Plague

Posted 10:56 PM by Michelle



I would have left for Mauritania six weeks ago if I had joined Peace Corps. I would only be in my second month of training for the agro-forestry program I was supposed to head in rural Mauritania. I would still be in Nouakchott, the capitol, at the Peace Corps headquaters. This picture is from that city.

The truly ridiculous element of this plague is that it was caused by plentiful rain- desperately needed plentiful rain- that ended a drought and promised a healthy growing season, the first in years. Unfortunately, the rains blessed the locusts as well. I can only wonder what the agro-forestry Peace Corps folks are going to teach now, now that there won't be any crops. The farmers would be planting right now, but they are afraid they'd just be feeding the offspring of the current plague. Mauritania is one of the least, if not THE least developed countries in Africa, lacking any kind of development outside the capital city. It is infamous as being the hardest country in which to serve. Christ, I wonder what all those kids in the training camp are thinking right now.

I don't feel lucky to have missed it; I just feel more of the same wonderment as to what I would be doing over there right now, what my life would be like. Apparently right now I'd be buring tires and banging pots to keep the locusts away. Instead, I'm watching my cat attempt to wash himself even though he's wearing a lamp shade on his head.

Paralysis

Posted 9:31 PM by Michelle
I'm feeling like there is so much to do that I am unable to figure out where to begin. I feel like I'm trying to punch through marshmallow. I have so much to do at my job that sometimes it's all I can do to make a list, that only in the making of the list do I feel satisfied because actually getting to the things on the list seems impossible. I don't know how to do most of the stuff I'm supposed to do. I don't know how to write grants. I don't know how to create messaging. I don't know how to effectively run an organization that is dying on the vine.

When I try, when I really try, when I draw upon what I DO know, I'm sometimes successful, but it is exhausting. And then I procrastinate because I don't even know where to begin.

I have so many miles to run, literally, before I feel good about my body again, and I have no time nor money for a trainer who is wonderful but with whom I have yet to be successful, but it doesn't matter anyway, because I don't have any time or money.

And my poor, sweet cat had surgery today for a hematoma on his ear. Turns out that he's had ear mites for over a decade, but he scratches them so furiously and shakes his head with such violence that he's killed the mites off before they've been detected, but not before they've laid eggs. These mites have a very short life cycle in this turbulent atmosphere, but they've managed to adapt and procreate. Only because Fezzik was sedated were the vets able to go deep enough to find the eggs. Fezzik scratched hard enough to break a blood vessel, and then shook all the blood out into his ear tissue, which was so swollen today his ear was closed from within. They drained it, and stapled it, and now he has to wear an Elizabethan collar. Clearly, he's thrilled.





And now I'm listening to him crash around the apartment. My lithe, stealthy, fluid cat is now running into walls. He just discovered that if he shoves his face into a wine bottle he can scratch his ears. Which is exactly what he's not supposed to do.

Maybe it's just that I had meetings until 6 PM today, or that I spent hours at the vet, or that it's always hard come back after being in New York. Maybe it's that I have conflicted feelings about a number of people in my life. Maybe it's because my apartment is a mess and I'm broke and my cat just head-butted my wine fridge. Maybe it's because I don't feel like I'm fooling anybody. Maybe it's because the caliber of professional people within this valley is so utterly disappointing. Maybe it's because there is not one man in this state that I want to kiss. Or maybe it's just that I'm still jet-lagged and I should shut the fuck up and go to bed.