Not a Wasted Word

We got back from the farm today. It was a three day trip. We got up there around lunch time on Thursday and left after lunch time on Monday. It was a really good time. 

When I was a kid we spent a week every summer in the Ozarks at a cabin on the lake. We swam and fished off the dock and water skied behind the boat. It was always the week my dad was in town (he spent the summer traveling for work) and my aunt took off work. It was a super fun week of swimming and boating and playing card games with family. 

The uncle whose family owned that house in the Lake of the Ozarks (my dad’s sister’s husband) now owns his own “house” (it is so big that the word “house” doesn’t seem adequate) with a private quarry lake behind it. Our new tradition is to go every year and spend a long weekend there: my parents and my two aunts and uncles, my seven cousins, their spouses (four of us are married) and the kids. 

It’s a ton of fun. We play and swim and explore. The kids have an incredible time and the parents do too. With so many grandparents around there is always a helping hand. Meat is grilled and dinners are prepared and we all eat together. Then we enjoy drinks together after the kids are asleep. Mostly we swim and have so much fun. 

I’m so glad my kids get to have these experiences, spending a few days surrounded by cousins and aunts and uncles, catching frogs at the “fairy pond” and spending hours in the lake. I hope these memories are as foundational for them as the Ozarks were for me. 

My husband goes home tomorrow and we fly back Wednesday afternoon. I’m definitely ready to head home, but am thankful to have a few more days to see my cousins. 

Yesterday was my birthday. I turned 37. 

Seven is my lucky number so I had big expectations for this birthday and this year. I started getting excited last summer. 

And then the election happened and our country seemed on the verge of implosion. I spent the spring getting bad news from work and rejections from high schools. I started to think that maybe this birthday was not going to the start of a lucky year. 

I’ve spent a lot of time and energy trying to turn that attitude around. I am excited about my plans to invest in my professional self. I started reading some new books on the teaching method I use and quickly realized that I had lost track of how and why that method was effective, and was no longer employing it in a meaningful way. I’m excited to start next school year with new (to me) ideas and a renewed commitment to language learning. 

I also look forward to participating in professional development opportunities, meeting other language teachers and possibly even collaborating with them in the future. 

I will continue to focus on my own Spanish skills, and may even take a proficiency test in the winter. If I get a high score it could help my chances at getting interviews next spring.

So even though this year doesn’t look like what I had hoped when I started building up my 7.17.17:37 birthday, there is a lot to be excited about. I hope that by the time I turn 38, I’m comfortable with whatever the next year will look like. 

We made it to St. Louis. It was a long day and my kids tried my patience but we got here and that is good. 

I have visited St. Louis every summer for the entirety of my life. When we lived in Hong Kong we’d spend over a month here each summer, so in many ways it feels like a second home. We have always stayed with my grandmother when we are in town and her house is absolutely a home away from home. Everything about it is familiar.

But it’s a small house and my grandmother is 91. It’s a lot for my family to stay there with my parents. My kids are getting bigger and they want to run around and play. There isn’t really adequate space at my grandmother’s house. So this year I am staying with my kids at my uncle’s house, in the house where my aunt died last year.

It’s sad to be here with her gone. Her face smiles back at my from a hundred pictures but she is absent from this place. I miss her. 

I will admit I don’t think about my aunt being gone often. We didn’t keep in touch much when I wasn’t in town; it’s not like I mourn her passing every day. But when it’s the time of year when I would have seen her, I find myself crying all the time. It’s surprising how much it hurts. 

Being in my aunt’s house, with my uncle who is still learning to cope with his grief, is hard. It know it is what’s best for my family, as here we have more space and are closer to my cousin and her kids. But it’s a constant reminder that my aunt is gone, and also a preview of what is to come, when my grandmother, and her house, are no longer there for us to visit. 

My uncle and my mother and my mother’s sisters are driving to Birmingham tomorrow to say goodbye to their brother’s wife, who is dying of cancer. She has two daughters in high school. Another aunt gone too soon. 

Thinking a lot tonight about death and dying, about the cycle of life, from beginning to end. It’s a lot to process.  

I can’t believe my flight leaves in less than 12 hours. I’ve had an amazing time, but I’m ready to go home. 

Today I lounged in the thermal pools and got a massage (which was AMAZING!). The place was very nice. 

I also took a walk they suggest that was totally amazing. It was only 2km long but every step was incredible.

Getting back to Quito was almost as hard as getting to Papallacta had been the day before. I think it’s definitely worth a visit, but it would be WAY better to arrange private transportation. The buses are a mess. 

I was able to avoid taking the bus all the way to the southern terminal because I just had them drop me at an over pass, where I took another bus into the centro histórico. I was pretty proud of myself for that. I found my hostal with no problems. 

Someone is coming to get me at 5:30am so I should try to sleep. After 15 hours of travel tomorrow (with a 5.5 hour layover in Mexico City!) I should be home. Thanks for putting up with all my pictures!

Ecuador gets it’s name from being right under the equator, and there is a monument north of Quito where you can stand in both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres at the same time.

It is pretty f*cking cool. 

Gravity works differently when you are standing directly on the center of the Earth. I got an egg to balance on the head of a nail. 

It was definitely a cool experience to visit the equator. I’m glad I went. 

I spent many hours yesterday trying to get from “the middle of the world” back to Quito and then to some thermal springs near one of the volcanoes. It was quite an experience, one I feel like everyone has to have in a foreign country. Ah buses in Central and South America: they are in so many ways a window into the country where they run. 

After what should have been a 2 hour trip stretched to 5 hours, I finally arrived. I have never appreciated warm water so much in my life. 

I have until 1pm at the springs’ hotel today then it’s back to Quito for an afternoon and final night at a hostal in the city. Someone is picking me up at 5:30am Monday to take me to the airport. 

See you all on the other side!

Also llamas!!!

Best. Run. Ever. 

It’s Thursday night. It’s been a great trip. Since I have classes until 4pm, I need to spent my three hours of daylight each afternoon wisely. I got some Spanish books and picked up obligatory presents for family at the Mercado Artesenal. I have homework to finish after dinner and by the time that’s done I’m wiped. 

Today I feel like I really hit a wall of mental exhaustion. I knew it was going to come, but the suddenness and intensity really caught me off guard. 

I started to slip into that hole of “holy shit I still have so far to go, I’m never going to get there.” It was hard to crawl out. 

But I am improving. My classes are really intense and so worthwhile. My teachers are amazing. My family is incredible. I’m really glad I came. 

I can’t believe tomorrow is my last day of classes. Saturday morning I’m headed to “La Mitad del Mundo,” a spot directly  under the equator, where you can stand with one foot in each hemisphere at the same time. Then it’s off to some hot springs where I sprung (ha!) for a night in a touristy hotel so I could relax in the warm, natural waters or some really beautiful pools. I’ll be doing all the by myself, and of course there are no direct routes. 

Sunday afternoon I head back to Quito and early Monday morning I’m on a plane back to the States. 

I wish I could write more but my brain is mush. Instead, here are more pictures. 

EL CENTRO HISTÓRICO

EL PARQUE CAROLINA

EL TELEFORICO

MY DAILY WALK

Sometimes it seems I have two conflicting personalities. There is a part of me that truly loves traveling. I revel in discovering a new place, and so many of my most salient memories are of my trips to Europe and Central America. But I’m also a homebody. I take great comfort in the familiarity of home and routine. And I always miss my family so much when I’m away.I will admit, leaving my kids on Saturday morning was hard. Really hard. I had to leave in a hurry because I didn’t want them to see me cry. I barely got to hug my husband. I was also running late, which didn’t help. They handled the actual good-bye really well, which was probably because I took BART so the wouldn’t have to watch me walk away at the airport. They were happily distracted by the TV when I finally shut the front door.

I wish I could say I skipped away from all my responsibilities, excited for a new opportunity, but instead I spent the walk wiping away tears, wishing I could wipe away the enduring sense of dread.

My actual trip to Ecuador was nothing but luck. A BART train was pulling into the station as I came down the escalator (they only come every 20-25 minutes on the weekends) and there was no line to check in at the airport. For some reason I got bumped up to the “sky priority” seats, which means I was basically in first class. I’ve NEVER flown first class, and to say I was excited would be a grave understatement. They served drinks in actual glasses and gave us dinner and the movies were free. I even enjoyed a tequila, just because I could.

I had a five hour layover in Mexico City. That sucked, but I killed an hour in a book store (oh my how I LOVE Spanish language book stores, I’m like a kid at Christmas in them) and treated myself to dinner (and two mezcals), before I watched a movie on my iPad. (I had downloaded movies on the Netflix and Amazon apps, along with Hoopla so I could watch without wifi – technology is f*cking awesome). 

My flight to Ecuador left at 1am (11pm my time – Central and South America don’t observe DST so they are only two hours ahead of the west coast right now) and I tried to get a little sleep. I managed better in that giant seat than I would have otherwise and I think I got a good two hours in. Still, I was pretty exhausted when I landed in Quito.

My host family came to get me, but they were bringing their son to the airport too, so I had another hour and a half of waiting until they came. 

They are a very nice couple, and have hosted MANY students over the years so it all comes really naturally to them. Their house is very cute. They have five dogs who don’t come in the house, but are very friendly when I go into the yard. My room is very cute, and the bathroom is right next door. So far they’ve served two meals I would never eat at home, but I enjoyed them both well enough.

I slept for about three hours after breakfast, until noon Quito time, then I just hung out in my room for a bit reading. After almost 24 hours on planes or in airports, I soaked in the silence of the little house on the hill. 

After lunch they took me to a nearby park and they took the dogs in one direction while I set off in another. I ended up hiking for three hours! It is a beautiful park with some incredible views; I look forward to running there a couple times this week.

My husband asked that we not FaceTime tonight because my son has had a really hard time with me being gone. I miss them and wish I could talk to them, but I understand and respect my husband’s concern. Maybe tomorrow.

Now it is almost 9pm Quito time, but only 7pm my time. I need to fall asleep soon because I have an early morning tomorrow. Luckily, between the lack of sleep last night and the long hike, I don’t think it will be that hard to fall asleep. 

I’ll leave you with some pictures from my hike.