erinelezabeth920

[erinelezabeth920]

The Gap

I woke up this morning at about 6:45 am. The smell of smoke was still in the air, floating through the apartment, burning in my nostrils. I reached for my phone, saw a voicemail. It was from the school district- due to widespread power outages from strong winds, (remote) school can not occur due to lack of internet access. I put down my phone. That’s about the most 2020 thing I’ve ever heard; the first day of remote school is cancelled due to high winds spreading wildfire smoke from the eastern side of the state and causing power outages. 

I put my head back down on the pillow, feeling confused. I had spent yesterday making food for the week, trying to figure out the best work from home routine. I felt a little groundless. Eventually I got up, took a shower and made some breakfast. I laid on the couch with my phone and scrolled to the New York Times “The Daily” podcast episode. It was about Daniel Prude and the events in Rochester, NY. My stomach tightened. It was grounding, but not the kind I was looking for. Still, I knew I needed to listen. Rochester is my home city, in a way. Growing up in Western New York in the suburbs clearly segregated as a result of the white flight and redlining that plagues most northern industrial cities, I didn’t really grow up in Rochester, but a shiny privileged version of it. The city I knew was a 20 minute drive away, where I rode in the back of a minivan to the zoo and planatarium as a child, and later drove to concerts and coffee shops as a teenager in my parents’ car, my friends in the back listening to the radio.

The city of segregtion, racial injustice, police brutality and intense violence is not my home, save (likely racist) newspaper headlines sitting on our suburban kitchen table at every morning next to the yellow box of Cheerios. The city in which a strong black community lifts up voices in a proud culture is not my home, save only friends’ parents telling us not to drive in the city at night, and vauge nervous jokes about the Taco Bell drive through with bullet proof glass. Those experiences growing up shaped me to dehumanize violence, catastrophize without context, and view the city of my home and it’s black and brown inhabitants through a perversive, racist lens

So sitting in my smoky apartment across the country while drinking tea, hearing the story of Daniel Prude, his brother, family and tragedy, affected me in strange ways. The first thing I noticed was that it wasn’t the larger story (which- to be clear- is extremely tragic and unacceptable), but the tiniest details that really got me- the mention of Strong Memorial Hospital, the hospital that Daniel was initially admitted to for mental health treatment, was the hospital I was born in. Mentions of the frigid March weather, a light snow falling, pierced my sharp memory of that time of year. The mention of Jefferson Ave- the street where Daniel was assulted, brought my mother’s voice to mind, giving me driving directions to the dentist or something when I was half-listening. Even the audio clip of the officer at the scene jolted me- his voice sounded exactly like my cousin-in-law. Not even an accent exactly, just as if the whole manner of speaking was plucked right out of the personal, private fabric of my family and placed into a national podcast; someone I could have gone to high school with- probably from the type of big Italian-American family that is all over Rochester, gathering to make pasta sauce on Sundays. 

And yet the personal fabric of my life, while woven in this tragic, racist story, is at the same time so far removed from it. But not the typical removal of listening to and reading about the stories of Geroge Floyd and Breonna Taylor, a feeling of injustice and outrage yet inpersonal because of my race, background, privilage and lack of connection to the places they lived. In this case, the gap is at once razor thin narrower, and at the same time wider than the widest chasm.  Because, I didn’t hear about Daniel from my friends or family. I heard about him from a national news podcast, the same way everyone else in the country did. Instead, I heard updates from my mother a few days ago about my grandparents’ house up for sale in the suburbs, and the Labor Day events at the yacht club marina where someone had brought a keg unofficially. I didn’t hear about it, because I didn’t need to. It didn’t affect me. And it hasn’t, ever. My whole life. When I was home for my grandmother’s passing, back in July, the only mentions of protests I heard from my well-intentioned but removed parents were when the marches were blocking the main highways. I lead a life that was and is parallel in many ways to Daniel Prude’s family, operating in the same spaces, but in an entirely different universe. I felt the early March snow, the frigid wind, but never naked in a street, handcuffed with a hood over my face. I watched the snow fall across a wide and vast expanse, as if through a glass, warm and dry, where I never have to worry about police brutality, and the fear of death at the hands of those who are supposed to help. 

After I finished listening, I wanted to post something about it on social media. Rochester is my home city; I wanted to make a call for justice, mental health support. Use your voice. Show everybody that you’re one of the “good ones.” But honestly, I couldn’t really think of anything to say. Because, I just can’t be posting about big sweeping change (which DOES absolutely need to happen- Erin the mental health professional speaking), without honestly examining my own background and compliance in these systems. The fact is, I was shaped and elevated into the world by a place in which collatoral and resources have been contintually drained from the heart of a city and shifted to the suburbs. This same resource drain that has lifted me up has left the services to support those most vulnerable and in need, struggling from mental health or other illnesses, underfunded and disproportionate. It’s one thing to look at the national movement against the police brutality of black and brown bodies and think- ‘of course I am in support of this.’ It’s another to deeply examine your compliance and personal gain from the systems that have created it. 

Even now, I work in one of the most diverse school districts in the country, supporting psychological services and upholding educational and social justice laws. But I moved clear across the country to do so. Why? What am I running away from? Likely, an attempt at freedom from a past wrought with guilt, blinders, and violent, racist newspaper headlines briefly glanced at while running out the door to catch the school bus. And I’d wait at the edge of my driveway, headphones on under my hood, looking out at the wide suburban lawns, bundling my coat closer in the early morning dark, a deep layer of protection against the softly falling March snow. 

Maybe, now I will start to take a closer look at the headlines. I’m just not sure if it will be enough. 

#blacklivesmatter #white privelage #Rochester #mental health #writing

[erinelezabeth920]

Love in the Time Of

Nostalgia. Do you remember the last trip you went on? Maybe it was a road trip, or a flight above patchwork plains? Or maybe a visit to family, the old and familiar grating with the growth of life? Do you remember that feeling of just... moving? The passing trees, the stirring as the landscape shuffles and re-arranges itself into your own soul puzzle. It’s a wanderlust- inherent, vital and deep. I remember wind on the mountains- Wyoming maybe or wildflowers in a spring breeze in Colorado. I remember a trumpet in New Orleans in the rain, walking the streets in a whisky daze, taking in melodies that wedged their way into my body like the droplets that fell from the sky. Last night I drank rose and watched an episode of Ken Burns’ documentary on country music. They were at the beginnings, origins until 1930s or so. The sound of the banjo, harmonica, fiddle, mandolin all merging from different areas of the word- the banjo out of Africa and the Caribbean into the horrors of slavery, used to uplift out of a deep and lasting persecution until even the whispered legacy was taken and mangled for white gain. The mandolin from Italy and continental Europe, and the fiddle from the English ballads, Scottish Highlands all merging for something completely new. As I watched, and the melodies faded in and out, I remembered nights in the mountains trying to strum my little guitar under a desert moon. I remembered Indiana, driving through rain listening to bluegrass. I remembered stories my mother and aunts told me of my grandfather, who died when I was in high school. He used to sit on the porch through summer nights and strum his guitar, singing all the old country ballads out of the hills and radio of the 1930s, occasionally throwing in a yodel to the fireflies dotting the upstate New York corn fields. Add that to the Irish and Scottish heritage that runs through my veins, and I’m drawn to the fiddle and picking like a moth to light. I had been listening to an episode of ‘Dolly Parton’s America’ while I cooked dinner; pasta and vegetables while the rain pounded outside. From my headphones, Jad Abumrad had been describing Dolly’s ‘Tennessee Mountain Home’ and the essence of nostalgia in country music. A longing for simpler times. ‘Country music,’ he had said as I strained the pasta into the sink, “is immigrant music.” He went into it a bit. Country music, at its core, is about a longing for something that is gone. A home that once was. A front porch. The sound of a river, or the whistle of a train to unknown places. A sense of home that can’t even be expressed except through a melody that you somehow feel you’ve known your whole life. Once the podcast ended, I sat with my glass of wine out of a can and pasta in front of the TV.  Andy was hosting a DnD sesion in the bedroom. I scrolled until I found the PBS episode. I drank my wine and slurped pasta as we went deep into black and white photos and voiced-over stories as Ken Burns does. The origins of those old folk songs we know well, (think “O Brother Where Art Thou” soundtrack), one song taken from the other until they’re blended into our conscious and unconscious history. “Music,” Jad had said, “is the soundtrack to our lives. Wherever we go, its with us. And that’s how we mixed.” Jimmie Rodgers circa 1929 travelled around “catching songs.” He’d drive sometimes 90 miles into the hills to listen to someone singing in their kitchen, gather it up in a flutter of shifting memories and dust, and put it down to record. When “Mule Skinner Blues’ began playing over some old photos, I yelped, “Holy crap that’s Dolly’s song!” I knew it was an old folk tune, but I didn’t realize it was Jimmie Rodgers, the OG of country according to most. Dolly took the original lick and turned up the volume to 10. “That song,” Jad had said at one point, “is fire.” Twenty or so minutes later, as the episode credits rolled, lo and behold Dolly’s version began playing. I let the credits roll until finished. Then I turned off the TV and sank into the couch. Silence. 

“Okay Google,” I called to the kitchen, “...play ‘Mule Skinner Blues’ by Dolly Parton.” 

Jad’s right. That song is fire. 

When it finished, too lazy to bother, the Spotify algorithm marched on with the next song. It was Dolly’s voice, but she was singing ‘The Story.’ “Isn’t this Brandi’s song?” Andy asked from the computer where he was now playing video games.

“I think so?” I googled it. Brandi Carlisle, 2007. Dolly Parton cover. “Damn,” I said, “Dolly’s covering Brandi? That’s epic.” “Okay Google, play ‘The Story’ by Brandi Carlisle.” Dolly’s version was fine, but Brandi is the new queen. I laid on the couch and listened. As her gritty, smooth voice washed over me, I remembered Chattanooga, Tennessee in early September. I remembered sitting in a lawn of a big park, festival lights strung through the heavy leaves, a wide river, humid skies, a big moon. The day had been sweltering, but by the time Brandi came out for her headliner it had cooled to an ease. The grass was full of people, standing, sitting, or somewhere in between. The air dripped and hummed and turned indigo as she sang her first note.   Google then moved on to Joni Mitchell. Good job algorithm, because I happened to remember that Tennessee night in September, Brandi telling us that Joni was her idol. She was going to have a chance in a month or so to play the album ‘Blue’ all the way through for Joni herself. ‘I’m going to royally fuck up,” she told us. “I need to practice on you.” So she did. I closed my eyes. The moon reflected in scintillations on the river. I thought she sounded like warm honey. I went to get up, to turn off the music and go to bed. It was late and I had to work in the morning. As I walked over toward the kitchen the little white screen on the counter tucked behind the coffee maker, as if in a small act of defiance, struck up some solemn piano chords. The beginning of ‘I And Love And You’ by the Avett Brothers. I sighed softly, cursed the Spotify algorithm for being too damn good, and slowly walked back to the couch. I laid down and closed my eyes.

Immediately I saw in my mind the wide Columbia River at sunset, the sweeping rocks and plains of Eastern Washington. The music filled the gorge like a bowl, rising up as if from the river itself. I’ve seen the Avett Brothers twice live, both times at the Gorge Amphitheater sitting next to friends as the sky lit on fire. The clouds turned orange to dark blue, and the lights of the stage looked like heaven twinkling. I could feel the blanket beneath me, the cold grass, the gentle swaying of the bodies of my friends beside me. “Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in... are you aware the shape I’m in. My hands they shake my head it spins. Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.” The mighty Columbia flowed dark and wide in the space beyond. 

(The Gorge, August 2019) Back in the apartment, eyes still closed as the notes lingered, trying to hold on to the wisps of memories, Google moved on to “The Joke”. Back to Brandi. If you know that song, I don’t need to explain. The music swelled. She basically shattered her emotions through the ceiling in a soaring arc of notes. I thought of her, young and unknown busking at Pike Place, the folk ringing through her voice surrounded by the grunge of the 90s in back bars and alleys. You can hear it in her songs, the moody gray sky, ocean and deep misty mountains, chunky guitar and angst. They try to put us in boxes, slap on labels but the joke’s on them. It’s ‘the rub’, as Ken Burns called it. Seattle and folk, Tennessee and jazz. Slavery and persecution, reconstruction and high rises. The rub of people and place, the mixing and sighing of ideas like notes mingling in the night air. “Imagine a ship,” says Jad. “Nineteenth century, whaling ship maybe in the Indian Ocean. Full of people from different cultures, places. What did they have with them? Likely instruments. And a lot of free time.” Do you remember the last trip you took? The sounds, the sights, the smells passing you by like dandelion seeds drifting in the wind. They latch onto your coarse sweaters, stick to your old shoes. Maybe they’re discarded, or they take root, slowly growing into something more. You know that scene at the end of Lord of the Rings, where Sam and Frodo are on the side of Mt. Doom and Frodo says, “No Sam, I can’t recall The Shire, nor the taste of strawberries?” Sometimos, especially recently, I feel like that. I know it’s dramatic, but it’s also true. The hug of a friend, a seething mass of bodies at a concert, the electricity of a new city, or moonlight floating on a river as Joni Mitchell is practiced to the Tennessee sky. It’s the rub, brushing up against life, re-inventing ourselves over and over, growing like the dandelion into our veins, a little newer each time.  I miss it. I told Google to turn off the music. The rain outside had stopped. I got up off the couch. Andy sat at the computer, headphones on. I brushed my teeth and went to bed, the silence of the apartment heavy as a blanket. And somewhere in the space between sleep and dreams, a fiddle flickered a tune, fading into the ether like moonlight falling on the dark water below.

#country music #live music #quarantine #creative writing #mental health #seattle #music #travel

[erinelezabeth920]

Love in the Time Of

Shame. Is the thing I want to talk about. Love in the time of shame.

I mean I don’t really want to talk about it. I’d really rather not actually, except that I have the sneaking suspicion that I’m not the only one. Not by a long shot. So here we go.  Last night I wanted to go to bed by 10pm, so I could get up early and go on a run BEFORE signing into Zoom at 7:45am to lead a yoga meditation class for my friends and family, BEFORE doing some reading of self-help books and solo meditation BEFORE I start trying to do an impossible job from my living room for an unclear number of hours per day with an attention span of basically zero to negative. 

When I write this it sounds absurd. I know that. But brains are weird. Especially mine. Remember the anxiety based overfunctioning/ underfunctioning I talked about last time? Overfunctioning much?  Anyway, that didn’t happen. We had finished a DnD session with my brother and college roommate, (my character is a rouge-gnome named Huckleberry Shake who has short purple hair, is really good at sneaking and lock picking, and carries a crossbow. I like to imagine a sort of cross between ‘Midsummer's Night Dream’ and Assassin’s Creed’.) Anyway, it was around 9:30 ish pm. It was also Cinco de Mayo, and we had picked up tacos from the neighborhood about a 15 minute drive south with a strong hispanic/ latinx population. The past couple weeks I’ve been referencing that line in ‘Wet Hot American Summer’ where they all pile into the pick up truck to go into town and go batshit crazy. “It always feels good to get away from camp, even for an hour!” Just to drive somewhere to pick up food feels like a crazy adventure these days. 

I made us magaritas when I got back; they were bright blue because we had some kind of blue liquor that I can’t remember the name of. After DnD I wanted to watch some TV. I made myself another margarita and some popcorn, which is my quarantine coping crutch. I watched this trashy but great Netflix show about teenagers in North Carolina called Outer Banks. Except the episodes kept ending on cliff hangers (OMG he KILLED HIM?), so I kept watching. I painted my toenails purple, using packing peanuts to space them out. I was kind of proud of myself actually.

It was about midnight when I went to bed. I woke up with a small headache, a result of tequila and salty popcorn and poor quality sleep. I was going to go on a walk/ run and listen to the news. I didn’t. I snoozed the alarm about ten times. It was raining out. I led my yoga class and ate some sourdough toast. And here we are. The light is filtering through the apartment windows, as I sit on the couch in my sweat pants. The crazy thing is, I just feel SO much shame. And guilt. Guilt for having a headache, shame for not waking up early to do all these things I honestly don’t even need to do. I feel shame for not writing more often, shame when I look at the dishes that are dirty. Shame when I don’t go outside to go on a walk, exercise, or when I close my work laptop early to lie on the couch and scroll through my phone.  I’ve been trying the past couple weeks to figure out this phenomena that seems to be happening to me, but also to other people I talk to. I feel okay for about 3 days, and then completely collapse. I just can’t do anything, flatline, but there doesn’t really seem to be a direct cause. It’s just like dropping on the roller coaster without warning. I was telling a friend the other day that on weekends, all I do is sleep. Usually I’m a very active person who has an almost clincally hard time sitting still. I haven’t felt like this, I told him, since I worked the hardest jobs in my life- full time wilderness therapy or residential treatment for children with Autism working 12 hour days. I work MAYBE six hours a day these days but probably more like four, broken up by lying on the couch watching documentaries and scrolling on my phone. So why am I SO DAMN EXHAUSTED? 

I did some research the other week into chronic stress for a newsletter article I was writing for parents of my elementary school. Chronic stress is different than acute stress, I found, because it has no concrete beginning and end. It’s not like a car crash or a loved one dying. Instead (for those of us with the intense privelage not to be on the front lines- god bless if you are) it’s a constant low hum in the background through news headlines, grocery store lines and crossing the street when another person is coming your direction on the sidewalk. It’s a disruption of normality with no conceivable ending, sending our brains into a low key 24/7 flight or fight mode, draining us with tiny doses of adrenaline and uncertainty that build up over time. It’s not in the forefront, but it’s there in our tight shoulders, exhaustion, inattention, insomnia, short fuses and total lack of motivation. Until we can’t take it any more and crash, seemingly out of nowhere. And then the whole thing starts again. 

As Brene Brown says, “We’ve hit our collective weary.” In one podcast episode she interviews a grief expert. He says, we are all grieving right now. Even if we don’t name it, we’re showing the symptoms. But instead of grieving the death of an individual (for most of us), we are grieving the lifestyles we’ve lost (work settings, close contact, friendships, normalcy). And grief exhausts us. BUT, because most of us aren’t experiencing acute grief (ie a loved one dying) we feel shame on TOP of that grief, that we shouldn’t be tired or inept when others have it SO much worse. It’s a meta emotion. Shame layered on grief like a terrible lasagna. How can we be justified in experiencing grief when all we do is sit on the couch and watch Netflix and eat snacks for hours a day? We’re not even in a wartime or something concrete that gives justification and purpose. Instead it’s just a vague, deep sense of disruption of life as we know it. But it’s just as real. I was walking on the beach at the time I listened to the podcast; when he said the words, “We are grieving the loss of the world as we knew it,” the sun was setting over the water. It hit me like a ton of bricks.

A few weeks ago, Andy cut my hair. When the pieces fell to the floor of our friend’s porch and the scissors snipped away larger chunks than I woud have liked, my stomach dropped. I started panicking. I felt like the world was ending. I don’t panic when I read the news, go to the grocery store in a mask, or even read the death toll. But when my hair fell to the ground around me in the gathering twilight, I absolutely lost it. I came home and sobbed. It was the first time I’d cried since the pandemic began, and it’s like it just all came out. I was so angry at Andy, and he felt so bad. I was a shell of a person for twelve hours. I cancelled morning yoga for the first time in six weeks, lamenting everyone would have look at me close up on a screen. I wanted to stay in bed forever, (until we fixed the haircut and it actually looked pretty good). But for a second there I was broken, and it was because of a goddamn haircut. I mean for Christ sakes, people are dying out there. It made me feel so petty and stupid. There’s a global pandemic happening, and I am distraught FROM MY HAIR?!

But that’s how grief works. We can’t look at the thing head on, it’s too much. A death toll is just numbers. Our brains seek to survive, to normalize, to adapt just to get through. So instead the trauma seeps into the corners, slowly creeping into our bodies and collective exhaustion until one little thing causes the world to come crashing down. The straw that breaks the camel’s back. And then we feel overwhelming shame for being so affected by something so little. For me, my lizard brain was honestly convinced I would never be attractive or happy again. 

(ALSO to be fair we watched, ‘Little Women’ a few days later. In the movie there’s the scene where Jo cuts all her hair off to give her mother money to travel to their sick father in the war. She’s then pictured crying under the stairwell. “Is it mother?” her sister asks. “No,” she says, “It’s MY HAIR!”. "See?!” I said to Andy.)

The underlying theme here is shame. We’re ashamed of our emotions because they don’t seem justified. Comparative suffering. My suffering isn’t nearly as bad as others, therefore I should not feel this way. I’m ashamed of myself for eating snacks and worried I’m going to gain a bunch of weight. Then I’m ashamed for being ashamed instead of being body positive. I’m ashamed of myself for enjoying an evening with drinks (yes plural), popcorn, painting my toes and watching teenagers who are actually in their twenties look for buried treasure. Honestly, it sounds like a great night. And it was. 

I just finished re-reading “The Four Agreements”, the Toltec wisdom book. The first agreement is “Be Impeccable With Your Word.” I assumed from the first time I read it, it meant “always tell the truth”. The reality though, is it means, our words have power. Especially our words about ourselves. Just this morning I entered my enchilada and margaritas from yesterday into my ‘Weight Watchers’ app and felt terrible. I told myself I was fat, lazy and useless. Which seems absurd when I write it out, but that’s the honest to goodness narrative inside my head. Being impeccable with our word means watching what we say to ourselves, because our words create a reality. We create our own cycles of shame. 

Even at this moment, typing this, I feel ashamed that this piece of writing is so scattered. My English major brain is mad at me. Get it together Erin. Find a cohesive theme and stick to it. Get emotional, but not too emotional. Tell stories, but not too many stories. But writing at it’s best is vulnerability and transparency;  and honestly right now it’s hard to hold on to any one thought for longer than a few seconds. And I’m pretty sure it’s not just me. Little pieces, scattered thoughts, just trying to put the puzzle together. (Oh and don’t even get me STARTED on puzzles... Andy is MUCH better than me at them, and, saving the face of our relationship, let’s just say that is another dangerous straw perched on the camel’s back through only the fault of my own...) Anyway, I think at this point, just find anything that makes you smile. Literally anything. I personally like Brad Leone’s Bon Appetite Youtube channel “It’s Alive.” He makes me laugh so much. The episode with him and Orville Peck making elote almost broke me.  Find those things, hold on to them and be kind to yourself. It’s okay to feel less than. Just remember you’re not. We’ve collectively hit weary, the point in the race where you’ve been running for so long, but the finish line is so far away. It’s okay just to go one step at a time. 

Paint your toes. Eat your popcorn. Drink your margaritas. Whatever we can do just to survive. One step at a time. You’re not alone. 

And that’s love in the time of. 

#mental health #coronavirus #quarantine #seattle

[erinelezabeth920]

Love in the Time Of

Anxiety. Is the first thing that comes to mind.  Exhibit A- yesterday I woke up at 10:30 am. A thing unheard of for me without being out to 2am the night before, which rarely ever happens anymore. I generally like mornings. And it was Easter. And it was sunny and beautiful as all get up outside. I’m not a devout Christian, but I grew up going to church; I am closeted very spiritual, and I like human stories, community and meditative spaces. Therefore, Easter is usually the one day a year I like to go to church. It’s just a me thing; I was lucky to grow up in a progressive church so the guilt and pentinance thing doesn’t really bother me. My family was also just as likely to go out to breakfast at the local diner on a Sunday morning as we were to go to church. I think it was really just about the intentional time. (The hilarious part being that I grew up in a small town in Upstate New York, so we would have to leave the diner by 10:30 when church got out and the weekly patrons filed in for their cup of coffee and eggs tittering “oh HELLO Dunn family! We missed you today...” My dad would have his watch timed for a perfect exit. Today, empty nesters, my parents are devout patrons at what they call the Church of Danny Wegman, a Sunday morning grocery shopping ritual at Wegmans for any upstate New Yorkers out there. According to them, they’ve even converted a few friends.)  So anyway I woke up at 10:30 and stayed in bed until 11:30. Christ has risen, but Erin definitely did not. The stone was rolled away to find me still lying in bed. Eventually I roused myself out of sheer hanger to eat leftover pizza and pour some cold brew from a can into a glass. I muttered something angry to Andy about playing video games and not making me breakfast because it was Easter so he should just KNOW that I wanted to wake up to a nice breakfast without any communication on my part. Duh. Ressurection indeed. 

I was feeling hungry and sad and weird. You know that feeling when you sleep so much your body is confused about what time/ day it is and anything you should be feeling? Plus add the quarantine and the fact it was Sunday after a break from work aka Sunday scaries and the apartment was super dirty, because I’d been avoiding cleaning all week. I resented the sun outside, high in the sky, wishing I could roll back the clock four hours and calmly and serenly watch the sunrise out my window with the meditative curl of steam from my tea under a blanket, my cat softly lying next to me, contemplating the newness of the world.  But it was almost noon, so here we are. After I ate my cold pizza and cold brew I got back into bed, waiting for Andy to be done with his video games and check on me so I could leech his energy. I laid in bed hating myself with inner monolouge like “Bitch, if you were single HOW do you think you’d be getting out of bed right now? Strong independent woman my ass” (Answer: I wouldn’t.) Credit to Andy though, he’s nothing but supportive and reliable even when I’m shooting angry looks across the apartment for no reason over my cold brew as he chats away merrily with his brother via Fortnite. 

“I’m stuck,” I said as I laid under the covers. “I need an energy push. I want to stay in bed forever.” “Either not moving or going somewhere far away,” Andy said gently, nailing my reactions to anxiety (I had stayed up late the night before Googling School Psychologist jobs in small towns across the state). He laid down with with me for a moment, and then began breathing deeply vis a vis Terry Crews about to lift something gargantuous. “OKAY, HERE WE GO!” he yelled, and ripped the covers off, pushing me off the bed, pulling me up and and shoving me toward the bathroom with a towel. Again, credit to Andy.

The shower made me feel better. I think under all the anxiety and negative self-talk, I was really just sad. Easter has never been a huge holiday, but I always liked it in a kind of personal way, just connecting with spring, new beginnings etc. I missed my family I guess or any sense of celebration. And I get this thing like, I am a mental health professional, I teach yoga, therefor I shouldn’t have hard times during this, because I am above such petty emotions. (Logically it makes no sense, but the way our brains work it makes perfect sense.) I put on a nicer ish sweater and ripped jeans. Easter Sunday best, it’s all about doing the best we can. Our friends knocked on the door, and came in to stand safely in the doorway with a boquet of flowers and a bag of fried dandelions (what? but they were delicious I’ll have you know.) “Happy Easter!” they said. My towel was still on my head. My eyes would have almost teared up if I had been alert enough to feel emotions fully. They hung out for a bit in the doorway, pet the cat, then headed out. One of my friends had said he was practicing sleeping in to prep for a night volunteer shift, but only made it until 9:45 that morning. It made me feel like a lump. As they left, we said we’d go on a walk with them later. We didn’t. Flakiness doesn’t stop during a quarantine. 

(flowes, fried dandelions and Felix) Andy made eggs after I complained he hadn’t made me breakfast (to which his response was, ‘I asked if you wanted breakfast and you grunted and went back to sleep.” Well... my anger is completey justifiable. Obviously.) We watched Lego Masters- Star Wars episode. It was really good. The sun fltered in. I wanted it to go away, or I wanted to have the energy to go out in it. I had a headache. My jaw hurt. I laid on the couch and read for hours intermittently scrolling through my phone and checking how many people had viewed my Instagram story, and then immediately hating myself for scrolling through my phone, until we finally found the motivation to do some cleaning while listening to a DnD podcast. That felt nice. Then we went on a walk still listening to the podcast. The characters were fighting a giant invisible spider. I felt tired, and noticed how far you could see into the foothills of the mountains. I’m scared, I said to Andy, that when things return to normal I’ll be sad. Not for like the deaths and economy and stuff, but this- that we can see so clearly to the mountains. What happens when that’s gone? We were going to cook, but felt lazy. We orded sushi. It was okay. We watched Return of the Jedi. During the Lego Masters episode one of the teams had built the battle of Endor and made all the Ewoks’ primitive weapons. It was cool. I liked all the trees and ferns. I wondered about Carrie Fischer in her skimpy Jabba outfit, how did she feel around all those men? I contemplated searching Pornhub later for spin offs and then felt weird about it.  We drank wine. We turned the lights off. The cat meowed at the door to explore outside. I was annoyed at him, so Andy took him out. Andy went to bed. I laid on the couch and listened to a Brene Brown podcast about anxiety, My jaw still hurt. Anxiety she said, manifests in two ways. I thought okay Brene, sometimes you annoy me, because not to be pretenious here, but I know more about psychology than you. But you have a real way of getting people to listen. So I’ll listen. The two ways, she explained, are over and under performing. Over performers tend to do a million things, check off to-do lists, always have a task, something to be doing to stop themselves from feeling (I’m looking at all you bread makers. Just kidding, baking bread is a completely wholesome way of coping with free time, and really I’m just jealous...) 

Underperformers on the other hand tend to shut down, need help from others, seem helpless from the outside, tend to fold under pressure, exuding low energy. Neither is better than the other, although society definitely favors the over performers. But in reality, both are just a way to avoid anxiety- keep it lurking in the shadows like the monster of a horror film, instead of bringing it out into the light. And we all know the suspension of an unknown movie monster is so much worse than after we’ve just seen the damn thing.  

Then she went into birth order; first borns tend to be more over-performers with last borns more under-performing, which is fine and probably pretty true and all, but I don’t totally subscribe to those things as pre-destined. But I did like finding a name to a feeling or habit. Naming is the first way to remove power. I had been drastically underperforming all day. And it’s not even my fault. It’s just anxiety- that all of us have, lingering in the peripherals, and our habitual responses. 

And honestly, that’s okay. I’d spent time with my partner. I’d seen friends and been the recipient of kindness. I’d gotten outside. I’d cleaned the apartment. We’d had dinner and watched a movie. We were fed, healthy and both have jobs. I’d even called my parents before they went to sleep to wish them happy Easter. Why can’t that just damn be enough? 

Before I went to bed, I watched an online Easter church serivce from a local church. It was awkward. The pastor filmed himself walking around a cemetary. And yet, somehow, it felt nice. I felt a tiny bit part of something. 

Check the facts honey. It is enough. It’s always enough. You’re enough.

And that’s love in the time of. 

#mental health #quarantine #seattle #writing #non-fiction

[erinelezabeth920]

Love In The Time Of

What seems like ages ago I started this blog. I think I had just graduated college. I wrote a piece called, “Love in the Time Of,” in which I tried to encapsulate (I’m sure poorly), the feeling of being out of college, floating through life and anxieties untethered. 

That seems small now, but the title still seems to fit. So when I decided I wanted to get back into writing (I’m sure I could say for noble purposes to give people uplifting words during this time of crisis etc etc., but really because I’m bored and other people are bored so the chances you’ll read my writing are just statistically higher), the title seemed to fit. In the time of... In the time of what? Pandemic? Disease? Quarantine? Being in small spaces with your loved ones? Being far away from your loved ones? Uncertaintly? Beauty? Eating a lot of popcorn? The list goes on.  The truth is, there’s a lot happening and there’s also very little. So it seemed like a good time to excersie writing the details. The day in and day outs that always get left out because grand adventures are much easier to write about. But what makes me special, sets me apart from the rest? Answer: nothing. For example, it’s much harder to write that today my alarm went off at 7:30am (well really it went off at 6:45 but I snoozed it for 45 minutes.) I got up in a little bit of a panic and pulled on some leggings. The sun was out. I started the hot water heater upper thing, filled my water bottle I knew I wouldn’t drink, pet my cat who was up half the night, and woke up my boyfriend who didn’t want to wake up because the cat was up half the night. I pulled out my laptop and unrolled my yoga mat. I checked my watch- 7:40. Text from my mom- Not going to make yoga this morning. SUN (all caps) is out. Going on a walk. Power to you mom. Sent back sun emoji. Started Zoom meeting. Drank tea. A couple people trickled on. Led my meditation session followed by a 20 minute yoga session while my cat ran around and my boyfriend made coffee. The sun was in my face. I talked about Princess Dairies the movie, and how Jonathan Van Ness on the Queer Eye episode I watched the other day led similar yoga poses I did and said the same thing at the end of his session; “The light in me sees and recognizes the light in you.”  Its harder to write that when I closed my computer I felt kind of empty. I got some coffee. Made some oatmeal. Hugged Andy because he needed a hug- touch affirmation is his love language. Listened to the radio station, John in the morning. I worry about him in the booth all alone. He played Tom Petty’s “Wild Flowers” and Queen’s “Under Pressure.” It felt fitting. He is such a good DJ, so I posted a picture of my Morning Show mug on instagram, so he would see it but also the rest of the world to know I’m okay? Cool? Interesting? I can’t even tell my motivations any more.

I sat outside on my tiny porch that overlooks a Safeway roof. I sat in the sun and pretended I was on Spring Break (this week is Spring Break for public schools, say what you will). I listened to more music. I played guitar kind of poorly and wondered if the guys at the Safeway loading dock could hear me (Monday is a delivery day). I wondered if they could, would they be inspired or annoyed. I chose to think inspired. I tried to play “New Slang” by the Shins but couldn’t find the key to sing in.   It’s harder to write that instead of some big adventure, I did a home workout with Andy. Squats are hard and relationships are not shiny. I took a bath. I read some essays by a non-fiction author about needing her own space as a middle -aged woman and mother. I wonder how she is doing now? I face-timed my mom. I had a Zoom dance party with my cousins. I made a salad and listened to the ‘Daily’ podcast about unemployment. I wondered if it was good spring break vibes to keep up with the news, but it also somehow makes me feel less alone. 

I organized under the bathroom sink. I put all the soaps in a little bag leftover from a Christmas gift exhange. That made me feel good for some reason.  It’s hard to write that I am sitting on the couch. No metaphors, no big meanings, words of wisdom. Just sitting. Andy is playing video games with his brother in California. My instinct is to be annoyed, but I know it’s important. Soon I’ll go on a walk, but maybe I’ll just take a nap and feel guilty. And maybe after that we’ll watch more Star Wars. I think we’re at the movie with the Yoda puppet. Thank goodness we got more popcorn kernels. I can hear the cars below driving into the Safeway parking lot. I wonder if they’re scared to be there, if they’re all wearing masks. My laundy has stopped. I can hear the cat’s water filter, like a softly flowing stream in the distance.  And that, I suppose, is love in the time of.  

#writing #quarantine #non-fiction #mental health

[erinelezabeth920]

Breathe With It

I went on a run this morning with Andy; it’s this thing we’re trying to do in the classic ‘a couple living together in their late 20′s who realize they drink too much wine and order too much takeout’ kind of way. We live in a neighborhood called West Seattle, over the bridge from the train yards, and cargo crates, and cranes like migrating dinosaurs silhouetting the city. Across the Duwamish river, a river with tides and native voices carrying from the past to a proud and tortured present. Actual tides as the ocean breathes life in and out of a river. 

(Mt. Ranier over the Duwamish River, from the West Seattle Bridge) 

And anyway we were on a run through the neighborhoods, the overgrown blackberry bushes about to pop their fruit, low hanging clouds in the Seattle sky, hint of humidity. I was listening to a podcast about a trans woman in the outdoors, and, after 20 years of living as a man, a Brene Brown quote that had talked her off the brink of taking her own life; instead she had driven to Las Vegas and went dancing, simply “as herself” for the first time in her whole life. 

And I guess, as we crested over the sidewalk hill, breathing heavily and you can see the Seattle skyline over the water and hills, that I thought I often find myself drawn to narratives that invoke transformation. It’s like an addiction; the idea that I can be more than I am- somehow different and better. Leave myself and my bodies, my routines and problems to soar through clouds and peaks and look just like those smiling ghosts I see on social media. One dimensional. Easy.  In the podcast though, she didn’t use the word transformation. She didn’t like it because, a transformation implies becoming something you weren’t before. She called it a realization. “I was always there,” she said. “I just needed the courage to realize it.” Just like a flower was always a flower, a butterfly was always a butterfly, and spring is always lying, waiting for the snow to melt itself away. 

It’s hard to let go of the narrative of change, hot and burning as I dream of travel, a new job, the outdoors, just finding that one thing that will fix all of it. To float off into the cloud hanging sky and dissolve out of my heavy body and bones. 

But instead, for a moment, I looked away from the sky, down to my feet. At the flowers. The blackberry buds. The sidewalk and the cracks, weeds growing in between. I felt the air burning in my lungs, my legs like lead. 

And when the world breathes itself new life like a river with tides on a still morning, I breathed with it. 

Andy slowed down behind me. I stopped to see why.  “Look,” he pointed. In the yard beside him was a row of flowers, all colors popping against the green and gray. On the rock next to it someone had scrawled the words, “Rainbow Garden”. 

#Seattle #non fiction #writing #mental health #pride

[erinelezabeth920]

Erin Elizabeth Dunn <[email protected]> 10:19 AM (11 minutes ago) to xxxxxxxxxxxxx Hi Peter. My name is Erin. I am a certified Wilderness First Responder, outdoor guide for women and youth, as well as a pre-PhD student at the University of Washington in Seattle. I am writing in response to your article in Outside Online, a review of "Free Solo" dated September 28th, 2018. I am writing in particular to address an aspect of the article.

When mentioning Honnold's support team, you stated this phrase; "For two years, Honnold swore Chin and his crew to secrecy to keep pressure down. But the small group who know about his plans—Chin, Caldwell, and his girlfriend, Sanni McCandless—still seem to oppress him. McCandless’s emotions, in particular, are a wild card: she is as transparent as Honnold is reserved, and seemingly spends half the film in tears or on the verge of them."

I would like to respectfully communicate that that is an unacceptable way to portray any woman, especially one involved in the outdoor world. To portray women in this light as emotional, unpredictable and a "wild card" fully despicably pushes the negative narrative of the weak, emotionally fragile woman in the too often support role to the outdoor man. 

It is also, factually a blatantly untrue statement, as, in the film Sanni McCandless spends 60-80% of the time very intelligently articulating her emotions and feelings around Honnold's endeavors, as well as their own relationship. She cries exactly twice, while the men surrounding Honnold's life, including Honnold himself are unable to showcase their own emotions in this, a scientifically proven effect manner of emotional processing, or else it is shown off screen. Any statement in a review article starting with the word "seemingly" implies personal bias and therefor is undue.

Intent is one thing, but I think you need to take a hard look at your female readers, particularly the young women aspiring toward reaching goals of professional climbing. To further the toxic narrative of an emotional woman unfit for outdoor activity due to your own "seemingly" objective lens of a film reviewer is to disrespect current and future generations of outdoor women.  Words matter. Think about it. 

Respectfully, Erin 

[erinelezabeth920]

Epilogue: Galapagos

Ha, thought you were done with me eh? In the spirit of epilogues, I’ll try to be brief, but hey it’s unlikely. This blog was really just an exercise in trying to document a crazy fast, once in a lifetime experience that could slip by in the blink of an eye. Tears in the rain, via Roy Batty via Blade Runner. The writing wasn’t stellar. There were typos and shitty internet. But hey. I did it. It’s there and that can never go away. And it really helped me to imagine (even if it was only imaginary) that there were people on the other side. So if you’ve made it this far, really. Really. Thank you.

***

I got picked up from Monica’s at 5:30 am. Chelsea, Mayra and I rode to the airport. After paying the Galapagos visa fee and some booking kerfuffles, I got on the flight first to Guayaquil, then Isla Baltra. Landing on the island was cool; windswept with cacti, surrounded by water. I had an issue paying the 100$ Parque entrance fee, as I didn’t know it couldn’t be card and the airport ATM was out of cash. The airport folks held on to my passport, saying to pick it up in the town when I had my money. Seemed questionable but what can you do.

I took a bus, boat and another bus from the airport to a crossing to another island, and down a windy road on that island to a town. We passed farms and mostly empty green space. Luckily the bus dropped me off right in front of my hostel. Cool.

The town was neat. A mix of locals and tourists with markets and ceviche places. I took a nap, found some ceviche, walked to the docks and watched a movie. I was dead tired. The next morning I rented a bike, went to the Darwin Research center, and tracked down my passport. I had dinner with my friend Jenna from the program who was also traveling.

The day after I slept late again, picked up my laundry and biked/ walked to a beach. I met Mayra and Chelsea there. We sat for a bit staring at the waves and discussing the program. We met later that night for dinner and ended up at the only bar in town chatting up locals. They reminded me of my friends from Orcas Island. When in Galapagos?

The next day I shelled out some of my dwindling money for a snorkeling trip. The seas were rough and it was cold, but we saw seals, sharks, fish, rays and the most beautiful sea turtles. The folks on the trip were funny too. Two german girls who were very sick convinced the recent college grad from UCLA to tell stories about his past 10 months in Ecuador the whole time as a distraction. Surprisingly it worked.

I grabbed dinner with Mayra and Chelsea again, but was too tired to stay out. I met them for lunch the next day, where they had talked up the waiter and were getting free drinks. #blondeprivelage

After that I caught a boat from the dock to another island, Isabella. I had left the majority of my stuff at the hostel as I’d be returning in three nights. The ride was bumpy, two hours long and terrible. I had to pay a 10$ “docking fee”, whatever that is.

I spent three nights on Isla Isabella. It was beautiful but kind of a tough time as I didn’t bring enough cash. As a result I was hungry a lot and kind of lonely, a little over traveling. Which is a crazy feeling to have in the Galapagos but travel is not all sexy photos and cool stuff, regardless where you are. I’d argue islands make you more lonely. Andy and Emily were off backpacking the Enchantments, one of the most beautiful places in Washington, and Andy was heading to a wedding on a lovely island outside of Seattle after. I was homesick and spent a lot of time waiting for instagram stories to load on the low quality internet.

There were highlights though. A hike to a volcanic crater where the guide (in Spanish) told us about growing up on the island, how the culture was changing with more tourism (white specifically) and less Spanish. I didn’t understand everything, but enough to figure out he conveniently left that part out to the English speaking Canadian contingency of the tour.

Another fun part was that my friends Jenna and Audrey from the program were around. We’d get dinner and talk about our days, other travels and all the things. I said bye to them Friday night. Mayra and Chelsea had left the day before from another island, so it was just me.

Another day I went kayaking and snorkeling. There was a beautiful German man paddling in a double with me who I was better than. My two German friends from the snorkeling trip were also there, looking much less sick. It was a blast. We saw penguins on the rocks, seals, a sharks and a turtle. I loved just sliding off the kayak right into the water. After that, I walked the length of the beach to the end, where a gravel road travelled up into some mangroves. At the end of the road was a cool rock wall waterfall thing but it was a ways and getting dark, so I climbed up a lookout instead. It was beautiful.

The next day I left Isabella at 3pm. I saw my German friends on the beach who were taking surf lessons and invited me, but I didn’t have the money. My phone charger and watch had also both died that day, and I kept having to ask strangers what time it was.

The ride back was 100x better, probably because of the sea sickness pill Jenna had given me. I checked back into the hostel, grabbed my things, and got some food. Seafood pasta which wasn’t that good. Should’ve gotten the ceviche and michelada, the always wise words of Erin forever in my head. Push that comfort zone.

The night was pretty. I said bye to the salt air and the ice cream and the seals sleeping on the bench, but I was tired and running out of money and pretty ready to go. The next morning I misunderstood the timing for the bus and had to take a 25$ taxi to the dock. It ended up being ok though because the driver was really nice, told me about living on a farm on the island and how he hates the rain (it was raining). Plus, on the side of the road, just munching on some leaves, I finally saw a tortoise in the wild.

So began my 24 hour journey from Galapagos to Boston with a taxi, boat, bus, plane, plane, plane, plane. There was another docking fee for the airport and I was so fed up with upcharges by that point, I only had 4$ cash and made them take it.

I saw my German friends at the airport again. Funny how traveling does that. Back in Quito I ate onion rings and a milkshake which made my stomach hurt, but my American self couldn’t resist. In Miami, I kept speaking Spanish because why not, until the baggage claim had issues and I thought I’d miss my flight to Boston through customs. I would’ve had an actual meltdown. I had very little left at that point. Luckily it was fixed and I got to the gate just in time, arriving in Boston at 10am. After confusing texts, because Boston is always confusing, I met Andy at the baggage claim. We went straight to Dunkin Donuts, as I’d barely eaten since Quito,and sat on a bench outside the airport in the hot muggy air, waiting for our Air Bnb to open up before we took the train into the city. I watched the Red Sox and Patriots hats go by, and held my iced coffee like a diamond. I talked and talked and talked, finally in person without the internet delay. And Andy smiled and listened and commented supportively. And occasionally hugged me to remember I was real, and we were happy.

We spent the next week with family and friends in Boston and Rockport Mass, and I was happy floating with comfort, family, good food, someone to sleep next to. I saw old friends in Boston, and a Seattle friend moving to Norway. My stomach didn’t hurt and my brother and his girlfriend came up from New York. We went sailing, drank wine with my aunts and uncles, did puzzles and played Euchre, ate lobster and it was maybe the happiest week of my life. Nothing like leaving to make you appreciate the things you love most.

Then, 5 days later we dropped off Colin, Lian and Andy at the airport and bus station in Boston in a rainstorm. My dad and dog and I drove back to Rochester. That’s where some of the post travel depression set in. In reverse culture shock phases there’s the honeymoon followed by the lull, the reaclimation. I didn’t sleep well, slept late in the mornings. I visited grandparents in nursing homes which is always hard when you never know which time is the last goodbye. Plus I think, regardless of travel or not, childhood homes as an adult are always hard, a strange mix of feelings.

On the plus side I had fresh peaches, good Italian food and cut all my hair off. I hung out with my parents, driving around looking at smaller houses they should move in to, knowing they’re happy where they are. The last night I went with my dad to race our sailboat on Lake Ontario. There was strong wind and I sat in the front, watching the sun set. We got first place, the same boat my grandparents raced 30 years before. I dove into the water and let it rock me, the original water as I spent the first two years of my life in a little house on Lake Ontario, carried in the waves in my mother’s arms before I could walk.

The sun set. The crescent moon rose. The crickets chirped. That heavy almost midwestern summer night. The men sat on the porch and talked about the race. I drank a Molson Canadian and flipped the sausages. I was flying out to Seattle in the morning. I took a breath and looked around, letting it seep in. This was home, deep and rooted as the heart on the sail of our boat. We can travel the world in wide circles, as far as we want but those strings, invisible strings will always ground us and root us to the earth, a small piece in the puzzle, branch of the tree of our family, ancestors and the bodily feel alignment, relaxing into your deepest, original self.

Until next time my friends.

Always in adventure,

Erin

#travel #seattle #galapagos #family #home #writing #travelabroad

[erinelezabeth920]

Days 30 & 31: La Ultima

Friday morning (Day 30) I woke up stupid early. We had to meet at a panderia at 7:30. So not that early but early enough where I’d been out on a party bus the night before. I got dropped off in a taxi and found everyone there, eating breakfast. Erin was in a rough state, feeling sick, concerned she had stomach poisoning. Mike was out of it too. Eventually we all ate our food (or Gatorade) piled on a bus and drove about an hour and a half out of the city. I sat in the back next to Tara and her little 8 month year old baby. We chatted as the bus drove out of the city toward the volcano, Cotopaxi.

Long story short, we went mountain biking and it was pretty awesome. We drove up to Cotapaxi National Park, up into the clouds and the chilly mist with pine trees. I felt a hint of Seattle and my soul lifted. All 20 and some change of us filing along on single track paths in the arid, eerie landscape of the side of an active volcano. Mike and some others sped off. I putted along, braking too much and skidding on rocks, cursing. Mountain biking is not the top of my favorite outdoor activities, something about the instability, fear of falling, not liking narrow spaces and not being able to get over that. But even with all that, biking (hands gripping the handle bars in a death grip) in the Middle Earth like landscape, fresh air on my face was like a cure all, as it always is. We went for about 2 or 3 hours, 12 miles and all, stopping for lunch. It was cold and we had tea by a little hut and sandwiches, and brownies which our guide’s wife had made which were the best brownies ever. Apparently known in the program from the years past.

Cotopaxi is one of the world’s highest active volcanoes. The National park itself was actually closed for the past two years due to eruption activity. That day the peak itself was wreathed in clouds- very Northwest esque, but its presence still seen and felt. We biked over dirt and gravel, up hills and through water. I got off and walked a lot. At one point Erin and I tried to pee behind some boulders in the empty landscape and were not very successful. It was incredibly beautiful. The Andes are foreign to me, electric with the feeling of a moonscape, arid and huge. There were cows and fences, and at one point llamas! Finally. I took many selfies.

Finally we got to the meeting place. I felt tired, sore, and grinning in that outside way where my body feels electric, active and close to the edge of experience. It was the perfect last adventure day. We all got on the bus and fell asleep.

We got back to the city around 3:30pm. I stopped at my favorite coffee shop, a “white person place” I call it with lates and good internet. I ordered a giant hot chocolate. I called my mom. Sturgill Simpson played over the speakers and I almost started crying. Homesickness is a funny thing.

When it started to get dark I headed back to Monica’s. That night at dinner we chatted about Seattle, immigration and a bunch of other things. Primo was going off about some movie he loved. I was amazed at how much better my Spanish had gotten, maybe not speaking wise, but definitely just following the conversations without a total blank stare all the time. Monica then gave me a package and a card; it was a scarf and a card saying thank you for staying, and I am a part of the family. It was signed by everyone and even had the names of all the dogs. I in turn went upstairs and brought down the Seattle mug, magnet and Chukar Cherries I had bought at the airport. They put the magnet on the fridge and we all ate some cherries. It was a nice time and night. In typical Erin fashion I am overly emotional with goodbyes and as a result shut down or tend to run away. I excused myself pretty early and headed upstairs, trying to avoid the emotions that were swirling around. I petted the dogs on the way upstairs.

Saturday (Day 31)

I woke up around 8am or so and took the bus to Beraca. My stomach felt pretty off, so Kayla and I went to find a bathroom. It was bright and sunny and I was wearing my hat but very tired. We’d pretty much been non-stop for the last two weeks (or month). A handful of us we’re meeting to head up a couple hours north to a smaller town that had a huge market on Saturdays. I definitely didn’t need to buy anything else, but wanted to go just to see a new place and hang out with folks for the last day. The crew from Neuro (me, Kayla, Erin plus Liz, Jenna and Stephanie) piled in a van with Tara, her mother, two friends and little baby. The drive was pretty, rolling hills and dry landscapes with the mountains in the distance. It kind of looked like California wine country, and cacti lined the road. I was talkative on the way up, product of the coffee I had drank, although it hurt my stomach later. We got to Otavalo, a small town; it was big market, six streets or so with a mix of locals and tourists and tons of blankets, scarves, food and the deal. It was fun for a bit but then I was pretty finished and sat in the town center people watching. It reminded me a little of a South America Sonoma, Spanish colonial architecture and a center foundation square.

(Otavalo)

After Otavalo we headed over to a different town with apparently cheap high quality leather but I’m not really into those things so I found a restaurant and had a Caprese salad. The way back was long. I felt very sick, the roads were windy and there was traffic. Tara’s baby was crying too. Back in Quito Kayla and I stopped at the artisanal market, as we’d decided they had better jewelry than Otovalo. She helped me learn how to look for the number for real silver and helped me pick out a beautiful ring.

(Erin, Kayla and I and our rings)

The sun was setting and it was lovely. I was blocking out a lot of emotions because it was easier that way. We parted ways saying we’d meet up later. Erin had a date with one of the Spanish teachers (!) and Mike and Jojo wanted to go back to the gay bar. Somehow we all had to say bye to each other. I headed back to Monica’s to pack. I had a quick dinner with them but my heart wasn’t in it. We had already done our formal goodbyes the night before and I was pulling away for self preservation. I gave hugs and excused myself to pack.

Finally, after shoving everything in my backpack which was definitely twice as heavy as when I arrived, I headed out the door and grabbed a taxi. I met up with Kayla and her roommate from the one week program Brittany at a strange mall site up north in the city. We found a bar close by, which happened to be a rock and roll bar full of white people. Ah well I had two micheladas and was happy. At 11pm we walked over to a salsa club where Mike, Erin, Jojo and Raul were standing outside. There was a lot of hugging and passing around a water bottle of tequila. Then Kayla and Brittany headed back. Raul said goodbye as well; Mike, Jojo and I gave Erin her space for that one. She skipped up to us a few minutes later, grinning. I walked the three of the to the dance club, and dropped them off at the door. More hugs, Mike and I promised to hang out in NYC, waves goodbye and they dissappeared behind the doors and into the thumping bass.

And then it was just me. I was hungry. There was a McDonalds near by. In my sad and emotional state my basic instincts took over and I found myself with a double cheeseburger and fries at a little table by the window. Country music played on the radio. For some reason it felt like a limbo, transitioning out, phasing myself back into a ghost, walking the streets of Quito in transparency, like I was never here at all. Alone in McDonalds at midnight listening to country music, half in this world and half in America, part of both and neither. We can travel all we want, but we can never escape ourselves. Sometimes it’s honestly best to embrace it.

I finished up, grabbed a cab and headed back. The guy upcharged me and I couldn’t find the energy to care. The lights of the city zoomed by, and I didn’t have enough emotions. I was pretty empty, placidly gazing out the window. I said gracias, paid the fare, opened the gate and headed inside the dark house. Mayra and Chelsea were picking me up at 5am the next morning to go to the airport. It was 12:30am.

And well, that was that.

#writing #ecuador #travel #blog #outdoors

[erinelezabeth920]

Days 26-29: Penultimate

Penúltimo was a word that Monica used Friday night at dinner. “The one before the last”. It’s a word in English too, but no one really uses it and I liked it.

Monday (Day 26) was rough. I should have been energized from the weekend, moving into our last full week, but I was exhausted. Andy and I had gotten in a fight Sunday evening/ that morning surrounding feminism and my experiences in Ecuador, with men often cat-calling, me feeling unsafe in my own body or targeted. That weekend in Puerto Lopez I had an uncomfortable experience where a local man showered in front of me while I was sitting by the pool. As a result I saw everything. He then continued to talk to me after the fact (clothed) calling me thin and pretty and asking if I had a boyfriend, and why I didn’t want to go out dancing with him. The whole experience made me extremely uncomfortable, but of course in classic instances of violation between men and women, I felt shameful, felt like it was my fault, that I had somehow brought it on myself.

Those instances piled up, adding to a relationship functioning from several thousand miles with spotty internet. I complained about men, feeling hurt and angry. Andy became defensive, and I became irate, and it spiraled. Fights are hard though with such a distance and without face to face interaction, and I was left fuming for a few days on my own in Quito instead of appropriately communicating and resolving.

We were under deadline at the clinic as well, pushing to finish our tasks before we left. We had three new people from the two week group which was at once helpful but also stressful with task delegation. My stomach was off once again, probably something from the coast. In Spanish class I was exhausted. I had forgotten to do my homework which was some pretty important things for past tense learning verbs. Irma was a little pissed. I was obviously out of it, and she kept asking what was wrong. I wanted my laundry done, with gross salty clothes from the coast but wasn’t sure Monica would do it with one week left.

I went to salsa class to try and cheer myself up, but I was tired. There were also a bunch of new people from the two and one week groups, all female, so I danced the part of the guy, my brain doing somersaults to switch things around. “It’s hard being the guy” I told Kayla as we held hands and twirled. “No, it really isn’t.” She responded. I grinned. Truth. I got annoyed when the two male instructors wanted a photo with all the women at the end of class.

After salsa I stopped at a coffee shop to grab hot chocolate. I tried calling Andy, but was still upset and it didn’t go well. I gave up and went home, skipping dinner and going straight to bed.

Tuesday (Day 27) was a little better. I felt better in the morning after sleep. Andy and I chatted some. I’m sure the altitude the day before had affected me as well. Moving from sea level to almost 10,000 feet is no joke. The clinic was good; Kayla and I tried our screener on patients and it really worked. We were over the moon proud with excel graphs of symptoms matching the stories the patients were saying. We had power lunch at an almuerzo near Beraca that had become a favorite of Kayla’s. A fun part about the last week; Erin, Kayla and I had all nailed down our favorite lunch spots over the past three weeks. In a kind of unspoken agreement we went to each person’s favorite spot.

Tuesday at the end of Spanish class we went on a scavenger hunt around a market which was good because I was behind in my homework. I wasn’t thrilled on competitions, but it actually turned out to be pretty fun with Irma leading me around and checking off all the different kinds of food. You had a take a picture to prove you found the item, so I now have like 20 photos of me with food. After the scavenger hunt Irma and I got ice cream and sat in the grass. It was nice, I like her a lot and she’s a hysterical person, always commenting on younger men with her sun umbrella. After that we had a party at the Spanish school with cake and Ecuadorian dancers in a traditional celebration style. It was ok, but I was tired at that point. I headed home, stopping at the artisanal market with Kayla to buy some gifts. There’s a lady who sells blankets we like. The sun was slanting low over the buildings; it always gets dark around 6:30 or so. I stopped off in a bar to get a Michelada (new fav drink) and call Emily. I messaged Andy for a bit after and headed home.

(I really wish I could post all of them)

Wednesday (Day 28) I was also tired. My stomach was definitely off. We raced for our deadline at the clinic, almost meeting it with some last minute things to finish up. We had lunch at Ahi Dulce, Erin’s favorite place where she befriended the owner and salsa dances with him. I had an arrepa and a huge milkshake. It was great.

(Seriously tho)

For our last day of Spanish class we all went on a field trip to Mita del Mundo, the point of the equator. The bus was crowded but I tried to talk to Irma in Spanish. With Mike’s help she told us about growing up on the coast, why she lives in Quito, about her job as an English teacher and why she thinks all tacos taste the same.

Mita del Mundo itself was crowded and touristy but cool. I was a little annoyed at our large group and lack of direction, but finally we split off into smaller groups. The hilight was definitely the water demonstration where water drains one direction north of line, another direction south of the line, and straight down on the equator. (Shits nuts. Mike straight up didn’t believe it and had to pull the drain plug himself for proof). That and the balancing the egg (apparently it’s easier because something about forces. Science is hard enough in English- Spanish I’m lost). Only one Spanish teacher managed to pull it off.

During the tour Irma had go to back to the city to attend to her 2 year old daughter. I was sad to see her go and gave her a chocolate bar I had bought her.

After, a bunch of folks were headed to a soccer game but I was exhausted and opted to hear back into the city. After the long trek of bus, metro and walking I stopped off at a bar before heading home. I ended up ordering a tall michelada, watching the game on a TV (Quito won) and talking with Andy for a few hours on the phone. It was incredibly nice; I felt lighter and more whole after a draining few days. Sometimes I think there is benefit to travel and pushing your limites, but just as beneficial are those self care moments, just speaking with the person you care about, and having a drink in a bar, feeling like home.

Thursday (Day 29)

Thursday I woke up feeling lighter. It was our last day at the clinic. My last commute, bus rides, waiting next to the empeñada lady etc etc. In the morning we briefed Maria on the tools. Then we are pastries and took online personality tests (Harry Potter and Mayer’s Briggs) like any good psychologists with free time. We also had a tough conversation about termination, what our connection with the clinic will look like after this program is over. The harsh reality is that, not much. Honestly though, at the end I was incredibly proud. Maybe the most proud of anything academic I’ve ever done and I have my wonderful friends and colleagues for inspiration. Alpha Females.

Erin, Kayla and I tried to go to our favorite Mexican place for lunch but it was closed, so we found a different one. The food was okay but there was a three margarita special for 10$ and we figured it was the last day so why not.

After that we walked to the park for our last charla. (They walked. I was late.) A guy (a professor, acting coach?) went through some demonstrations and talks about the physical manifestions of emotions and the coinciding theories. It was pretty cool, if not very research grounded but Jojo and I kept cracking up during the silent reflections because a flute somewhere in the park was playing Titanic’s “My Heart Will Go On”. After that it was cold so we went inside a cevicheria to have our discussion. We talked about the difficulties of the trip, our comfort and challenge zones. It was a brief but good convo. After that I walked home, stopping by the market for my very last gifts. Elvira (the blanket woman) was so nice she gave me a wallet for free.

I was home for about 20 minutes, changed my clothes, then caught a taxi BACK to the cevicheria for our final cena (dinner).

I wished I hadn’t been so tired during dinner. The days are just so LONG and having so many people, (over 20 students by this point) is kind of overwhelming. We all sat at long tables and ordered beers. Tara passed us out envelopes on which we’d written goals a month before. I think I did alright on mine. I sat next to Mike and Kayla and we chatted. Erin of course had them turn up the music to salsa. Everyone signed the walls, a thing there. I commemorated myself as Lizzy south of the equator once and for all.

After dinner was over the chiva (party bus) appeared outside. It was supposed to be a surprise but it had leaked. I wanted to go home and was going to duck out, but Tara overheard me and coerced me into coming along. The first hour was actually very fun. Standing up on a bus with flashing lights and loud music, a little plastic cup around our necks. Some of the Spanish teachers were there and even Maria and Alejandro from the clinic! We took off around the city, blasting music. After a while though, it got old. I spend my days in Quito being annoyed by crowded busses and loud music, so I leaned against the railing and looked out at the city, as Mike and Erin danced next to me, Erin singing every word.

I saw the cathedrals and the parks, the shops and the steps. I saw the dirty faces and people looking at us, not too kindly from park benches and stoops. I saw the hills, the lights and the old architecture. I felt even more othered, here on this bus with mostly white people having a great time while people and stray dogs roamed the streets. “I feel cognitive dissonance,” Liz, an older woman and two week participant stood next to me. She was a long time school psychologist and also a yoga teacher. She knew I was as well. “I thought you would feel it as well.” I nodded. We stared out into the city behind our walls of music and privelage, not saying anything else.

Finally, the bus ended back where it began. Folks spilled out, excited to go out and keep partying but I was done for the night. I hugged Kat, who was leaving the next day, and grabbed a taxi, speeding off into the night.

#ecuador #travel #writing #blog #travelabroad #quito

[erinelezabeth920]

Days 23-25: Puerto López

We got on the bus at 8:45pm. Erin, Kayla and I had walked to her host house after the museum to pick up our things and change. (Her host house, a gated condo was very posh- Ecuador elite). Kayla then called and Uber which we missed, so Kayla called another Uber. We waited on the side of the street in traffic until he arrived. A few minutes into the ride though Erin realized she had forgotten her bus ticket and we had to turn around. Luckily it was in her room and luckily she remembered.

The ride to Quitumbre, the giant bus station south of the city, took about 45 minutes. Kayla chatted with the driver; she was always really good at those things. Erin fell asleep and I looked out the window. It was a beautiful evening, the sunset stunning and the clouds framed the mountains. We could see Cotopaxi, the sunset glinting off the glacier snow. The city sprawled in the twilight.

We were about two hours early to the bus station. We tried to find food but it was all gross bus station food and the vendors were heckling us. I got an empeñada and a coffee, which was a bad idea and made me feel sick. Sitting with our bags, we met a girl from England who was also traveling to Puerto Lopez but solo, so we adopted her. Night busses are scary alone. Mike, Ana and Star were supposed to meet us, but we had no internet so no way of knowing where they were. Finally, at 8:15 we lined up for the bus only to realize that we needed some kind of entrance ticket. We rushed to the counter and ran into Mike, Star and Ana. They had gotten dinner on the way. Smart. They charged us 1$ each for the extra ticket thing which was dumb but that’s Ecuador for you. Nada es gratis.

(Erin and Kayla steal my phone while I go to the bathroom)

We finally loaded the bus. They wanted us to put our bags below but we had heard that bags often get stolen on these busses so we lied and said we had laptops in them to keep them in our seats. An older woman sat next to me, part of a family. At least I had a window and the seats reclined. Star and the British girl were in front of me, and Kayla Erin, Mike and Ana across the aisle. We made a pact if one of us had to go to the bathroom to wake someone else up to watch the stuff. Traveling in groups has its perks.

I didn’t sleep right away, still feeling sick from the empeñada and coffee, and the bathroom bus situation was less than ideal. There was a movie playing that I can’t remember the name of, but Chris Pratt was a cowboy and that was nice to look at. Eventually I fell asleep.

Sometime around 4 in the morning we stopped. Getting off the bus the air felt muggy, heavy, different than the Quito mountain climate. There were palm trees and I knew we were close to the ocean. The ride itself hadn’t exactly been smooth; we must’ve been on the windiest road ever, but regardless I slept. At 6am we pulled into the station. It was dark and we shuffled off, dazed and confused. One of the those travel moments where you really have no idea how you’re going to get from point A to point B and just have to trust the travel universe. Which I’ve found somehow always works out. Just not in the ways you might think.

We shuffled out of the station and to these tuk tuk type rickshaw things with three wheels and no windows, which I guess were the local taxis. We split up, three each and zoomed into the dark dirt road clutching our bags. I smelled the ocean even though it was dark. I had zero idea where we were going, especially once the rickshaw started to climb this huge hill sounding like it was going to die any minute. Stray dogs lurked on the edge of the road. Finally we pulled up to a gate with the name of the hostel in the middle of nowhere and were dropped off. Hm. The six of us wandered in the dark, trying to find a path or anything, trying not to yell at Erin asking where the hell she had booked us. It was honestly pretty damn funny. Finally a voice said “hola?” and a light turned on. A woman came to get us, we explained we had nights booked but had shown up early from the bus. She let us sit by the pool with our stuff, saying the room wouldn’t be ready until 10. The pool deck faced the ocean up on our hill in the glowing daylight. We settled in; I felt comfortable with my friends around, sitting on various chairs using the internet or reading. I found a bench, laid down and passed out hard.

I woke up two hours later when it was light out. The women at the hotel had served us breakfast which was super nice considering we didn’t have a room yet; eggs, coffee, bread and fruit. Finally she told us we could leave our stuff in our room while she cleaned it to be ready. I sat in a hammock and read while Kayla and Mike went on a run and Erin and the rest went to the beach. Finally, Kayla and Mike came back and we all met at the beach.

Puerto López itself was small, a local fishing town with poor families, stray dogs and markets mixed with hostels and nicer restaurants. We opted to travel there instead of the nearby party town of Montanita on recommendations from Mike’s host family. It took 20 minutes to get to the beach walking. That day (Friday, day 23) we really didn’t do much. It was great. Erin and I swam in the ocean while she nerded out about ocean science. We took naps on the beach and had lunch and a too expensive place that took forever where I had cerviche and Ana and Mike split a bottle of wine. Star, Ana and I hung out at a chocolate shop for about an hour where I swung on a swing and drank hot chocolate. It reminded me of my time in Panama. We bought things of beer and drank them on our porch, talking about all sorts of things. We went out to dinner at a pizza/ sushi place. Erin wanted to go dancing on the beach, but we were exhausted and crashed hard. I took the bunk bed.

The next day we woke up and had breakfast to head to the tour place by 9. It was raining and I had brought all the wrong clothes. Oh well. We headed to the dock and got on the boat. Soon our boat broke down so we split up to different boats. It was raining but the water was beautiful. I scanned for whales and saw a few fins. We went out about an hour or so to an island, park of a coastal Ecuadorian national park where we walked around and saw a shit ton of birds, frigates and blue footed boobies. The island apparently shares ecosystems with the Galapagos. I tried to listen in Spanish. After we got back in the boat and went snorkeling, ate lunch, finally ending with whale watching. We saw a bunch of whales, migrating to warmer waters from Antarctica. It was incredible. Even the guides were smiling. I watched the island disappear in the mist. Apparently it was an important place for indigenous tribes and Incans too. I wonder how they found it, out in the middle of the ocean.

After we were freezing, went back and showered and went to dinner at a pasta place where we laughed a lot, although I was annoyed because all I wanted was ceviche. After I drank a Michelada on the beach and we watched a dance party with a funny mix of Ecuadorian families, high school kids and tourists. I liked it. I sat in a beach chair with my drink. Erin danced next to me, refusing to acknowledge the 18 year olds who were eyeing her. We walked back in the dark; Erin was afraid of stray dogs and to be honest, so was I but the humid ocean air was heavy and nice.

The next day we chilled in the morning, then had the most amazing lunch of my life at a fish market directly next to the docks with shrimp and ceviche and beer that more than made up for skipping the sea food the night before. We sat in blue plastic chairs and looked at the water. A dog followed us and I liked him. Ana and I walked back together along the water and got ice cream. After we piled back into the tuk tuk things, went to the bus station, took a bus two hours to Manta that blasted music the whole time but drove along the ocean. I saw small shacks with kids running around. From Manta we took a taxi to a tiny airport with the easiest security of my life and got on a plane, walking outside across the runway. 50 minutes later we were in Quito.

We split up the Ubers so I went with Star, Mike and Ana. We took the same windy road up to the city we had taken my first night coming in. I looked at the sprawl of lights under the mountains. It was amazing how different, comfortable I felt, almost like coming home. Traveling with 5 other people was at times hard for me as someone who is a good solo traveler and needs their own space. But it was also hugely rewarding, dinners together, hanging out on the porch, splashing in the waves. This trip has bonded us quickly in ways I would have never thought possible, and driving up through the lights of Quito listening to Ed Sheeran on the radio, I just thought of how easy, comfortable I felt.

We tried to find food but it was Sunday at 10pm and everything was closed. Finally, in one of those travel strokes of fate and beauty we came across a tiny tapas place run by an incredible Argentinian man. He led us to a garden and lit some candles. I ordered a glass of wine and a mushroom sandwich. Mike and Star and Ana and I chewed in silence, soft jazz music in the background, the smell of salt still in our hair.

#travel #ecuador #writing #travelabroad #blog #southamerica

[erinelezabeth920]

Days 19-22: Growth

“It’s the get through”, I told Andy over the phone with spotty internet, drinking a Pilsner at a bar on Amazones on my way back to the bus. It was Monday (Day 19). Back to la routina.

It had been a hard day. I hadn’t slept well and had woken up tired. The busses were stressful, crowded, the cars emitting exhaust fumes, people shoving. The neuro clinic was fine; we went to go get cappuccinos from the coffee shop next door and it had really messed up my stomach. Raf was in an off mood, criticizing us for things, or asking questions like why didn’t we include this criteria, maybe we should add this, making hours more work for me and Kayla.

We had lunch at an almuerzo place, but my stomach was off and I didn’t want any of it. I bought a chocolate bar and sprite at the mini market. It felt like I might be getting my period. Kayla and Erin were off too, Erin was in her complaining mood, and Kayla was snappy. We walked into Beraca, the Spanish building to be bombarded with people. I had forgotten that the two week program group had showed up that weekend; this was their first day at the Spanish school. Meaning 9 new students meant 9 new teachers and 18 more people in the already small space. The energy was buzzing with new psychology girls who I’m sorry all looked the same. I know it’s rude but I felt annoyed, like an older sibling in the hospital. This was our space. Our program. We had a bond, a vibe, a routine. And suddenly it was thrown off by fresh travel energy, and all these new girls, just as we were slumping.

We had Spanish class for an hour. It was harder to concentrate; Irma and I got moved from our nice room with windows to the back room. Then we all (teachers included) headed outside and piled on a bus. Herding 30 people on a public bus was a nightmare when no one seemed to be in charge. It was hot and I was annoyed. We got off that bus and waited for like 15 minutes on a busy street corner for another one. I hate traveling in big groups. The objective was to talk to our Spanish teacher, but Irma was hot too and the high pitched chatter of the new girls about schools and policies and IEPs annoyed me. Finally the other bus came; we drove up a windy street to the top of the hill, the site of the Panecilla statue.

Once we were there it was kind of fun. There was space to spread out. Irma and I talked with Kayla and her teacher about our job site. Irma made dirty jokes. We looked over the city and saw the volcanos. I noticed sights at the Historical District from the Saturday before. I talked to Mike and his teacher; they have a hysterical friendship. I ate some chips I had in my bag and climbed up to the top of the tower. The site itself is an old Incan ruin on a hill overlooking the city. In 1976 they build a statue of a woman, a protector of the city looking out. It’s iconic of the city and beautiful to see from afar and up close. It was actually a nice time.

After that event things got annoying again. There wasn’t much direction and it seemed like we were just kind of stranded up there as class was officially over. Mike and Ana went to go try and buy bus tickets for our upcoming weekend coast trip. Erin, Kayla, Kat, Star and I ended up walking all the way back to Parque Elijido. Once we got over the confusion of the Spanish teachers who wanted to go out and were telling us a million different things, it was actually kind of nice. We walked through pretty streets in the historic district, narrow with colonial buildings and cobble streets. Kat and I vented to each other and felt better. Erin was still complaining.

At Parque Elijido I walked with them a ways to Amazones, the more commercial street. I needed a drink. I split off at a bar I found and said bye. I sat down and ordered a beer.

Which brings us to the conversation. I was telling Andy that traveling is kind of like a relationship. I know this phase. I had weeks of it in Thailand, Denmark too. When the honeymoon has worn off, all the new and shiny. And suddenly all the little things you didn’t notice start bothering you. The traffic, the food, how people always sit on the outside seat on the bus. The annoyance of small change, the lack of internet and Google maps. You want to go home. You wonder what your friends are doing, if they forgot you. Erin complains, Kayla is snarky, Mike gets in moods. I don’t understand anything in Spanish. I’m sick of paying for public bathrooms and throwing toilet paper in the trash. Or the big one, I’m sick of getting cat called in the street, feeling unsafe from men, clutching my belongings, being beeped at by cab drivers. The intense machismo and the fear I feel as a result. The list goes on.

That’s the phase. And then (for anyone who’s moved to a new place or been in a relationship) comes growth. It’s uncomfortable. It’s re-wiring our neurons for new patterns, expanded ways of thinking, literally changing ourselves. Growth doesn’t happen in fancy hotels or guided tours on vacation, in a safe and tourist bubble. Growth happens out in the streets, in immersion when all you want is for someone to speak English to you and a hot shower, standing on a completely packed bus at 7:15am, the only person with blonde hair, everyone staring, not able to drink coffee because your stomach can’t handle it.

That night when I came back, having tea with Monica and everyone, they showed me a shoe box. Inside was a beautiful dark green hummingbird with a broken wing, they were nursing back to health.

Day 20:

A lot of it was the same. Clinic in the morning, Kayla and I were formatting our screener tool, trying to change Spanish tenses from first to third person for a parent and self report and it was very difficult. We went to power lunch lunch at a Mexican restaurant nearby. It was good but I was very tired and not talkative. Tara was there, the other program director since Anton had left and they had switched off. She sat next to me and I felt bad because I didn’t talk much. I get quiet in big groups of new people with loud personalities.

After lunch we bussed to Beraca and I tried to finish my homework. I got tired and put my headphones in. I knew I should talk to the new people but I just didn’t have it in me. Irma and I had Spanish class until 4:30.

After that Kayla Star, Erin and I walked over to a sketchy looking bus station to buy the tickets for the weekend. We were all still kind of touchy and annoyed, trying to find the place, figure out the right time. The machine was slow and a car alarm kept going off. They headed back to go salsa dancing, but I was close to my house and felt pretty out of it, so I headed home.

I wanted a beer, so I stopped in at an almuerzo place that was still open. It was just the family and me; a grandma, some kids, uncle and who knows who else. I sat down at a plastic table with my beer and opened my Spanish teenage vampire book, trying to be unassuming. Soon I heard a commotion; more people had arrived, and then there was cake and singing of ‘Feliz cumpleaños’. A little girl of maybe 5 sat in a chair to blown out the candles. Someone recorded on a phone. I closed my book and turned around, smiling. I had accidentally walked into a birthday party.

When I left, I put my 2$ on the counter. “Who’s birthday I asked?” as everyone had been looking at me a little strangely. She pointed to the little girl. ‘Feliz cumpleaños’ I said. They smiled and so did I as I walked out into the Ecuadorian night.

Day 21:

We made a meal in our Spanish class. I had already eaten an empeñada with Kayla for lunch and felt full. I had done my Spanish homework and Irma taught me the recipe. Tara had made an announcement to the four week group that this was the phase where the adrenaline had worn off, and it would get tougher. She was right. It was kind of fun, a cool idea and I enjoyed myself except there were a lot of people and it was loud. Mike and I learned a card game from the cute teacher Raul, and we all ate the food. I was very tired by the end; I headed to a coffee shop but the internet didn’t work great.

Instead of going home, I just hung around. At 8 I walked back down the street, feeling a little sketched in the dark with my computer in my bag. I found the bar, Uncle Julio’s. Karaoke. It was the best. Just the best. A tiny empty bar with two old men singing Spanish ballads and about 9 Americans belting out 90s songs with popcorn and beer. Jojo sang Christina Aguelera, Raf sang Shania Twain. Kayla sang Ashanti and Star killed it with “My Heart Will Go On” It breathed life into me; I was up dancing talking to people and feeling like my old self. We ended the night with a sing along of “I Wanna Dance With Somebody”, my home karaoke favorite which the whole bar joined. And for that moment everything felt aligned.

Day 22:

I woke up and packed my stuff for the beach. Monica called me an Uber so I wouldn’t have to take my things on the bus. At the clinic, three new people from the 2 week group came to join us, which was stressful but we made it work.

After the clinic Kayla and I walked with Erin to her house to drop off our stuff. Then we headed up to the site of our “charla” walking up a huge hill with heavy breathing. We stopped for lunch at an absolutely adorable coffee shop, where I had a giant juice and a panini and we talked about relationships. It was a nice time. After that we went to an art museum where we had to pay 8$ to get in and were mas about it. The museum was beautiful though, a famous artist from Ecuador who donated his house and most of his collection to the public.

After after that we sat the in grass outside. It was a nice day. We talked about privilege and multiculturalism, and our experiences in Ecuador thus far. We talked about the difficulty, the growth. I tried to contribute as best I could, talking about my frustrations with being hustled on the street, beeped at by every taxi, stared at on the bus, and even THAT is a product of my privelage, as a visitor from a country with more opportunity. I am harassed because I am perceived as having more. And I do.

We ended the charla early. Standing up in the sun, outside of a beautiful museum overlooking the city, I felt a huge weight lift. The week was over. I stood and stared for a bit at the Quito houses as the clouds floated by. In a few hours we’d be on a bus to the beach. I had gotten through.

Because finally after the frustration comes acceptance. Where you grow and change, let go of the things or learn to embrace them, changing yourself in the process. Even in the hard weeks, the lulls, the moments shine through. A city from a hill, a hummingbird in a shoebox, an accidental birthday party. Until you’re dancing to Whitney in a tiny dive bar in South America, drink in hand and suddenly the world doesn’t feel so big after all.

#ecuador #travel #writing #blog #quito #travelabroad

[erinelezabeth920]

Days 17-18: - Quito

Day 17:

It was Saturday. It was a tired day. I woke up late. I hadn’t slept in since god knows when. Not too late though because that damn equator sun shines right through my window. I went down around 8am and had breakfast with Monica; she thought I was going to Quilotoa today instead of the day before. My Spanish was probably off. I was hoping she would do my laundry today because it was beyond tragically low (hadn’t been washed since the hospital, since I arrived to Quito). She said something that the lines were all full (air dry clothing after hand washing), and she would do it tomorrow. Damn. After breakfast I went upstairs and diddled around until 10:30am. At 10:30 I headed out the door wearing shorts and a T-shirt (still held out hopes for laundry, maybe…). It was bright and sunny out. I wrapped my scarf around my shoulders. I tried out a different bus route to the Spanish school which sent me the completely wrong direction, so I just grabbed a taxi instead. I waited out on the steps for a few minutes until Kat showed up. Star showed up directly after; we sat on the steps and chatted, trying to ignore the gazes of the men at the barber shop next door. Soon a younger woman showed up, who we figured out was our tour guide. Michela, either a friend or daughter or something of one of the Spanish teachers was a local college student who was studying history and tourism. She wanted to practice giving tours, so the teachers asked if any of us were interested. It seemed like a nice way to spend a Saturday.

Mike and Ana arrived a few minutes later, and we set off. Kayla was getting her hair done, and Erin was at home mourning the loss of her phone (it had gotten stolen on the metro, just after we had said goodbye from margaritas after Quilotoa). We headed on the crowded metro to the historical district. It was honestly beautiful. We had been there before, but it was basically the first day and I was so out of it I don’t remember much. The day was perfect, sunny and not too hot. Michela told us about the history of the buildings, the Spanish conquistadors, and showed us the statue in the Plaza de Independencia when Ecuador become its own country. We went into the public library, and into some breathtakingly amazing churches of which I have no photos because it’s not allowed. With Spanish colonial architecture, narrow streets, churches and historic buildings, Quito was actually the first city in the world to be named a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

I had thought that Michela would speak in English, but she didn’t know it well enough she said, so spoke Spanish. I missed some things, but it was good practice and I asked Mike and Ana to translate a lot. She spoke of politics, the Spanish influence, and Incan relics. There is so much depth and history to this place that I can’t begin to scratch the surface. I stood on the roof of the old library, surveying the city.

People were out everywhere. Tourists and locals alike. The historic center has old buildings, colonial style and cobble streets with vendors selling ice cream, fruit and empanadas. We had lunch at an almuerzo place (3$). After lunch, Kat and Mike headed out. Ana, Star and I opted to stay to visit the Museo del Ciudad. Michela had to head out, but set us up with a tour guide (also in Spanish) for 3$. It was honestly one of the best experiences I’ve had here. The museum was beautifully laid out in an old building where each room explained a historical period of time in Quito. From the geography, to indigenous people, where they lived, what they ate, how they moved from hunter gather to society, the overtake of the Incan Empire (which only lasted 40 years who knew?!) to the first Spanish conquistadors, mass massacre of the indigenous people (what else is new), colonial period, independence, and finally modernization (also didn’t know Ecuador only adopted the American dollar 10 years ago, to avoid inflation and the total shit that is happening to Venezuela right now). Anyway, two extremely informative hours, listening in Spanish. How completely American, that I can live in a place and know nothing about it. After the museum Ana, Star and I bought street churros and they were amazing.

After that I went home. I was tired. I napped for an hour then went to meet Kayla, Erin and Star for dinner at a pasta place in Plaza Foch. Erin was in better spirits. It’s just mentally and emotionally draining to feel constantly unsafe. But dinner was nice. I was exhausted but hung out with Erin and Kayla for a little- we looked for a place to dance in Plaza Foch, but it was too early and everyone was hustling us trying to get us to come in for a drink. I got annoyed and was going to slap the next guy that walked up to me with a menu, so we took a taxi up to the gay bar where Mike and the others were meeting. After another annoying conversation with the bartender about cover charge, we paid the stupid 10$ went in and danced for a little. I’m getting familiar with all the popular latino songs. (Erin already knows them by heart.) It was a typical gay club, flashing lights and music and men who can dance. Mike, Jojo, Ana and Mayra showed up shortly after. I danced with them for a bit; Erin, Mike and Jojo were in their element. I was tired though, just overstimulated from a lot of people in small spaces with smoke and bodies, which is essentially all the public transportation is in Quito, so I said goodbye around 11:45 and caught a cab home.

The cab driver didn’t have his meter on. He told me 5$. I told him absolutely not, 3$. He said no, 4$. I was pissed the whole ride home and gave him 3.50$

Day 18:

Sunday was just wonderful. It was a bright, sunny morning. I ate breakfast with Monica and Hernando. We sat and talked for a long time; I told them how I was an outdoor guide back home and showed them pictures, of the mountains in Washington, the mountain goats, the cherry blossoms. I brought down my laundry (finally). Monica asked if I wanted to go to the market, but I told her I was meeting friends to watch the world cup game.

Heading outside, the city was dead. I don’t know if it’s the Catholicism, the World Cup, or both, but everything felt quiet. The streets were empty and people were biking happily where usually cars are zooming and honking. The first bus I took was playing the game on the radio. When I got off at the park, a street vendor was listening on a portable radio. I took the second bus up toward the clinic and got off to find the bar we were meeting at. The streets were empty, just occasional cars and bikes. The day was absolutely beautiful. I met Erin and Kayla outside, and we walked in to a happy, popping bar. I ordered a mojito and Venezuelan mozzarella sticks. It was a fun atmosphere.

After the game we (the 8 of us) walked to Parque Carolina, a big park nearby. We went to the botanical gardens, and wandered around for a few hours looking at the different plants, flowers and ponds. After that we found a nice grassy space in the park to plop. We read, took naps and took turns watching stuff so people could go buy food. The park was extremely busy, almost like an amusement park with a little river of paddle boats, food vendors everywhere, and a little sketchy looking ferris wheel. Families were playing, happy. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but the energy felt different. More carefree. Probably the Catholicism. Day of rest. At one point a family with a guitar and a harp came right next to us and played. It was wonderful. The little boy kept running away with the maracas.

After the market, I stopped for pasta and a glass of wine. It was okay but overpriced. I had bought a 2$ teenage vampire novel in Spanish off the street and tried to translate it. I got through one page. After that, I headed home. I had tea and bread with Monica, Primo, Pablito, Anai, and Hernando. It was nice. After that I headed to bed.

I don’t know how to explain it, but it was a special day, weekend really because I wasn’t jetting off somewhere in search of adventures. Sunday especially felt, well NORMAL. Waking up late, chatting with the family over breakfast, meeting friends to watch the game, hanging out in the park. That’s what typical Sundays are. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but it was a marker, an accomplishment of sorts in the most tranquil of ways. We were past the point of two week, of the adrenaline of a vacation, and were just, for a brief quiet moment, living. In Quito.

It’s kind of a beautiful thought. 

#ecuador #travel #blog #writing #studyabroad #southamerica

[erinelezabeth920]

Day 16: Quilotoa

The one where we went to a big volcanic crater and it was cool.

Ok so really, what happened is every weekend we have Fri-Sunday off. The first weekend we had activities since we had just arrived and then I got deathly ill etc. The weekend after that we went to Banos as included in the program. This was our first free weekend. A few of us had heard about a big crater lake that you could hike to and kayak in a couple hours away. After a long process of group texts and trips to the travel agency a block from the Spanish school, we had booked a bus for the 8 of us plus Mayra and Chelsea for 45$ each.

Friday morning I woke up at 6am to get to the travel place by 6:45am. I took a cab because I was tired and wanted to sleep more. Monica was up and gave me some breakfast. I was in a good mood, that ‘leave the city’ kind of mood that always makes me happy regardless of the country or place. Just excited to breathe again.

I got out of the taxi and met Ana and Mike on the street walking up. We went into the travel place where the director woman waited for us, and introduced us to our guide and bus driver. As we headed out to the bus, she looked at my shoes, Chaco sandals and asked if I had sneakers. No, I said, I’ll be fine.

On the bus, the guide introduced himself, said (in Spanish) we’d be driving about 3 hours to Quilotoa down the Pan American Sur Highway, the one that travels all the way down the continent to the tip. It was a sunny day and he said that the volcanoes were out. I got a little tingle in that adventure part of my stomach; my heart lept. It’s been a passionate dream of mine ever since watching a Patagonia documentary, to go to Chile and Patagonia, the mountains, rocks and ocean on the other end of the world. And I was on the road there. Albeit thousands of miles away, but it was something. It was a start. Someday.

The guide came to my seat in the bus and talked to me, asking if I wanted to stop and buy sneakers. I asked him if it would be cold, or if he was worried for stability (or tried to in Spanish). He said it is bad to hike in sandals. I showed him the supports, the straps and told him “subo montanas “, I climb mountains in these “con una mochila” with a backpack. He nodded and said he’d watch me for safety.

I sat back in my seat, a little miffed. I didn’t doubt his expertise (had climbed Cotopaxi, Mt McKinley and peaks in Alaska), his knowledge of the area, or his concern of safety as a guide. But I knew the weather. I know outdoor safety and my own body. I had done my research on this spot and hold a Wilderness First Responder certification. I couldn’t help notice him glance at my painted toenails as he spoke to me. If I had been a tall, bearded muscular outdoorsy looking dude in sandals, would he have said anything? I couldn’t help but wonder, maybe not.

We stopped briefly for an overlook of the city. The sun was harsh on the hills and the city stretched in its wide valley, north to south populations for miles. I saw the Panecilla, the Basilica, and other historic parts of the city, tiny below. It was pretty. Someone was asking the guide if he had been to the states. He said he lived in California for 5 years. I sauntered over and mentioned I live in Seattle. “Ah Cascades” he said. I told him I like to hike, have climbed Mt St Helens and guide sea kayaking trips. I want to climb Ranier someday. I knew I was trying to prove myself but I couldn’t help it. I wanted him to take me seriously. Not for approval but for my own internalized self worth. It was a strange feeling. I wished I had my Outdoor Research jacket, my hiking pants, boots all of my gear just to show that I really was compentent, like a middle school girl wanting to dress up for the popular kids. They weren’t rational thoughts. But they were strong and real as anything.

Back in the bus, I gazed out the window in the sharp morning sun as the city faded behind to dry rolling hills. People herded sheep down the highway, wrapped in traditional shawls. Cotopaxi, the huge volcano loomed to our left, snow topped glacier peak. I pointed. The guide took out his phone and sat next to me, scrolling through pictures of the climb he led the other day. It looked beautiful, incredible. heard myself asking questions like, how many feet? Ice axes? Glissading? Using a broken mix of English and Spanish. I was still trying to prove myself. I knew that, and I felt a weird mix of pride that he showed me his pictures frustrated with myself for needing so badly to be taken seriously by someone else (a man) instead of just being confident in myself.

After 3 and a half hours on the bus, we arrived. The landscape had changed from rolling hills to sharp rocks and cliffs mixed with farms and fields as sheep and alpacas roamed and stray dogs lingered on the road side. We pulled into the site. It was dusty and windy. Really windy. We had been steadily driving up for 3 hours and I could feel it. We got out of the bus, amidst market stalls and some shanty restaurant on the mountain side. We walked up some steps to the observation point. It was REALLY windy, with dust blowing. Ana and Mayra went to go buy hats. People looked uncomfortable. Erin looked over at me, “You’re in your element aren’t you?” I grinned and spread my arms out wide.

Looking over the crater was incredible. I’ve never been to Crater Lake in Oregon but I expect it’s something like this. Wide cliffs and teal blue waters at 14,000 feet, the wind whipping as the mountains didn’t block us any more. I saw the path down, probably about half a mile. Once Ana and Mayra caught up we started down.

It was fun, dusty and less windy in the crater. The guide came and asked me how my feet were. I said great (I love hiking in Chacos). He said, I can’t see them. I looked down, my toes were covered in dust. I grinned. The path was sandy and slippery, we slid the way down. Ana used poles as her knee was bothering her. Many locals passed, coming down leading burros, or walking folks back up on their backs. Almost to the bottom we stopped at a little bench to see the view.

(Mike and I eat a Cliff Bar I found hiding in my pack)

At the bottom there were people and kayaks. We wanted to kayak but they were doubles and there was a person left out. I wanted everyone else to have the experience, because I kayak a lot at home. I asked if I just could go alone. The boat guy said no. I told him I knew how to kayak. He still said no. I said fine, miffed, and that I’d just watch. The guide came over to talk to him. They chatted, then he nodded and handed me a life jacket. Mike came up behind and said “Ella es una experta” I was at once happy they were confident in me, and conflicted that it’d taken men to speak on my behalf to get him to agree.

The kayaking itself though was great. We paddled around in the crater for about 20 minutes, relaxing. The cliffs rose huge on either side. It felt surreal. I smiled and called out to people, and even put my feet in the water. When we came pulled the boats ashore to head back up, I stood in the water for a few moments, looking at the view and letting my feet soak, feeling calm and content. Sandals for the win motherfuckers.

(Riding solo)

The walk back up sucked. It was beautiful, but hot and steep, and at 14,000 feet my breathing was harsh and my legs felt like lead. Some folks opted to take burros. I was determined not to let them pass me. We stopped often. Erin pulled out her inhaler. She she said felt like I failure. I told her at 14,000 feet, no one is a failure for needing help to breathe. At least there were many photo opportunities.

Once we got to the top, we were exhausted. It was windy again, so we ducked in a small restaurant for an Ecuadorian lunch; juice, soup, plantains, rice and chicken. After finding an ice cream bar and doing some souvenir shopping, I headed on the bus. I slept most of the way back. At one moment though I opened my eyes to see a big gray cloud out the widow passing trough the sunny sky over the mountains. In the cloud arched a huge rainbow.

We got back to Quito around 5:30pm. Star, Erin and I decided to grab some food before heading back to our host houses, because we were starving. We went to a Mexican restaurant at Plaza Foch. Sitting upstairs on a patio looking over the bars and shops with people, I had the best nachos and margarita ever. Erin gazed over the street, looking longingly at the salsa bars and women walking in heels as the electric Quito night began to unfold. She knew we were all too tired to go out that night and wasn’t happy about it. I told them today was like a typical, best case weekend day for me in Seattle. Leave early, long car ride, great adventure with friends in the mountains, get back exhausted, have good food and a drink, crash on the couch early, happy and content.

Erin broke her gaze from the street to look at me. “You’re crazy,” she said.

I grinned.

#travel #quito #ecuador #outdoor #women #writing #adventure

[erinelezabeth920]

Days 12-15 – La Routina

The routine is this. Every weekday Mon-Thurs at 5:45 am my alarm goes off. The sun is just starting rise over the mountains directly outside my window (with very thin curtains), the sky turning rosy pink. Sometimes I can see the glacier peak. One morning the sun rose right over the mountain, glowing gold on the top. I snooze my alarm, half conscious taking in the view and go back to sleep. I snooze the alarm until about 6:20, (6:30 on a bad day), when the equator sun is full up over the mountains and the city, shining in my face until my room starts to get warm like a green house. A funny bell recording rings from the speakers on top of the church next door. I get up, brush my teeth, find some semi-professional clothes from my shelf to wear, brush my hair, put on a little makeup, pack my backpack (laptop, charger, Spanish book, water bottle, sunscreen) slide my sunglasses in my jacket pocket, make sure I have enough cash for the day (in a secure place) and 50 cents for the bus.

At around 6:45 (on a good day) I head downstairs. I’m usually greeted by the dogs. Monica is in the kitchen. I’ll sit at the table and she’ll give me a cup of hot water (tea not coffee), a glass of blended fruit juice, sometimes a bowl of fruit, and usually an egg of some sort. Sometimes I do my Spanish homework, but mostly I just sit and zone out. We speak a little in Spanish, but she usually has the radio on, and I mostly eat in silence. I think we have an unspoken agreement of a love of peaceful quiet mornings. Around 7am Hernando comes into the kitchen on his way to work (?) class(?) I know it has to do with mathematics at the university. He always gives me a big grin (toothy, he is missing  many teeth), shakes my hand and says “tienes un buen dia” – have a good day. He always wears a Fox news baseball cap which I think is a gift from a previous host student. I find it funny but never say anything.

I try to leave by 7, but usually at roughly 7:05 I finish up my breakfast and leave the kitchen, usually telling Monica about when I’ll be back (sies y media o siete en la noche), and thank you for the food. Sometimes I bring some pan y queso in a plastic bag with me. I pet the dogs (the big one, Manolo is my favorite), grab my backpack, make sure my valuables are secured, and head out the door.

The dogs see me off down the porch to the gate. I pet them bye, open the gate and head into the street. Monica lives on a small quiet street (minus the dogs) that ends in a dead end on one side, and big chain strung between two concrete posts on the other blocking the entrance for cars. A guy sits in a plastic lawn chair next to the chain, listening to football (soccer) on a small radio. I think it’s Ecuador’s version of a gated community. I wave to him as I pass every morning, heading out on the main road.

I walk about 10 minutes down the road, past the church, the panderia, the small shops and lots of people and some cars passing. Usually the sun is hot and strong in my face, the mountains and the city spread out, as we’re up on a hill.  I come to a fork in the road with a lot of traffic, heading onto the big road. I dodge taxis, busses, motor bikes and cars to cross the road. I wait for the bus with other people, in a kind of chaos as taxis stop, horns beep and people flag down busses, stopping all over the sidewalk. I get on any one that says SUR OCCIDENTAL, pay the 25 cents to the person sitting at the front (not the driver, another separate money person) and squish in with various crowds of people, clutching my belongings tight. The bus lurches and honks down the big road for about ten minutes like a painful roller coaster until I finally get off at Parque Elijido, a big square park in the center ish of the city. From there I walk the northern edge of the park past people selling fruit, cigarettes, empanadas and cheap jewelry, dodging bicycles until I cross the street where a traffic cop is directing traffic counter to what the lights are saying. No one seems to pay much attention. I just stick close to other people. Then I walk two streets to Juan de la Mera, up the street to the bus station and wait for the bus with the green on it that says ALOY ALFERA. I get on that one (much less crowded), pay another 25 cents and ride up to the edge of Parque Carolina on another big road. I get off when I see the fountain. Then I cross the street again, dodging four lanes of traffic, exhaust pipe smoke and a median, walk two blocks, take a left, a right, cross the street and enter into a fancy looking building with glass doors. It’s somewhere between 7:45 and 8:00pm. And to be honest I’m already pretty exhausted.

I enter in a big lobby with tile floors and a security guard behind the desk. Sometimes the door to the elevator is locked, sometimes not. He’ll buzz me in if so, and I ride up five floors. I always feel like I should be dressed fancier. The higher class working women in Ecuador seem to be stuck in the late 80s style of emerging professionalism; tall heels, lipstick, done hair etc. I feel inadequate, sloppy. At the fifth floor I get out, walk past the sign that says NEUROLOGIC INTERNATIONAL with a picture of a brain and happy people, and to a different unmarked door. I ring the doorbell. Sometimes Erin or Kayla are there with me. Raf usually answers as she gets there early. I walk through the clean, sterile clinic office, to a small room with a conference table and chairs and a big window overlooking the street. I take off my jacket, put down my backpack, open my computer and finally relax.

The next three hours are mostly working on Excel spreadsheets in some silence, with me and Kayla tossing diagnostic ideas back and forth, the occasional ask for translation in Spanish, and heating up water from the electric heater to make instant coffee. I know it sounds boring but it’s kind of like a calm in the storm and I love it. This is probably what normal office jobs are like, something I have zero experience in. The irony is I traveled all the way to Ecuador to work in a high rise clinic. Who would have thought? Occasionally Maria, the clinician pops her head in to chat, and once in a while Dr. Cruz the white haired legend himself in a white lab coat comes by to say hi.

At around 11-11:15 we wrap up where we’re at and head out. Usually we’ll catch the bus back toward Beraca, the Spanish school – although sometimes we’ll eat lunch near the clinic. Lunch, depending on the restaurant we choose varies from Mexican to Italian (my favorite; best ravioli ever) for 7-8$ or classic Ecuadorian almuerzo- generally soup, rice, meat or fish and juice for 3$. Lunch during the program is on our own. Dinner and breakfast are provided. Once a week we have what’s called a power lunch where we meet with all the small team directors and discuss what’s happening with our site. Our power lunches are on Tuesdays, and I had my first arepas last week at a small Ecuadorian restaurant.

During lunch, Erin Kayla and I usually do our Spanish homework. They’re in the book ahead of me, and I conjugate verbs and fill in sentences while they work on past tense and reflexives. Around 1pm we usually head over to the Spanish school. By this point I’m usually really tired. I sit on the couches mindlessly scrolling through my phone, or walk across the street for a Sprite. People fill in from their other sites- Kat and Star, Ana, Mike and Leandra. We chat, tired, catching up on the day. The World Cup was on, on the little TV and the Spanish teachers gathered with us on the couches to watch some of it.

At 1:30 we start classes. Irma usually bustles in right at 1:30. We sit in a little room behind the couches, facing each other at a small table. We’re both pretty tired and it’s hot in there, but I tend to perk up as the classes go on. I like them even if I’m tired. I learn a lot. We go over my homework, verbs, have conversations, work on vocab, and Youtube songs. She’s funny and I like to (try to) talk about my life in Spanish. I write things down in a notebook or scrap paper. We take a break at 3:30 – usually I get tea from the small table in the corner, and end classes at 4:30.

There are variations on the theme as well, a process to nail down the routine. On Monday (Day 12) Monica forgot I left the house so early, and scrambled to throw together some food. I laughed and told her it was fine, and brought some pan to go. That morning I tried to follow Google Maps by taking the bus for the first time. I waited at a random corner for 15 minutes for a #54 bus to come that never came (funny Google maps, thinking the Quito busses have numbers instead of random locations plastered to the windshields). I gave up and took a taxi.

After class, it depends. Monday at 5pm a handful of us went to a salsa dancing class for 4$ right around the corner from the Spanish school. It was hysterical, the teacher sharp and funny. Mike and Jojo, for all their flamboyantness and moves in the club couldn’t dance for shit. I picked it up quickly. I’ve always had a knack for learning dance steps. I wonder why I don’t do it more.

Tuesday (Day 13), I switched up my bus routine and figured out something that worked. But I got off a stop too late and had to walk three blocks back to the clinic. That evening after Spanish class, Kayla Erin and I went to find a drink. Kayla wanted to practice her Spanish, and Erin wanted to work on her dissertation and I wanted to do none of those things, so we went to a little brewery that served Ecuadorian beer. It wasn’t very good. Seattle has made me a beer snob. It’s the hard cold truth of the world. Wednesday (Day 14), I got off the bus stop too early. Our Spanish classes go until 5:30, an hour later on Wednesdays. This week we watched a movie in the back room. We started the movie 30 minutes late so everyone (teachers included) could watch the end of the Croatia England game on the tiny TV. Much standing up, cheering and nailbiting. I didn’t understand the movie, something about travelers in Ecuador. They all spoke too fast although the scenery was pretty. Mike and I fell asleep on the beanbags. At least there was popcorn.

Thursdays we don’t have Spanish class. In the afternoons we’ll either have a guest speaker, like Dr. Borjas the week before, or just a charla as a group. That Thursday (Day 15) we all went to the Itchimbia cultural center, up on a hill over the city. Erin, Kayla and I got lost in our uber getting there, but the day was nice and we walked around looking at the view, taking pictures or sitting in the grass. We talked about disproportionality education and how educators and psychologists can help be cultural competent. I painted my nails in the grass, listening intently to everyone’s words.

Usually I head home when it starts to get dark. Admittedly I’m not very good at time management, and generally walk the 10 or so minutes from Spanish school to Parque Elijido to the bus in the dark. Although sometimes if I feel sketchy I grab a taxi. Or one evening when the busses were so crowded with people pushing just to get on, and I gave up and got a cab. Thursday after Itchimbia we walked back from the cultural center to Elijido and looked at the market stalls.

But by 6:30-7 I head home. I am afraid of the dark in Quito, especially as an American. Wallets, phones, everything gets stolen. I get off the bus on the big street, and walk up the quiet main street. Sometimes the moon is out, smiling it’s crescent grin like an orange slice so far south. I pass the church. Sometimes people are going in. I pass the minimercado. Sometimes I buy a chocolate bar. I pass the man at the chain gate again. There is a gym on our street that is sometimes bumping music so loud with yelling that it must be a crossfit class or something. I walk up to the house gate and pry it open (it’s never locked); sometimes the dogs greet me, (they don’t bark at me anymore) and head inside.

Sometimes I say hi to Monica quickly and head up to my room to chill for a bit, Facetiming Andy or my mom, or reading for a bit. If it’s later, I’ll head right into the kitchen. Monica has out cups for tea, pan and sometimes soup. I sit and talk, usually with Primo who is loud and funny. Hernando is there, and Anai. Sometimes Pablito and Alejandra who lives next door. The radio is on and it’s nice even though I can’t understand much. Primo makes me laugh, telling stories.

Around 8pm I pet the dogs and head upstairs. I write for about an hour, sitting on my bed looking out at the city lights. Then I usually spend too much time scrolling social media, classic travel homesickness, trying to fill a void that isn’t fillable- until I finally turn off my wifi, take a shower and read until I go to sleep, around 10:30

And that’s the routine.

#ecuador #quito #travel #psychology #writing #studyabroad

[erinelezabeth920]

Days 9-11 – Baños

Day 9

My alarm went off at 4:45. I snoozed it until 5:15, got up in the dark and threw some clothes in a bag. At 5:30, Jojo texted me, saying they were running a little late. I felt nauseous; my body was still in recovery mode and needed more sleep. I walked downstairs. Somehow, Monica was awake. I drank some tea, and she gave me a plastic bag with pan and some ham. I went outside to sit on the stoop with the dogs in the early gray light. Soon Jojo texted me they were here, and a black uber pulled up. I got in, along with Jojo, Mayra and another girl, Manuela who is their host sister. Apparently she was coming along for the trip. Manuela, excited and 19 talked the whole taxi ride. I stared out the window irrationally annoyed, it being way too early for me to deal with Spanish. Plus my stomach felt a little sick. In the morning light we pulled into a bus station a on the outskirts of the city. Long rows of buses with people walking between selling fruit and cigarettes, with stray dogs roaming around framed a big while building. We went inside and sat near the entrance. Soon other folks from the program arrived looking sleepy with backpacks and bags. Anton was wearing a backwards hat and shorts. People went to go find coffee, breakfast, and use the bathroom. In about 10 minutes, we were boarding the bus. I snagged a window seat, settled back and tried to sleep. Unfortunately, about 15 minutes into the ride, a movie started playing, extremely loudly. “Baywatch” but in Spanish. It was kind of funny because it was 7am. After that I couldn’t sleep but listened to my audiobook of “On The Road.”

The bus wound through hills, mountains and farms. Up the pass, green hillsides with sheep, a snow capped peak in the distance. Through the clouds, then down winding roads. I dozed in and out. Finally, after 3 and a half hours we arrived. Getting off the bus at the station, we walked into town. There were green hills all around us, close like we were in a valley or a basin. The town was not what I expected. I guess in my dumb American way I was expecting some fancy resort, which of course was totally off base. It reminded me a lot of Pai in Thailand; small and square nestled between huge mountains, dirty streets lined with hostels, bars, tourist shops, street carts, adventure guides, stray dogs etc. That first afternoon, after walking to our hotel, I opted to hang out solo while everyone went up to a big swing at the top of the mountain. I still wasn’t feeling 100% and needed some solo time. I ended up, after taking a nap in the room, walking across the street to a public pool/ sauna and making friends with a bunch of locals hanging out in the hot tub. They asked me all sorts of questions about America and wanted to take my picture. I said sure.

(view from the hotel patio)

After that, I went out to dinner with everyone. I sat next to Star, who I was rooming with; who is actually working as a School Psych at a private school in Rochester. I had pasta which was delicious. After dinner we all took a party bus up to the top of the mountain (blasting Spanish music etc.) where we had a view of the city. It was kind of strange, the bus drivers gave us some spiked apple cider and we wandered around a campfire, some food trucks and a little shack where you paid 25 cents for a view of the town below. After 40 minutes we took the party bus back down, dirt road wind in our hair while Jojo danced on the pole. It was fun.

After that, we went to a bar called the Leprechaun to go salsa dancing. It was really fun; just to see everyone out, dancing, the program director, small team directors and us, really like we’re all just a bunch of professionals on summer break hanging out and letting loose a little bit. I realized I hadn’t danced alone without a partner in ages. It felt nice, just to feel out the salsa rhythm, seeing a mix of locals and tourists just dancing to that Latin beat. I looked around at everyone, tall curly haired Erin from Iowa who loves salsa dancing and was in her element, Mike drinking a beer with Kayla and Ana, Anton being a goof doing some silly dance, and Jojo prancing around wearing a shirt that said “GAY AF” with a rainbow. I loved every minute of it, and didn’t stop smiling for a few hours. I went home around midnight, when the club music started to bang.

Day 10

The next morning it was raining. Folks were various levels of hungover. Mike, who loves dancing and stayed out later with some Venezuelan men, may have still been drunk. We had breakfast at the hotel; then a handful of us were picked up to go white water rafting. We drove into the gear center in the town, got wet suits, helmets etc. and headed out about 30 minutes down a windy mountain road, following the river through the jungle, clouds snaking through the hillsides.

We got to the river edge. It was raging because of the rain. I was stoked. We got ready and headed to our rafts. After a spat with the guide, where he asked for two men to come to the front of the boat to lead, and I asked why because I knew that I had the most experience in the raft, and he didn’t have an answer (he let me lead), we headed on the water.

It was hands down some of the best whitewater I’ve ever done. It was thrilled and terrifying and my body, fresh out of the hospital, strained with the paddle against the rapids and my smile was a mile wide. We passed waterfalls and jungle canopies and it was just the greatest 2 hours I’d had since coming to Ecuador. I felt, for the first time since being in the hospital, alive and like my best self again. Adventuring, paddle in hand, grinning with adrenaline. Mike, Erin and Kayla in my boat, plus two European dudes all had a great time. The guide hooted and hollered at the high water. After we pulled the boats out, soaking wet and high on life, we headed to a small town for lunch before heading back to Banos.

That afternoon was funny; I was exhausted. A few of us tried to go to a spa hotel, but they weren’t accepting drop ins, so Mike and I waited 30 minutes for an epic sandwich by the town center, and then got a kind of amazing kind of terrible Chinese massage that made us have to go take a nap after.

After that, we ended up going out for Italian food. It was the best meal I’d eaten since the hospital, with a big glass of red wine. I devoured it. It was the first time I hadn’t felt sick or nauseous while eating and I was high on life. I was also enjoying the company. It happened to be just the 8 of us, Anton and the small team directors were somewhere else. I loved getting to know people; Erin the overdramatic, sassy Leandra from Florida, Kat the hippie go-getter from California, Mike the sharp, sassy lover with questionable sexuality, Star, the self-proclaimed awkward black girl with a hysterical sense of humor, Ana, quiet and always translating Spanish for us, and Kayla, the posh adventurer from NY. It’s really special how intense experiences can from such strong bonds with such different people. The 8 of us that night, over pasta and drinks just chatted about everything, giving each other shit, various levels of tired and content. It was a special time, things that don’t happen often in life. After dinner, I was done. Other folks got ready to go out, but Star and I watched Criminal Minds in Spanish and fell asleep.

Day 11

The next morning I got up early. It was drizzling. I walked alone through the empty town streets to find an ATM, through the central square past the old church. The hills rose high all around, shrouded in mist. It felt like a Northwest morning. I liked being in a small town though; I felt safer than Quito. I knew from the maps that we were nestled at the base of a huge volcano, surrounded by other peaks. Pretty neat. I tried to go to a public hot spring, but the line was so long I gave up and went back to the room.

At 9 am a truck came to pick me up to go zipling. I had texted the travel agent woman the night before to plan it. It cost 20$. We drove up the side of the mountain, up gravel winding roads. I asked about farms, mountains, and how to say “cow” in Spanish. He dropped me off at the little shack, where I joined a cute family from Minnesota in putting on harnesses, helmets and gloves. We walked outside, through a path in the jungle with the dip-drip of rain and moisture, clouds weaving through the valley and trees.

There were 6 lines. It was amazing. I chatted with the Minnesota folks, and we got to go backwards, superman and upside down. Flying through the canopy looking at the river and raging waterfalls, swollen from the rain was magical. I loved every minute. I told them the weather felt like Seattle. After I returned to town, I found a taxi to take me up to the swing, the thing I had missed the first day. Carlos was the driver’s name. Carlos was great, brought me all the way up the mountain in his cab and told me about all the different places and what it was like to live in Baños. He even got his buddies at the swing to give me an extra turn. It was cloudy with no view, but I didn’t mind. Living in the Northwest makes you used to that. Sitting on a large glorified swing with a buckle, a guy pushes you way out over the edge of the cliff, swinging into the clouds and the nothingness. I had a huge grin on my face. Carlos and I walked through the garden before heading down, and he even stopped to show me his favorite view of the city. He was a nice guy.

I was feeling sad then. There was so much more I wanted to do in this place now that I was getting my energy back. But such is travelling. We packed up from the hotel and boarded the bus. Anton was late because he needed a slice of pizza. I got a hot chocolate on the way out.

I listened to “On the Road” again on the way back to Quito. I was more than exhausted.  But something about listening to Jack Keuroack in foreign countries always gets me more than it does when I’m home, like listening to “Dharma Bums” in Thailand, dreaming of the North Cascades. This time, I watched the South American Andes roll by, listening to descriptions of Colorado, the Nebraska plains, rolling away the American west under deep wide stars. Travelling in circles, all of us, never arriving, just chasing an elusive beautiful dream.

#ecuador #travelabroad #writing #blog #spanish

[erinelezabeth920]

Day 8 – Back @ it.

Essentially, that Thursday was my first full day here in Ecuador under the normal schedule, a little later than everyone else. I woke up at 6am (luckily the equator the sun streams right through my window so it’s not hard). There was a bee in my room. I hate bees. I quickly got dressed and closed the door, hoping it would crawl back out. I had breakfast with Monica at 7am. She made me eggs, with bread and fruit which I ate all of, and drank some tea. Slowly but surely.  

I headed outside, walked down the small side street to the main road and found a taxi. I was not about to attempt to bus across the city in my state. Not ready for that yet. The busses are like a glorified roller coaster with no seat belts packed with other people like sardines. It’s enough to make a healthy person nauseous. Anyway, showed my taxi driver the Google Maps pin, and he got me to the clinic well enough. I couldn’t remember which building it was and walked up and down the sidewalk a few times until I saw Erin and Kayla. I walked with them inside a tall glass lobby with a security guard, who held up his pass to let us in to the elevator. Upstairs, in the clinic we sat in a small meeting room with a hot water heater and big windows while they briefed me on what was going on. I’ll spare the psychology details for later, but essentially we were working off an excel document adapting a Spanish mental health screener from pre-existing assessment tools with easy to understand diagnostic criteria the clinic can use to determine treatments. Illegal? Possibly borderline. But when in Ecuador… Weirdly, nerdily, I loved all of it.

After the clinic, the three of us plus Raf and Anton (a program director who has helping us that day) piled into a tiny uber to head out of the city to a university for a talk from a psychology professor there. The ride was pretty hysterical, with four of us in the back and the driver blasting Spanish music as we drove to what I saw to be the very rich part of the city, almost like a suburb out in the hills with malls and restaurants and big houses. The social economic stratification in Quito is stark, upsetting and fascinating. But more on that later.

We got out of the uber and went to a ritzier Mexican restaurant, where we ordered chips and guac and tacos. It was great if expensive (Quito expensive. Typical states prices. But sometimes here you can get lunch for 2$) Anyway, thank goodness for my returning appetite. I loved sitting with the people too. Anton, a tall guy in his 30s from Long Island with the accent to prove it was much different than I pictured the PhD psychologist on the other end of the formal emails. He was goofy, a hysterical story teller, borderline inappropriate, always egging people on, throwing everyone under the bus and bringing energy everywhere he went. I couldn’t stop laughing. No wonder he’s been with the program since it started. Raf (Rafaella), our site director, is funny too. She reminds me of my cousin Dena; small, dark-haired, intense, brilliant, driven with a dry sense of humor. The two of them had me in stitches.

(Program instagram post @ Mexican lunch. R-L, Erin, Raf, Kayla, me)

After our Mexican lunch, we walked over to the university (University San Francisco de Quito) with a pit stop in a fancy pottery shop so Raf and Anton could look at bowls (or something).  We then met the rest of the crew and headed into the university. I was fading fast then, but still able to make observations about the nice-ness of the university, that statues and glass windows and lawns and fountains. I found out later it was private, compared to the public ones in the city. “Rich people go there” Monica told me later. We all filed into a building, and finally a classroom where we sat in a circle of chairs. A women came in to speak with us, as well as a couple other students and Mike’s Spanish tutor from the school who studies psychology at the local university. The woman who spoke to us, Dr. Borja was a badass. A professor at the university, she had studied psychology in Toronto, but returned to her home in Ecuador to essentially found the first university clinical psychology program 20 years ago. Now most universities have 4-5 year clinical programs. So, she basically founded psychology in Ecuador.  Bad. Ass.

I wish I hadn’t been so tired during her talk, although to be fair to me it was the warm afternoon of my first full day since not dying and I was exhausted. She spoke of the Ecuadorian school system, the license (or lack thereof) psychologists need in this country, and the difference between the need and the quality of research and implementation of treatment here. There are not established rules or norms. It’s very new. They don’t even have masters programs, so most practicing psychologists are just out of undergrad, about 20 years old. There’s a lot more she said which I’m happy to talk about sometime with anyone, but I won’t go into it here.

(Dr. Borja in in the middle)

After the talk, we all filed outside to sit in a circle and have our first “charla” which I’m going to be honest I don’t know what it means in Spanish, but it’s essentially our weekly discussion based on the readings, always concerning a topic of multiculturalism. This time, with Anton leading, we went around and told the origin stories from our families, explaining our cultures and our thoughts surrounding identity there-in. It was nice to hear everyone’s words, and to be in that type of open space again, from living a culture that often feels far behind our own in terms of progressive ideals (Primo calls Hillary Clinton “Bill’s wife”. Just an example…) I listened to others’ stories and the sun set behind the hills. Leaves blew from the trees in the wind. I took my shoes off and let my feet touch the grass. I secretly thanked Dr. Jones from the bottom of my heart for creating such an open space within our program in Seattle to discuss these topics in a way that feels open and validating, or at least attempts to. I felt better equipped than many folks around the circle, trying to listen more than speak.

Finally, when the colors on the hills were purple in the setting sun, we headed back with a lurching bus ride into the city. After a metro adventure with Kat and Leandra, where I was totally overwhelmed in the huge station, finally got on the right route, overshot my stop, walked sketchily next to the park in the dark, got on another bus and I FINALLY made it home. I was exhausted, but glad to be off the bench and back in the game.

#travel #ecuador #blog #travelabroad #studyabroad #spanish #quito #writing