Endless Summer II
Sometimes I feel saner and more cheerful than what I write here; sometimes less. Now is less. This is the kind of work that breeds apathy. I'm not on the front lines. I don't meet the people that our organization is building houses for. I don't see the houses that are being built. I'm behind a barrier. I'm in an office. A room in which I spend a more than seven hours a day on most work days. The air is toxic there; intra-office and inter-agency politics and drama brews thick in heavy vats, with some from the adjacent church office spilling over into our space. Time dilation occurs near the speed of light and in church offices. Hours pass more slowly than common sense would deem possible. Two months I have been here and I have aged months beyond that.
There is no sense of accomplishment when the brochure I laid out is finally printed. When I'm finally finished with the website redesign, the site will look vastly improved compared to the original - not professional-level design, but adequate, and better than the hackery of the old site. My projects, like Eliot's world, end with a whimper. From the website ostensibly to the newsletter, but very soon I'll likely be moving from anything that might be considered interesting to purely busywork, or to manual labor.
This weekend I spent time with the other YAVs at Feliciana Retreat Center in nowhere Louisiana. Friday was spent in mandatory silence. I usually don't find silence particularly difficult, though this must be untrue for my new year resolution for two years running (and, with 2008, inevitably a third) is to talk less, a resolution I fail miserably. I do not know if silence is golden, but with much of the superfluity stripped out, it gives one more room to listen: listen to others talking, listen to the world around one. On Saturday we could talk again. I was vulgar, crass, rude, in a friendly joking sort of way. If I had to draw the line, I would claim my 'humor' as a vice rather than a virtue. If I didn't like lines, I would say that it just was: it is part of me, for now, at least. It seems to be the source of some amusement for my peers. I can only hope so; it would be its only redeeming value.
My parents ask me what I want for Christmas, and I don't know. I could give you a story about living in coastal Louisiana and being confronted with poverty and homelessness and strife everyday, and tell you that this has made me realize that material things are immaterial. But this would be a lie: I work in an office. I rarely leave the church grounds, or even the building. The only thing i see every day is a computer screen with emails and code. I simply don't need anything (and I don't) or want anything, or my imagination is dulled such that I can't think of anything. I certainly don't know what I'm going to give anyone, because I can't afford shiny things and I'm ill-equipped to make anything. Maybe this year we can exchange Christmas for another holiday; something that doesn't require giving or receiving much of anything, but simply existing with people I love. Labor Day, perhaps. I will trade for Labor Day this year and two Christmases next year. That would solve one of my problems, but only one of them. And having heard from a thirdhand source about some of the stuff that goes down in these parts, my problems are luxuries.
There is no sense of accomplishment when the brochure I laid out is finally printed. When I'm finally finished with the website redesign, the site will look vastly improved compared to the original - not professional-level design, but adequate, and better than the hackery of the old site. My projects, like Eliot's world, end with a whimper. From the website ostensibly to the newsletter, but very soon I'll likely be moving from anything that might be considered interesting to purely busywork, or to manual labor.
This weekend I spent time with the other YAVs at Feliciana Retreat Center in nowhere Louisiana. Friday was spent in mandatory silence. I usually don't find silence particularly difficult, though this must be untrue for my new year resolution for two years running (and, with 2008, inevitably a third) is to talk less, a resolution I fail miserably. I do not know if silence is golden, but with much of the superfluity stripped out, it gives one more room to listen: listen to others talking, listen to the world around one. On Saturday we could talk again. I was vulgar, crass, rude, in a friendly joking sort of way. If I had to draw the line, I would claim my 'humor' as a vice rather than a virtue. If I didn't like lines, I would say that it just was: it is part of me, for now, at least. It seems to be the source of some amusement for my peers. I can only hope so; it would be its only redeeming value.
My parents ask me what I want for Christmas, and I don't know. I could give you a story about living in coastal Louisiana and being confronted with poverty and homelessness and strife everyday, and tell you that this has made me realize that material things are immaterial. But this would be a lie: I work in an office. I rarely leave the church grounds, or even the building. The only thing i see every day is a computer screen with emails and code. I simply don't need anything (and I don't) or want anything, or my imagination is dulled such that I can't think of anything. I certainly don't know what I'm going to give anyone, because I can't afford shiny things and I'm ill-equipped to make anything. Maybe this year we can exchange Christmas for another holiday; something that doesn't require giving or receiving much of anything, but simply existing with people I love. Labor Day, perhaps. I will trade for Labor Day this year and two Christmases next year. That would solve one of my problems, but only one of them. And having heard from a thirdhand source about some of the stuff that goes down in these parts, my problems are luxuries.