Seeking beauty
I loved my life in Haiti. Three sunny years in the Artibonite learning Creole, eating local rice and planting trees often simultaneously with climbing mountains. Then two years in Port au Prince teaching everything I learned from the countryside and my friends there, swimming with Gabriela, learning Haitian folklore dance, climbing every mountain I could get to, and eating copious amounts of watercress. It did not take me five years to find the most beautiful places and people in Haiti. And then I continued to visit them and bring beautiful things home to adorn my house and/or make our mouths water.
I have friends who live in concrete houses in the suburbs of Port au Prince. I know people who drive their cars everywhere including spending hours in traffic. I know people who write reports and lead evaluations.
I worked at a school in Carrefour (which is where gravity and rain beaches the garbage of Port au Prince that doesn't make it into a dumpster) for several months. I have been to and through Cite Soleil. I have waited more then an hour in the back of a taptap...I've even fallen out of a taptap! But this afternoon picking these strawberries made me wonder if It's okay well if it's good enough to go around seeking beauty. I am a little jealous of people who can work in ugly environments and even get there by car. Will I learn this someday? I am between wanting everyone to seek beauty like I do and wanting to be more functional in environments that lack or appear to lack the elements of beauty that I seek. In the meantime I've decided that it is good enough to seek beauty- as long as it's on foot no, no as long as I'm supporting local businesses- okay okay seriously I think it is is good enough to seek beauty for itself period. Seeking beauty means that you have hope of finding it and that you are up for the challenge of defining it. Seeking beauty.
I loved my life in Haiti. Three sunny years in the Artibonite learning Creole, eating local rice and planting trees often simultaneously with climbing mountains. Then two years in Port au Prince teaching everything I learned from the countryside and my friends there, swimming with Gabriela, learning Haitian folklore dance, climbing every mountain I could get to, and eating copious amounts of watercress. It did not take me five years to find the most beautiful places and people in Haiti. And then I continued to visit them and bring beautiful things home to adorn my house and/or make our mouths water.
I have friends who live in concrete houses in the suburbs of Port au Prince. I know people who drive their cars everywhere including spending hours in traffic. I know people who write reports and lead evaluations.
I worked at a school in Carrefour (which is where gravity and rain beaches the garbage of Port au Prince that doesn't make it into a dumpster) for several months. I have been to and through Cite Soleil. I have waited more then an hour in the back of a taptap...I've even fallen out of a taptap! But this afternoon picking these strawberries made me wonder if It's okay well if it's good enough to go around seeking beauty. I am a little jealous of people who can work in ugly environments and even get there by car. Will I learn this someday? I am between wanting everyone to seek beauty like I do and wanting to be more functional in environments that lack or appear to lack the elements of beauty that I seek. In the meantime I've decided that it is good enough to seek beauty- as long as it's on foot no, no as long as I'm supporting local businesses- okay okay seriously I think it is is good enough to seek beauty for itself period. Seeking beauty means that you have hope of finding it and that you are up for the challenge of defining it. Seeking beauty.
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