Meg You Will Never be 6 Again

Rolling like Gloucestershire Cheese down a hill

As some of you may know my Uncle Ken passed away.  He battled cancer for over two years and passed away May 13th, two days before my Dad's anniversary.  I am glad he is no longer in pain but its hard to imagine the world without him.  Duffy is having a Celebration of Life event in San Francisco and then we are having a memorial service here in Chicago in June.  Thanks to all of those that have sent kind words, the whole family appreciates it. 

As always happens life has a way of moving on even when we want it just to stand still for a moment so we can catch our breath.  During the past few hectic and emotionally trying weeks the last thing on my mind was a job, so of course it was during that time that I finally got one.  Yes I am headed back to the Louisiana SPCA to head up an adoption challenge for the next six months.  I will be helping the shelter compete for a grant of 125K by increasing their adoptions and being more active in the community.  I am really excited about it because it will carry me through till they, inshallah, take over the Jefferson Parish shelters and then I would transition to working there.  

I got the final word on the job just two weeks ago so things have moved really fast.  I had to pack up my entire life, find a place to live, buy a CAR, and prepare for the job because things will happen as soon as I get there.  The plan is that I will move a car load of stuff now and move the rest in a U-Haul in July.  I will be living with a fellow animal shelter colleague till Rob and PJ are ready to move into an apartment at the beginning of August.  So right now my life is all about trying to shove as much stuff into boxes as I can.  I will only be coming home for two days pretty much in July to move so I need everything ready to go now.  I am shocked by the amount of stuff I have even though I have given a ton away and even though I am only bringing two chairs and two side tables.

I bought a car knowing that I would need to transport quite a bit now but that usually I am only moving around animals.  After a bunch of research and test drives I decided on a Honda Fit.  Its small, gets great gas mileage, is a hatchback, and fit my price range with only 6k miles on it.  I love it.  I test drove a Matrix, Prius, and a Fit and decided on the Fit after going back and forth.  The seats fold completely flat which is great for dogs and stuff and its bigger on the inside than the two other cars I was looking at.  I am really happy with it!!

Next step is to pack the car and drive to St Louis on Friday.  I am breaking the trip up into two days so that I don't have to drive 15 hours straight and I get to see Rob for one last time till I don't see him at all till July.  I can't believe I am moving in 48hours!!!  I am not bringing any animals with me right now because my friend has a bunch at his house so I figured it would just cause trouble to bring more.  I am going to miss them all soo much and I might miss my family a little bit too...  Just joking, I am going to miss home a lot.  I can't believe I am going to miss the beach and the farmers markets and summer friends.  But this job is a dream and its something I have been waiting for a long time.  I am really excited to get back to work!  

So if any of you see my Mom in the coming weeks, be sure to give her a hug because she is going to miss me more than she knows and her stress level is only going to get higher throughout June.  Remember also that I am going to be changing this blog to the blogger address!!  I need to save my money and the other hosting service is free.  I will post the address again later.  Ok thanks again and hope all is well!!

Paradise

 When I was in Peace Corps training I remember a volunteer coming and talking to us about how she deals with living in a village.  I don’t remember much of the talk but I do remember her saying “If someone asks me to go somewhere with them or do something with them, I always try to go because what I have planned can always be done at a later time.”  I remember thinking how odd an outlook that had to have been and how it sounded like my worst nightmare.  I like planning things and I get easily stressed if my plans have to be changed at the last moment.  Never the less I tried my best to work her outlook on life into my service.

 Now since I have been back I have found that motto amazing to live by.  I’m not saying that I throw everything out the window the second someone suggests plans to me or that I say yes to every invitation.  I have just learned to be more open minded to spontaneous plans.  I guess it helps that I am unemployed and like to travel?  Well that’s a whole other story.

 So as some of you might know I am in Hawaii right now.  I know I know I lead a hard life.  I wasn’t planning on coming back here so soon but the cards just fell into place.  You see my very good friend Emily from New Orleans needed a dog sitter for her neurotic dog and she didn’t know anyone in Hawaii that she trusted enough to leave him with for a week.  She knows my status of constant travel so she asked me if I would be willing to come and watch him for a week while she was away.  Of course I leap at the chance.  Trap Jack is a great dog even though he has issues, like licking his skin off, and I wasn’t about to go and pass up a trip to Hawaii when I’m not tied down to a job.  Lucky for me I have a Mom that supports me in my wanderlust because she knows how precious this time is and that this kind of freedom will not come around again in the near future.  Dog sitting is why I came and the perfection is why I’m staying.  When I mentioned to Rob that I would be going to Hawaii again I asked him to come because he had never been and anything is better than St Louis in the winter.  He said no right away like I knew he would but then magically a few weeks later he changed his mind.  So now instead of staying for a little over a week I’m going to be staying two weeks to hang out with Rob and introduce him to all that is wonderful about whale season.  

Rob is getting here on Saturday the same day that Emily gets back so for right now I’m by myself with TJ.  But since Emily is a great friend she introduced me to a couple of her friends before leaving so I would have people to hang out with and drive me around.  Oh forgot that part of the story!  Emily has a car that she offered as part of the dog sitting package deal.  I could stay at her place, eat her food, and use her car.  The only catch is that her car is a stick.  I don’t know how to drive stick.  The first day I was here was also the day she was leaving.  She gave me a three-hour lesson on how to drive stick and I can say that I now understand the basics and have driven it around quite a bit.  That being said I wouldn’t feel comfortable driving it anywhere near other cars, people, animals, or even curvy roads.   So the idea that I would have to deal with this car that I can barely drive was kind of terrifying.  Lucky for me two of her friends that I am friends with live right up the road with plenty of parking and they can drive stick.  So we left the car there and Emily can get it when she gets back. 

 The only thing this means is that I don’t have a car right now.  Totally not a big deal.  Emily lives right by the beach and food and a mall so I could live here for a while without needing a car. 

 This whole trip came about because Emily asked me to come and now I feel like all my activities here are coming about the same way.  When I knew that I would be here in December I knew I wanted to go see some surf competitions on the north shore.  I’m never here at this time of year and if we are we are usually on Maui.  Well upon hearing this Emily called her friend Abdulla and asked him if he was going to the north shore.  Turns out the next day there was the possibility of this huge competition that has only been held 7 times in the last 25 years because the conditions need to be perfect.  It’s called the Eddie Aikau and it happens in Waimea Bay.  Abdulla said that they were going to head out there at 3am the next day and if I wanted to come with he would pick me up.  It took me about a minute to decide that this was an amazing opportunity.  So the next day I waited on a dark street corner to be picked up by a guy I had never met to go to an epic surf invitational.   

 Words can’t even describe how much fun I had.  We drove for about an hour and then another hour to find parking.  We had to walk about a mile and a half to the beach and then wait there on the sand in the dark for the officials to decide if the contest was on or off.  Have you ever wondered what about 2,000 white middle class boys from California look like?  Well now I know.  We sat watching these amazing waves in the moonlight and the sun rose over the mountains behind us.  Everyone was crossing their fingers that the waves would be big and clean so that the Eddie would be a go.  The waves have to be at least 20ft and the break has to be clean for the contest to be a go.  That’s why there have only been 7 of them before.  As the sun rose 20 or so surfers went out to check the break and give their input on if it should be a go or not.  We all held our breath. 

 Only about 28 surfers are invited to this contest and NO GIRLS!  Kind of crazy and sad.  But as soon as the contest was a go the waves went crazy.  Abdulla had a much better camera than I did so he was in charge of all the wave pics.  I will post them as soon as I get them.  For me the best part of the contest was watching Kelly Slater (who is like my huge celebrity crush) charge this 30ft face and surf three breaks all the way to the beach and score a 98 out of 100.  It was the craziest thing I have ever seen.  We stayed through about three heats and then hit the slow road home because some of the people we were with needed to go to class.  Oh can I just say that no one in Oahu went to work or school that morning?  The entire island stopped to watch this event. 

  Anyways so the group I was with was awesome.  We went out to late breakfast because we had all been up since 3am and then drove around the east coast of the island because the traffic was sooo bad going west.  I had such a great time and the people I was with couldn’t have been cooler.  Its funny how when you do cool things you meet cool people…

 I knew Emily’s friend Hiro before but this was the first time I met his roommate Al.  Turns out that Al is all about bringing me around the island.  Last night he invited me to go Polynesian rowing with him.  It was amazing.  He is part of a club that actually competes but they let newbies come along for the ride anytime they want.  There were sooo many people there and Al left me to go with the more experienced group.  So I was with 12 people I didn’t know paddling a canoe down a dark canal under the stars.  It was kinda perfect.  We went about 2 miles to the bay and then came back.  It was hard but I had a blast.  Met a ton of cool people and did something I had never tried before. 

 So in summation of this really long post I’m having a great time and meeting a ton of cool people.  I will post more when Rob gets here on Saturday!  

Come on!!

Now that my life is about as interesting as a televised golf tournament, I have decided to try to start blogging again.  This was spurred by the fact that I'm bored and my blog hosting site just sent me my sites statistics.  Did you know that an average of 10 people a day view this blog?  And thats way way down since I left Peace Corps when it was up at like 70-80.  THATS CRAZY!!  

We all know how much I love to talk about myself anyways so this is going to be an experiment in patience.  I haven't written on this in awhile so quick update.  Lets see...  Well the beach house is still here.  I know that because I at the beach house.  I have taken full advantage of the kitchen, cable, beach, and farmer's market.  i cook everyday and try to bake something at least every other day.  Most of the baking is done for the dogs but Lizzy and I are enjoying some chocolate cupcakes that I made.  Mom claims that no one should cook or eat as much as I do.  Thanks mom!  Luckily for me I have a strong ego and when ever I feel like I'm eating too much I just picture Vegas staring at my stomach.  

I have also been traveling and visiting friends.  I was in New York for about 5 days a couple of weeks ago and then last weekend I went down to St louis to visit rob.  New York was amazing.  I saw all my old PC friends and we talked about how hard it is to find a job.  Seriously people i love myself soo much how can no one else love me even a little?!?  I'm still in the job search obviously.  New Orleans didn't work out because of the salary so now Im on the hunt.  So if anyone knows of any animal related jobs out there that will pay not only for me to eat but also my animals let me know.

St Louis was awesome.  We went to a Cardinals game and sat in the third row behind the third base line.  Now some of you may or may not know but Im not a huge baseball fan.  My family on the other hand knows all the stats for the White Sox and my mom gets physically ill when the game gets intense.  They go to all the games they can and for the most part sit in bad seats because they go to so many games.  So it was kinda like slipping a knife into my mom and my sisters stomachs when they found out where we were sitting.  We ate tons of food and it was a beautiful day on top of it.  

So basically my life right now is watching The Office and walking the dogs while my mom decorates the house for Christmas.  Oh I didn't mention that our beach house is on the Michiana Humane Society house tour.  That means that about 600 people are paying for tickets to view our house in all it's christmas splendor.  Needless to say our mom is going crazy right now.  There are christmas trees everywhere and everything that isn't green and red has been taken out of the house.  Did I mention that its cold now?  Yeah there was a reason I wanted to be out of here by now.  I hate the cold.  Ok well i hope to write more and post some pics of what I have been cooking!

Happy Birthday Martha

The 4th of July isn't just Americas Independence day its also my baby's birthday!!!  This year Martha turned 5!  I cant believe how old she is and i cant believe that i missed another birthday.  But she did have her friend buddy over and I heard she got to hang out with a new friend Marley from NYC.  I miss her so much and I know you all think I am crazy but still I wish I could have been there.  Over here I celebrated the 4th by hanging out with my friends Colleen and Bernard.  They just got back from a trip to Cape Verde and decided to put up with me on the 4th.  We grilled at 6 and just chilled out.  We made Quinao salad and girlled veggie skewers and Bernard made a huge burger.  It was a nice chill 4th.  Other than that I am just chilling in dakar trying to suffer through my physical theropy. 

PT consists of me going five days a week to the nicest little Lebanese woman.  The problem though is that it is super painful.  She uses an ultra sound machine on my hand and wrist for about 20 min to break off the calcium from my bones.  I guess my bones have some high density issues.  Anyways it feels like she is trying to break my bones from the inside out.  I have to stop her about 5 times during it to take a break.  Then i go through a series of exercises that arnt that bad.  I did get my MRI results back on Friday.  I have a couple of cysts in my wrist that are causing the majority of the pain.  So on Monday I think i start to get steroid injections for the tendinitis and collagen injections for the cysts.  Not quite sure though.  I am starting to feel quite at home in this city and its going to be really weird to go back to the village after being away for almost a whole month.

I called my family to tell them that I am stilled alive and my sister told me that they planted the beans of the season.  I am bummed cause I was supposed to have a plot of land to farm.  Oh well I really want to be able to move my wrist again so I guess I need to fix this first.  And yesterday I got the first call ever from my village.  My counterpart called me to see how I was and to ask when they were supposed to pay back the micro finance.  I love that she is concerned about that. 

Well other than that I am just hanging out and trying not to go crazy with boredom.  I need books cause the books here are all books that I wouldn't read.  I just read a 500 page one today and its not even 2pm.  Love you all and hope you all had a great 4th!

Testing my mantra

Yesterday was my one year anniversary in country as many of you know.  I was planning on heading back to the village to get a few days of work done there before I had to head back to dakar for a regional meeting.  I wake up at the crack of dawn and start getting dressed.  Then i move all my valuables from my bigger bag that gets put int he trunk of the sept place to my purse that I keep with me.  And that is the moment that I realize my camera was stolen the night before!!  I know trust me i know.  So this is how it went down. 

I was staying at the regional house with 6 other volunteers and at 6pm we all left the house together to go to happy hour.  At 8 my friend Joey came home and realized that 30mil was stolen from the bottom of her bag.  When I got home at midnight I went right to bed and it wasn't till the next day I realized my camera was gone.  I freaked out and woke up everyone in the house to look through their stuff.  Then i went to talk to the guards to ask if they had seen it.  What I was really asking was if they wanted to have a chance to give it back or if they wanted me to call the safety and security adviser for peace corps.  The bad thing is that our guards all have different shifts so when i woke up int he morning freaking out I had to deal with my fav guard.  So then I called Etienne our safety and security person.  He of course freaked out about the money and my camera.  I was balling at this point because this was like a one two punch this week.  Early in the week I learned that my journal was stolen or taken on accident from the same house.  I know I know.  So as I am crying on the phone with Etienne all i can think about is how its my one year in country and all my stuff from that year is being erased.

After having Etienne talk to the guards we search the whole house.  Its then that we realize that food was also taken out of the fridge.  A sandwich a couple of oranges and a yogurt.  So this person came into the house when he or she knew no one was home and then took a bit to eat while wandering through the house looking through our bags.  It makes my stomach turn knowing that i don't feel safe in a place where i am supposed to go when i am stressed out by normal life here.  Joey and I then had to go to the police station twice and sit there for hours as we answered questions about the robbery.  I think the fact that it was a jail that reeked of urine was just the icing on the cake of the day. 

I spoke with Etienne multiple times that day and I know he is going to try to fix the situation with security at the house but there its slim to none that i am getting my camera back.  I don't even care about the camera i mean i can replace that.  The reason i got the one that i did when i was in Houston was cause i was incapable of making a decision so i just got the same one i had before.  The thing i want back is my memory card.  I mean those are my photos since Oct.  I have my womens group first lettuce harvest on that, my kids concert, my gamou photos, and most importantly the pics of phoenix.  And this is after trying to deal with the fact that my journal was taken.  I mean who takes a journal?????  It had maybe ten pages empty and it only holds value to me.  AHHHHHHHH

So now i am stuck in dakar for what seems like the rest of my life.  I have to have a meeting with Etienne and since i have another meeting next week it doesn't make sense to go all the way back to my ville.  But the day did start to turn around.  Justin came over to the house and we watched some of his precious dvds that he never lets out of his site.  Then i found rice crispies cereal in the boutique.  I have developed an addiction to that cereal and i hadn't been able to find it in all of dakar for a week.  Amy just happen to call me yesterday and I haven't talked to her since before her Spain trip.  And then the icing one the cake.... I got a call from Thomas who is in NOLA and he said I have someone that wants to talk to you and it was Shelly from the LA/SPCA!!!  He was at the SPCA booth at the St Patty's parade and he knew i would love to talk to some of my friends.  Shelly sounded great and asked me when I was coming back cause they all missed me.  Really it was perfect.  I went back to finish a movie with Justin and Ashley and I couldn't stop smiling.  And if that wasn't enough Sandy's brother came into town just for the night and gave me a massage cause he is in Physical therapy school.  Great.  So my day did turn around a little but its proving to be a true test to stick with my It could always be worse mantra.  Well i will be here forever so i will blog later love you all

Loss

It is my sad news to report that my beloved Phoenix passed away yesterday during her spay surgery.  To say that I am upset would be like saying you didnt know me.  I miss her more than words can say and I feel so much guilt for having put her in the situation in the first place.  I am seriously considering coming home.  Everyone I would appreciate it if you would keep you 2 cents to your self as I am pretty sure I am a 24 year old who can make up her own mind.  Miss everyone and hug your pets for me

Doc Visit

So i got to see a doc and he said that my injury is caused by a combination of diet and too much activity.  So now I have to figure out how to cut salt out of my diet (impossible cause i never eat senegalese food as it is) I have to get dumb bells made in my village to strengthen my wrist and i have to wear wrist braces.  I am going to go back to the village on Sat though so I am really excited about that.  I cant wait to see Phoenix!!!!!

I also cant wait to explain to my brother that I need him to make me dumbells.  That should be lots of fun.  Well guys this might be the last posting for awhile.  I have loved being in Dakar and being able to respond to so many emails so quickly.  That i will miss.  I think tonight I am going to make a huge salad and try to do the same tomorrow.  If its possible I think i have oded on pastries.  Ok well I will be back in dakar around valentines day because of WAIST and I have to do some follow up work with the doctor.  So if you dont hear from me till then know that is cause I am in my village trying to get some work done.  Love you all and talk to u soon!

stuck

well i am currently stuck in dakar trying to figure out whats wrong with my wrist.  normally this wouldnt be suck a bad thing cause dakar means hot water, good food, and friends but I am too stressed out about leaving phoenix to enjoy any of it.  i mean i have almost been gone a week!!!  ahhh!!!  tomorrow my jica volunteer is going to check on her to make sure she is ok.  i called my brother today and he said she was fine but who knows.  its so much harder now that i have a dog.  so today I went to a dog store in dakar.  i was really excited cause its not like we have pet stores here.  well it was basically a room with a lot of dog food in in and some collars that cost about 18 bucks. 

well the new office is open now so i hope to go and use that tomorrow so i can use the computers there and maybe put up some more pics.  love you all sorry my life in boring right now.

Heaven

hello everyone!  I am currently in Dakar trying to get some med stuff done and taking a much needed break.  I will be here longer than expected because the peace corps office is moving and they have to send me a specialist for a problem with my hand.  So i will be posting many fun and interesting stories...or i hope to.  I love you all and thank you so much for your words of support.  Pape is doing fine and i hope that was my last trip to the hospital here for a long long time!

'Tis the Season in My Hut

I just want to throw out a big Thank You to the United States post office that made all of this possible.  Well since I have gotten back from Dakar I have received many Christmas/Birthday packages and I have been spacing them out so that I have something besides sand to look forward to.  Well today is my birthday and I am in linguere to work on the radio show.  So since I had to leave really early this morning to get here I opened my moms birthday package yesterday.  I am so glad I did cause look at what I did to my hut!!! Yep thats a Christmas tree complete with a star a tree skirt, gifts, and an advent calender!  Let me tell you Martha S has nothing on a bored Peace Corp Volunteer.  So this all occured because I opened my birthday package a day early and in it my mom had included a piece of garland.  Well I was looking around my hut trying to figure out where I was going to hang it when it occured to me that I live in Africa and thus could do anything I wanted to do with this garland.  So I set off on a search throughout my compound for pieces of wood and sticks to fashion myself a tree frame that I would then drape the garland over.  The hardest thing to find was the cinder block to hold it all up.  And to get the wood snug I used one of my many plastic bags that my mom continues to send me in packages.  Then I had to make a tree skirt because we all know it wouldnt be complete without one so that was next.  The star was easy and for decorations i used Jelly Belly ribbons and a broken bin bin.  But i bet you all are wondering what I made the wonderful looking gifts out of.  For those I need to send out a huge THANK YOU to the Wawros and Melanie and Mark.  Those are real presents.  From America presents.  I am not sure you realize but its going to be hard to open them cause they will never be that new or clean ever again.

My whole family has been admiring my new Christmas theme and they keep asking me what am I going to do with the presents.  So I tell them I am going to open them.  But whats inside and what are you going to do after? they ask.  Well I don't know whats inside so I cant tell you what I am going to do with them after but I am not giving them to you.  This is the conversation that I have about 20 times a day.  They cant get over that there is something inside that I don't know what it is.  Its been a test of my wolof and patience to try to continue to explain.  But the point is that I have a great family and this is all possible because of them.  Thank you Mom, Beth, and Melanie for everything that you have sent!!!

Moving on from the wonderfulness that is Christmas in my hut, I have some random village news.  One is that my JICA volunteer threw the best malaria seminar ever and now everything I do in my village will be compared to that.  I will put up pics eventually but basically it was a skit with Senegalese people about how one person got malaria and what happened and what he should have done.  There was probably about 150 to 200 people there and best of all they were all laughing.  My dad the village chief is the most stoic guy ever and he was cracking up.  It was so great to see them so engaged.  I think we are going to try to do it again before the start to the next rainy season.

In animal news its the start to kid season!!!  so there are tons of baby goats around and they are basically the cutest thing ever.  Steven and I are in a argument about wither goat babies or baby sheep are cuter.  In my opinion goats beat sheep no questions asked but I guess to each their own.  Anyways so my sister maggote who is a super woman, is friends with the herder so if a goat gives birth in the fields and they don't know who the mom is they bring the baby to maggotte.  Which really means they bring the goat to me.  The other day they brought me a preemie goat that my sister named Thomas and I bottle feed him for two days before he died.  It was sad but he is in a better place than Senegal.  Everyone thought it was so ridiculous that I was bottle feeding him cause they were just going to let him die but for those of you that really know me you know that nothing could have made me feel more at home than holding that little guy and trying my hardest to give him a fighting chance. In other sad news Amy miscarried so there wont be any little Amy's running around.  Its ok though cause she was too little to be a mom anyways, she still nurses off her own mom!  All in all there are tons of wide eye little goats running around and they all think that Phoenix is the cutest thing and then Phoenix gets scared and its really funny.  That is in a funny i live in Africa and this is what i find funny kind of way.

Family news.  Ok so Friday is tabaski which means tons of eating ie killing of rams, and tons of family in town.  i don't mean that we kill the family.  ok what ever leave me alone i don't speak English let alone write in English.  So everywhere you look people are getting ready either by getting new clothes made or by washing all their good dishes.  I am not that thrilled cause I don't find ram appealing but I am excited cause my sister might be coming back.  Xaj is my younger sister in law who had a baby just days before I came to the village.  She has been gone since I was in IST and rumor has it that she will be coming home for the holiday.  But i have been asking for awhile and no one seems to know.  So the other day me and my sister had some time alone and I started grilling her about why xaj has been gone so long and finally she told me that she was having problems with her husband aka my brother.  Thats really sad but at the same time i don't really like that brother either so i can see her point.  But I really want her to come home so I have someone else to hang out with and maggotte gets some help.  Which brings me to the point of my loser sister.  Fati is the sister that is trying to repopulate Africa all by herself.  She moved back home after her husband died of malaria.  And until a couple of days ago I didn't really have a problem with her except that she doesn't help maggotte.  Well the other day she told me how she cant wait to move back to Dakar where they have nice jewelry and fabric.  And what might you ask is she doing with her five kids that live with me?  oh shes leaving them with her elderly parents to take care of cause she just cant live in the village anymore its just too dull and there arnt enough nice things.  I just hate her.  Then the next day she has the nerve to ask me for money!  ahhhhh!!!!!

Anyways other than my loser sister life in the ville is good.  I am doing another painting project at the school and working on getting all the mud stoves finished.  Today is my birthday so I am in linguere to celebrate with friends and tomorrow we are recording our second radio show.  So work is good and life is good.  Miss you all and wish I were back but in time I will be.  Everyone eat some good food for me!!!