doors

I came here naive.

It's not easy to find international work.

All I want to do is work on community development issues, I want to gain experience working internationally, I want to make some sort of small difference. I want to earn a living while J attempts to build our house. I came here full of this intent and after 3 months (granted we had a setback) I am no farther along than I was when I arrived.

The resources see, they don't even come close to filling the need. And I knew this and I know this and yet I am still full of frustration because I can't help but think I could do something about it if only I was given a chance.

I'm whining here and I know it. I want this to work more than anything and in order to do that I need to work either with NGOs in the States or ones here and the US economy is terrible and here, well here is a wild landscape and there is still so much I do not know. But I'm scrappy and I'll work hard, I will and can do this if given a chance.

Five years ago we started this journey and I was told something then that always stuck with me. All you'll get is one door at a time, Jen. You'll have to walk through to see what comes next. And I've walked through all of them sometimes blindly sometimes in good faith and so far so good but this one, this door it seems to be stuck or hiding or I need one pill to make me smaller or one to grow so I can see where it is.

passing go

Another long day sitting in hospital pre-op and post-op rooms, J is hanging in but today was painful, really painful and seeing him like this and seeing us like this is making me tired.  Simply put, the last few weeks have been hell around the plus two.  And the hot doctor didn't even look so hot.  I'm not sure why that is but am thinking it has to do with me.

But grace is everywhere, isn't it.  

It's in the nurse who took me aside and shared some coffee, in the man who lended a hand to a stranger when I'd lost my way, in the pharmacy tech who pulled some strings, to my parents and friends here and the ones in the jungle who keep checking in and of course, all of you.  It's in motion, all of it and in times like this you almost sit back and take stock of all the goodness swirling all around you and how if it wasn't for that you don't know how things would work and yet because of it they keep on.  

The world is a small and friendly place and those kidney stones, well lets just say those fuckers are toast. I've got them in a jar and if I wasn't so annoyed with them I might name them, perhaps Cheech and Chong or George and Dick, comedy duos high and low.

And now we wait.  We need the green light. The one that can set us free. 

and that's why they call it the blues

i'd by lying if i said things were fine. i mean, things are fine, literally. figuratively, it's rather bluesy. i'm bluesy, whether it's the time of year or the lack of words of the cold or the sick or the feeling essentially like i've got so little to ahem, fucking contribute! around here these days, i don't know.

i sat down to write something you know, cheery, but then the words get all knackered in the back of my throat. it's not the weepy blues but more an ambivalent shade of indigo or a self righteous midnight. i want a pleasant surprise, or a party, pity. something. natch.

(if you can't say something nice)

and don't even get me started on the primaries. those fools. stooping to nastiness when it's obvious to anyone that any one of them would be better than the current jackass in the big house if they'd just stand up tall and show us the way. i watched a live caucus over the weekend and saw folks screaming at each other, waving their ballot cards, bashing the other guy and thought it may not be the best, but it's democracy.

(don't say anything at all)