Black and Blue. Red.

Sorry it's been so long, I'm at the Crooked Tree and I heard some girls talking about blogging so I ran to my car and got my journal. I might be a little rusty but here it goes:

It's now Tuesday morning and I'm beginning to adjust to the Nigerian way of life, namely the joy and thankfulness of little things. I missed AC and my car and Tex-Mex but I didn't want them (even now, August 11, I wish I was there, without the AC and without the meaningless comforts This American Life brings). That morning I stayed at the compound by myself. The Dwight Schrute family was busy and so was the rest of my group, and I wanted a few moments to gather the fragments of my mind. So I drew. I remember my favorite drawing of that day. It was a sad drawing but I suppose it spoke about my "inner self" or some bullshit like that:

I ripped a page out of my journal for my canvas and pulled three pens from my backpack. Black and Blue. Red. I took the blue pen and let my hand wander. It drew two monochromatic flowers, one using the positive space for the petals and the other using the negative space for the petals. The flowers were drawn in opposite corners (top left and bottom right) corners of the small piece of journal paper. Then I grabbed a black pen. I wrote down the lyrics of the Counting Crows song Miami, a song about getting close to somebody and then having the terror that, if you get too close, they will hurt you. Then I grabbed a red pen. I wrote down the lyrics of A Long December, also by the Counting Crows. The song is a melancholy reflection of the previous year and all its disappointments.  But it also looks forward to the next year with limited hope and desire for a better and more meaningful future. The lyrics with the red ink were diagonal in respect to the edges and the black-inked lyrics stood perpendicular to the vertical edges of the paper. It was a sad piece of work. When I was doing it I didn't really think about what I was doing, I just let my hand flow and my mind wander, and that is what popped out, and I even still have the paper if you would like to start bidding for it. 

When God's workers returned around lunchtime (Bumper, Papa, Cici, Audra etc...) we prepared to visit, for the last time, Gidan Bege. This was the Gidan Bege back in Jos, the first orphanage we visited in our tour. Faces and names--Samson, Silas, Musa--returned for both joy and pain. As we walked through the threshold into the cement courtyard the boys flooded into our arms. Their smiles humbled me. Lord why am I so selfish? We played football (soccer) for a bit and danced and sung and clapped and laughed, and then we had to say goodbye. But this was the first of several "goodbyes" that I had never experienced before. I'm only 18 and I'm not accustomed to breaking an embrace that might not be forged again in this life. I was saying goodbye to these dear boys possibly to never see them again. Before long I was sitting in the van, with the window half open staring at the orphan boy who had just helped me carry my backpack and his little friend (Musa) who carried my camera. I forced a smile. The crackling and crunching of the gravel beneath the tires splashed reality into my face like a bucket of water on a lazy sleeper. Goodbye boys.