Friday, April 27, 2012

If leaving is this hard, why do we keep doing it?

I cried a fair amount yesterday, but I mostly blame that on the women of El Jocote.  They kept tearing up when we went to their houses to say goodbye - so I did too.  This morning, I started crying when I gave Martha a hug goodbye, and kept crying until we were a good ways out of town.  I cried again when we saw Angela at the bus stop.  I cried a couple times on the bus, thinking about hugging Nubia goodbye, and waving goodbye to Estel, who was too shy or sad to even say goodbye for real.  I'll need to process a bit before I can write something about our experience for real, but for now, here are some views of our last visit to El Jocote:

The tiny shadow?  That means the sun is straight up.  That means it's hot.

Chocollito kisses for Gerald.

Visiting on the porch at Juan Valerio's house.

Too darn cute!

Doña Ines's mom shows off the garden one last time.

Showing the oldest students photos from the Stehekin school.

Preschoolers see the Stehekin presentation.

Our family.
 
Me with Felipe, Aracely, and their granddaughter.

Me and Jeff with Juan Valerio and Isabel.

We missed out on visiting one of our abuelitas, Santos - no one was home.

Leonarda building a house.

Estel and me.

Jeff and one of the Juanas with her new stove.

Us with Angela Fuentes, including her son Darwin, her daughter-in-law Brenda, her daughter Denia, and her grandkids Carlito and Angelito.

Jeff and Freddy, our new stove builder.



Yes, three pictures of Estel in a tree.  I'm going to miss her, and Julissa, too.

Me and Maricela with her new stove.

Maricela's entries for the ugly chicken contest.

Maricela and her new little girl.

Finally got a picture of Juana (the lady 10 days younger than me) - she's in the middle, and her four kids, Karen, Katherine, Jairo, and Norlan, are next to her.  Her sister is on the end, and another El Jocotian who works at her house a lot, Cruz, is on the other end.

Us and Cruz.

Us and the family we stayed with the most, from left: Ivania, Marta, and Tonio (and Tarzan the dog).

Leaving town.  At 5:30 am, everyone was up and going about their business, waving goodbye and watching me blubber.

Just you wait - soon enough, I'll be really excited about seeing my family, meeting my nephew, and getting back to the most beautiful home I could ever have in WA.  But for now, I'm still teary.

2 comments:

  1. How lucky you and Jeff are to have such wonderful new friends, Kate! And that, of course, is why it is so hard to leave them. When you get home there will also be tears, but of joy this time!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I always say I can cry at the drop of a hat. Take me to the airport and watch me cry as complete strangers bid farewell to each other. But this, dear Jeff and Kate, is a TRUE tear-jerker. I'd only cry harder if you decided to stay there and never come HOME. I love you both and am almost holding my breath till I see you again.

    ReplyDelete