Leave it to me to walk into an outdoors equipment store two weeks before I fly to Africa and expect to find sandals, here in Pennsylvania, in February. I guess I just forgot that it's 30 degrees outside here, has been for months, and will be for another month at least. It's 70-something in Dakar right now, and that's where my head is. Well, that's one of the places it is. It's also still in Portland, with friends I left last week; in Boston, with my sister I saw a few days ago; and in Philadelphia, with my other sister I'll see this weekend. I don't know that I've ever felt pulled in so many directions before. I must say it's easy to get distracted. But even if I still have to go to the eye doctor to get new glasses tomorrow, file my taxes, visit possibly both my grandmothers - who live on opposite sides of the state - and go to the AT&T store to talk to an actual live person to get them to stop my cell phone service (because I can't for the life of me find an actual number to call listed on their website), my major remaining concern is packing.
I went to the mall today to do some scouting: checking out things I might want to get to take with me, do some price comparisons, see what's out there. The whole idea of packing for two years is hard to wrap my head around. I think it will help if I can just grasp the fact that it can't be done. I mean, I won't for the entire two years only use what I take. I will inevitably add to it while I'm there, it's not like I'll be camping in the wilderness. So my paralyzing fear that I won't be able to find and take everything I need is one that can be gotten over. I will take many good and useful things. I won't be able to take everything I want to take. I can buy things there. It will be ok. Breathe.
The whole trip to the mall today, however, didn't help soothe my anxiety any. I stumbled around for a few hours, consulted the store directory several times, and narrowly avoided being trampled by oblivious teenagers only to return to my car feeling bewildered and slightly annoyed. I understand the mentality behind grouping many shops together for the easy consumption of shoppers, but standing in the center of that giant circus and watching the crowds hustle past, I realized that I feel less stressed about getting on a plane to go to a completely foreign country for two years than I do about trying to buy clothes at the mall. Ok, maybe not "less" stressed... but it's a different stress. A less artificially-created, evil-genius-masterminded, dehumanized one. But what can I say? Right now, oh Suburban American Shopping Mall, I need you. So soon I will return.
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2 comments:
It looks like you're already experiencing the culture shock people get when returning home after even brief periods across oceans. That building wasn't there before, was it? Where is Main Street anyway, didn't I always know that before?
Can't wait to hear your experiences with the OTHER culture shock, the one that comes form gonig to a less stuff-dependent world.
So I had that mall trip today and had entirely the same feelings...anxiety about packing and leaving while being overwhelmed with everything, all at once. It's a relief to know that I'm not the only one thinking this as we prepare for Staging and then Senegal.
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