Loss, Loneliness, and Privilege…November 2013

Loja: mosaic of Simon Bolivar, "El Libertador" 

In a world where millions have left "home" to escape conflict, persecution, and/or famine, I am a privileged traveler.  Our pensions (tied to 34 combined years of teaching in Colorado) enabled us to choose Ecuador, where a low cost of living frees up funds for other uses.  It's been great fun to see new places and make new friends…aspects of the external journey.

Bill at Loja's Casa Sol, our favorite $2.50 almuerzo (lunch) spot

The internal journey, however, has been more difficult…coping, at times, with silence from family and friends, with the lack of purpose that can accompany "retirement," and with a heightened need for emotional support that even the best marriage cannot always sustain!

"In the difficult…journey, the self of the traveler is impoverished and reduced to its essentials," wrote Eric Leeds.  With reduction to essentials came awareness of my need for recognition and response from others, and my attachment to things.


Journal entry:  November 3, 2013

San Sebastian Church, where we worship in Loja

Trading silver for earthenware

Simply patterned earthenware pieces,
imperfect, with unglazed backs, adorn
my rough-hewn pine table in Ecuador.
I've left the ornate family silver behind
in the US; no point having something
so fine that could be stolen, and I want
to live with less if I can finally curb the
will to possess, the tendency to fill spaces.

The emptiness is an adjustment, however,
for not just fewer possessions but
diminished connections and more quiet
define my days.  In this new space there is
room to ponder the exit from a crowded
life that was not life-giving; and perhaps
in the silence I will find my way to a
simpler pattern of existence, grounded in
reflection, consuming less, creating more.



Back to Haiti…and Colorado

In early November Haitian friends emailed: "The Daughters of the King National Assembly is November 22-23 in Port-au-Prince, and we expect you to be there!"  We would be in Miami anyway, en route to Colorado to sort through goods we had decided not to ship to Ecuador, so I flew from Miami to Haiti with my friend Kyle Laws (from Pueblo) for a few days, and then joined Bill in Colorado for Thanksgiving.

During our 45" flight from Loja to Quito, I took this photo of Cotopaxi, the world's highest active volcano (19, 347 ft.).  It also has one of the world's few equatorial glaciers.  100 climbers attempt the summit each weekend.

With Kyle Laws and friends in Port-au-Prince

2nd DOK Haitian National Assembly:  affirming vows to pray, serve, evangelize

The trip to Haiti reconnected me with the women of St. Basile's Episcopal Church in Gonaives.  Together we explored ways to advance an income-generating project started a couple years earlier (Haitian Batik Project). More trips to Haiti were on the horizon.