how to wash my clothes, how to talk, how to think.  Not everything I did was wrong, but it was weird, different, and I had to think about things in a way I never had to before.  To say it was hard would be the understatement of a lifetime.  But I did it.  I learned how to do my laundry and how to eat; learned to communicate and how to advocate for what I needed, as weird as it seemed to others.  I lived.  And it’s the proudest I’ve ever been of myself.  

The flight back was a whirlwind; more cars and airports and pat-downs and finally home sweet home.  But home was different, too.  I had adapted so much to living in Kankan, and now I needed to adapt back.  Which one would think would be simple, getting back to this life that I had looked forward to for so long, but it wasn’t that easy.  I found it really hard to talk about my time abroad, and especially difficult to try to articulate how I had changed, and how I now saw the world.  I was the same old me, back to another Christmas with family, but I felt different, and I couldn’t explain why.  Conversations were now strained, and I spent a lot of time by myself, just trying to figure out how to live life here all over again.  

I didn’t have much time though, because not even three weeks after I landed in the States I was off again.  The timing of this last trip wasn’t ideal, but I had the opportunity to travel to Thailand and Myanmar (Burma) for two weeks before the start of spring semester with a group of students from Wooster, and I couldn’t say no.  So I spent the day after Christmas packing my suitcase once again, and off I was to Thailand.  In less than thirty days I had been on three different continents.  I say none of this as a way to brag, but as conviction that I’m crazy.  And I mean that.  I spent the first few days of our time in Thailand in a state of shock, not really culture-shock and jet lag like my classmates were experiencing, but shock at this crazy pace of life and that I was (again) living out of a suitcase, living in limbo, traveling around.  My time in Thailand was nothing like my time in Guinea, and I feel so thankful for that.  While my study abroad program prided itself on not being tourist-y, our group in Thailand was a part of a large tourist culture, especially in Bangkok where we first stayed.  There are so many different ways to experience a new culture, to see and live in a different part of the world, and I learned to appreciate these ways.  Tourist isn’t always synonymous with ignorant and disrespectful, and even long term time spent in a country doesn’t make you all-knowing (or your motives better than others).  Tourism and Global Travel are complicated issues.  They deserve thought, especially if you yourself are planning to travel across borders, but the answers aren’t as clear as I once thought.  

And now I’m back.  To Ohio, to Wooster, to one of my, now many, “home away from home”s.  This is week 4 of classes, and I finally am feeling back to “normal,” whatever that means.  And sunrise after sunrise, life keeps surprising me, as I wake up to pure Joy shining through my windows.  Day after day, ink smudges across blank paper still trying to process it all.  I don’t know where I’m going from here, don’t know how I’m going to make sense of everything that has happened in the past six months, but still I try.  To articulate for myself and to share with others, but mostly as a way for me to continuing taking one more step in this journey that is life.  I try to find the words, to write, to speak, because it’s how I make sense of the world, and I thank you for listening and caring as my heart tries to make sense of the ebbs and flows of the journey. 

here, there, everywhere

I haven’t written in a while.  I wish there were a better reason than the one I’m about to share, but the honest reason it’s taken me so long to write another post is because I’ve just been unable to get my emotions together enough to think clearly about all that is life.  The last few weeks of life in Kankan flew by.  Between trying to finish up interviews and term papers, finishing my work on the loom for the final show, and saying the hardest good-byes in my entire life, I hardly had time to process for myself what was going on and how I was dealing with it, much less translate those experiences and emotions into English and find time to go to internet and share them with you. 

Then when I came back, I crashed.  I made it through the three days of traveling, a 9 hour taxi drive, two hotels, and five different airports, thanks to pure adrenaline.  Looking back, I really don’t know how we did it.  Strange thing home is, though.  If you’ve ever experienced reverse culture shock, you know what I mean.  The only thing worse than being in a different culture and having no idea what’s going on or what to do, is being in a culture where you should know what is going on and what to do, and yet you still don’t feel like you belong.  It’s rough.  Everyday things like making breakfast and taking a shower and walking outside to get the mail seem like totally foreign activities, and going to the grocery store or the mall?  Forget it.  The first time I walked into Kroger I had to stop and close my eyes, collect myself, before I could even walk past the second set of doors.  The horribly bright lights, the sounds of carts and announcements on the loud speaker and people talking in English, the absence of smells, no pungent fish or spices or fruit or even garbage for that matter, and then there’s the sheer abundance of everything.  I mean none of this as judgment, because it’s everyday life, it’s how we live here, and there really isn’t an alternative, but the difference is still such a shock.  I bought a bunch of bananas from the top of the display case, and I didn’t ask the women who was selling them how she was doing, and how was her family, and her home; didn’t need to ask the price because it was listed on a sign in huge bold numbers, and I didn’t tell her thank you, or good-bye, or see you tomorrow, as I would have back in Kankan, because there was no one to have this conversation with.  It’s such a simple thing, going to the store to buy bananas, and it’s not that there’s one best way to do this, it’s just different everywhere you go.  You can think you know that things will be different and strange, but emotions don’t really work this way.  You can know things with your head, but your heart doesn’t always speak the language of reason.

The three months I lived in Kankan were three of the hardest months of my life, and yet some days my heart longs for those dusty market streets and the sweet taste of fresh coconut, shared with friends under the cool shade of one of the few trees in the entire city.  I miss the really challenging conversations, miss struggling to communicate.  And yet, I love being back.  I love reconnecting with friends I haven’t seen in way too long, love waking up late without anything to do; I love baking with my mom in my pajamas and going to church again where God can be “she.” 

My mind keeps telling me I can’t love both of these things, I can’t actually have enjoyed life that was so hard and still love this life I came back to.  Missing home means that’s where my heart is, right?  That’s where I’m supposed to be?  But can my heart really be in more than one place?  My brain keeps telling me I have to find one place I belong, that only one can be the best for me.  I have to make the right choice, because there is only one right path, and I need to find that (and hopefully sooner rather than later).  And if I like one, I can’t like the other, right?  Or I should at least have to like one more than the other.  But my heart is telling me something totally different.  I love more than one place.  I loved cooking in the back of the restaurant in Kankan with my host sisters, and laughing together as they taught me how to dance right.  I love baking pumpkin muffins with my mom, both of us in our pajamas, sometimes talking, sometimes not, just enjoying being close to one another.  I love going to breakfast after church with my new friends in Wooster, and spending late Wednesday nights baking way more banana bread than we’ll ever eat.  I love walking across that familiar field at night, looking up at those stars, the only things there that never change, remembering all the times I’ve held God herself in my lap as I rocked her to sleep, or waited for lunch, or just been there for comfort.  In all my travels, my comings and goings, I’ve been searching for that one singular place, path, passion, but what I’ve found is that my passion, my love, multiplies with every place I go. 

I think what it is, my passion, my love, it’s where I find God.  And God, she doesn’t choose one place over the other.  She IS.  Allah ye ya.  Dieu est partout.  God is everywhere.  What do you want to be when you grow up?  What do you want to do with your major?  Where do you see yourself in 5 years?  I want to be in love with God.  I want to use my major to learn how to live with conviction and questions and laughter.  And in 5 years, I don’t care where I’ll be because wherever I’ll be, I’ll be with God. 

It’d be foolish to say I’m always aware of her, but she’s here, whether I realize it or not.  My acknowledgment of her presence, of her intimacy and care, doesn’t change her love.  So instead of pretending I don’t deserve it, or trying to run away from it, or making myself too busy to be able to slow down and realize it, I need to change my response. So I’m trying to slow down a little, stop all the frantic searching, and begin to notice God where I am, wherever I am.  Many times, it’s the little things that have a way of reminding me, the mundane become extraordinary because God, she has a way of changing even the simplest things into moments of love and grace and thanks.  This morning, it was the familiar sight of steam rising from the coffee in my mason jar as I sat outside under the trees working on my journals; and the voice of a friend, honest and from the heart, “I’m really glad you’re here with me right now.”  It was a beautiful sunset, the sun huge falling low in the sky, partially hidden behind a few clouds yet its radiance only enhanced by these shadows that tried to hide it.  Sometimes these little things slip right past, but with each glimpse of God, I become more aware of her presence right here, right now.  Because wherever I am, I am with God. 

November 13

Three weeks left before we leave.  For my family back home it’s still so far away, but for my family here, it’s way too soon.  I can’t believe it’s already been ten weeks.  Where has the time gone?  The days last forever and yet the weeks pass by so quickly.  My brain is like fried mush.  I’ve never lived with so much energy before and at the end of every day I’m absolutely exhausted.  And many times before the end of the day.  Because everything is challenging.  

Don’t get me wrong, there are just as many rewarding parts to each day as well, but even the good times are difficult.  Drinking coffee and eating fried plantains, buying beautiful fabric and delicious fresh fruit from the market, just walking down the street to get to class or taking a taxi moto across town to visit friends, it all requires so much energy.  And quiet time?  It hardly exists.  I came home yesterday and no one was home.  The next 5 minutes were the closest thing to peace and quiet I’ve had in a long time.  It just isn’t a thing here.  

And going to the library to do work, or even going to a café… first, you have to explain to everyone where you’re going and when you’ll be back; then you have to get there, either by walking or by taking a taxi, which involves haggling the price and avoiding dumb questions and trying to understand what people are saying; then once you get there, you have to greet everyone there and when you finally settle down to do work (that is, of course, assuming that where you are has electricity and you can plug your computer in) please, make sure you bring your earphones because then you won’t be able to hear everyone talking about you and you might actually get work done.  I’m so ready to just be normal again.  I never thought I’d say that.  

I take that back, I don’t want to be normal, but I would love to be where I knew what was going on, and I wasn’t stared at everywhere I went, and I could do what I needed to do without waiting for people, and I could communicate without being laughed at for not understanding, and I could just sit and watch the sun set and count the stars as the come out without being bitten by a thousand mosquitoes.  Life is great, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy.  

I don’t write this as a complaint, but rather as a celebration.  A celebration for every struggle I’ve made it through, every small ounce of courage I’ve gained; every tear I’ve shed for my life back home, for all those whom I love and who return that love more than I’ll ever know; It’s a celebration of the golden sunlight that comes at the end of every day, no matter how long or tiring, the golden sunlight that promises the soft comfort of darkness, and the familiar comfort of my favorite hunter laying low on the horizon.  It’s a celebration of love, of patience, of deep respect; a celebration of the comfort of a simple handshake, even though we don’t agree, we never will, and despite the fact that I’m only 70% sure I understood the words you said.  But the celebration runs deeper than words, because I understood your hopes, your dreams; I understood the struggle to try to find your place in the world, and to make the most of the life before you; the struggle to follow your heart and the wishes of your family at the same time, and the struggle to remain with God through all of this.  

My brain may feel mike mush at the end of the day, but heart sings always for joy, for love, for life.