This is nearly my 100th post, and I'm still not sure if I've captured Kin the way I see it. Surely it is a monumental task. Adding to it is the fact that there isn't a consistent image or experience. Life here seems viewed through a fluid, molten mask that offers an ever changing perspective based upon so many arbitrary details.
What I noticed most about my return was the darkness. As we drove along the candlelit streets, I felt enveloped in darkness. It was not just without but also seemed to seep within to my very core. I could feel it changing me. When I returned home, my house appeared too dimly lit. I turned on as many lamps as possible with no relief. I found it difficult to adjust. Even the daylight did nothing to alleviate the sense of closing in and closing down. The sky brightened only to a mellow gray, never revealing the warmth of its sun or the blue promise of hope. Returning felt a bit dismal.
But with some reflection, I now view this as a necessary transition to a slower pace. One I was less aware of on my first arrival. This was not a new trip, filled with awe inspiring images and unique experiences. This was a return. There was a rhythm waiting to find me and welcome me home. I needed to slow down to hear the songs around me. I needed quiet lights that would not blind me from the magic and the messages resonating from the earth, the air, the very space and time and moment that I occupied.
Here life requires a different way of interacting with the world, a softer, gentler pace. It is a way of being that cringes under the harsh, flourescent brightness of artificial light. It was a drastic contrast to the me that had existed only a day before.
Even now after four weeks, I am still adjusting. Before I left Africa, I was full of fervor- painting, drawing, writing. Music pushed me to an emotional edge that I happily tumbled over. Upon my return, I have yet to dissolve into that timeless void of creativity taken hold. In an effort to stay the isolation and lonliness that frequently plagued me last year, I've filled my days with work and obligations and occasional social visits that leave me longing for solitary reflection and contemplation.
I'm still working on the balance. A neighbor asked me to drive her to the vet this morning and I had time for reflection while I waited in the car. Everything I saw came as pages in a sketchbook and my fingers ached for a pencil, a piece of charcoal, anything to scratch with.
It was a moment to become reacquainted with the Africa that enchants me and the part of myself that is free enough to be enchanted. I watched a young girl learning to balance an empty bucket. As it began to tilt to the side, she stooped, careened, caught it and turned the whole thing into a dance step. She was clearly enjoying herself. When she returned with the bucket full of water, she did not lose her playfulness and managed a bright and cheerful grin at passersby who caught her in the act of dance and practice.
I watched the early morning routines, washing and brushing, taking place outside as they do in Africa. It is the dark interiors and lack of running water that bring families out to prepare for their day. Nothing is hidden. It is the openness and unabashed frankness of the routines that speaks to the timid, shy part of myself. The part that prefers to hide away in brooding silence. There is no space for that here and I let it wash over me, a welcome nourishing rain of acceptance and being.
I saw a young boy sauntering down the road, combing his hair and feeling good. I watched a father and his sons run up and down the hill, getting in their morning excercise. Two little girls were playing a game that consisted of climbing up the rocky side of their porch without holding on and trying not to fall backward. They jumped and grinned and pantomimed with energy and passion, congratulating each other on their accomplishment. When they ran over to some discarded potato chip bags, I could not tell if they were cleaning or using the refuse for play. One of the girls abandoned the task to carry a jerry can of water to the porch. Her body drooped and sagged with the weight of it, but she shuffled along until she could deposit the load. She returned to her friend, silvery bags now forgotton, and the two girls ran off holding and pulling each other, giggling with conspiracy, chip bags left in their dusty wake.
To accompany this festival, across the street an older boy stood propped against a lamppost. I couldn't have waited for more than 15 minutes but he sang (to me?) the entire time. He had a sweet, deep voice that was the perfect backdrop for the small bits of daily life that played so poignantly before me. Beside him two younger boys dissected flaps of cardboard, inspecting their strength and potential. With a final slap, one of the boys gathered his cardboard and glided up the hill, singing in a voice completely at odds but some how complimentary to the original serenader.
I don't know what it is about these simple scenes that tug at me and seduce me so. I wanted to remain, caught up in their comings and goings. Caught up in my obserations. Completely lost in the state of simply being.
