At some point after returning to Antigua, I realized that by the time I leave Guatemala in April, I will have spent nearly half the year thus far here. Of the 16 weeks that will have transpired, I will have spent a little over 7 in Guatemala.
I'm okay with that.
Although I've bounced around a bit recently in terms of where I've been staying, it is beginning to feel remarkably like "home." Not necessarily the home I've known forever, but a "home" for me no less. As I've become more comfortable and relaxed here, I find my mind wandering more and more as I walk through the streets. I find that where I once marveled at the cobblestones, warmed my eyes on the glowing peach walls of la Merced, and jumped at every firecracker explosion in the distance (and nearby), I now walk around wrapped up in my thoughts, ending up across town with little recollection of how I got there. It's all become so comfortably familiar.
It's a strange sense to have, that your life is so whole in two very different places. Back where I came from, there is family. There are friends. My boyfriend; my nieces; many places that I love and miss. The town I grew up in; the city I chose to make my new home. Everything familiar and well-worn exists there, a testament to the insidiousness with which attachments are made in spite of all of my efforts to the contrary. I have grown up there. I have a lot of complaints, but it has always been HOME.
Returning to Antigua was delightfully unsettling, because for once, upon returning to a foreign place, I was greeted with the same relief that I feel when stepping off a plane in Boston or Providence. I may not have a specific place here to call home, but still- Antigua is "home" in it's own way.
That played out adage is true: "home is where the heart is." In Providence, in Lakeville, and my childhood stomping grounds, my heart rests with the people I know and love; with memories of fun and happy times. My heart is written on the well-worn pages of the life I've always known and the places in which I've known it.
But now, a large part of my heart is here, whether my body is or not. When I return home, I think so often of the little faces I leave behind here; those that I know and love already, and those that I know I will meet in the future. The sum of my years of determined optimism have alighted in this quaint old city, the intermediate point between a world in which I can live, sleep, and socialize (somewhat) safely, and the more destitute places around it where there is such a need for compassionate commitment. Places where I can finally make myself useful in the only ways I know how.
As someone who never moved far from home, never went away to college, and always took family commitments seriously, it's a strange new feeling to see this separation take place. It's exhilarating, but unreal in some ways. This world, these little kids, are so real to me. They are flesh and blood and life and smiles and tears and hearts. But to everyone at home, the place from which I came, they are nothing but a story. A compelling story, a story that is deeply cared about and watched closely, but a story no less. I am the only one who knows how Sandra feels in my arms; what her laugh sounds like, how she uses her face and body to communicate.
I am the conduit between these very real little people, this very real place, and the people who constitute my other reality. I dance between these two realities, trying to reconcile them; to bring one to the other; to merge them and create a world, a life, that is real to everyone, and not just myself.
It's hard to think of leaving "home" for a long time. Though I've always tried so hard to resist it, I am attached, settled, and fond of the only place I've ever called home. The thought of leaving the people I love is frightening. To go so far away, despite the ease of communication in the digital age, feels like a subtle death. To make the conscious choice to go so far, where I cannot touch or hold so many people in my life, and remain there, is a scary one. When I leave, life will go on. I will be missed, but life will be exactly the same. Novel people and experiences will creep onto the periphery of my loved ones' lives and quietly take my place. For a child who grew up terrified about being pushed aside and forgotten, this is disconcerting.
But to think of what I gain in return... The opportunity to live the only real dream I've had. The privilege of handing my heart and life over to these children, instead of just one person. Does it strike everyone else as deeply futile as it strikes me to give your heart and your life to a single human being? To say, "above all else, I put you first. I trust you with my heart, with my soul, and I will allow you some say in determining the course of my life, because it is so intertwined with yours."
Many people do it, and are far happier and richer for it. They find contentedness in their love and the life they build. They care so much for the person they've chosen to be with, that they are willing to make adjustments to their plans. They are willing to make that person their top priority.
I can't, because I have seen what I have seen, and that makes me culpable. Just as any halfway decent human being couldn't see a man get hit by a car and drive away without checking first to see if he's okay and offering some assistance if he isn't, I can't see the conditions and problems I've seen without staying and offering whatever assistance I can. I feel like there is sometimes confusion about the exact source of my commitment to this cause; about what exact sentiment has gripped me so that I can't imagine following any other course right now.
I follow this course because several years ago, I went far away from home to a unfamiliar place to see if I could be of any use to the children I love so much, in life and in theory. Whether I knew what I was doing or not, I lost my ignorance when I walked into Inabif orphanage and saw Brayan sitting alone in a poorly-fit wheelchair in the corner of a dusty courtyard, moaning to himself. I lost my ignorance when I saw baby Samantha completely ignored and forgotten, locked in her own world, waiting for someone to pick the padlock and let her out.
To not know them, to not see them, and not help them, that is forgiveable. To see, to hear, to touch, to love them, and then not help them? Unimaginable.
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