I often get asked on what I'm doing next year. I go back and forth about staying out here all the time. Life is hard out here. The kids are a challenge, the conditions are hard, and I often feel like I'm missing out on so much. Already I've missed two weddings and the birth of a best friend's baby. And then there's Restaurants! Friends! Happy hours! Movies! Laughing! Gym! High speed internet! Haircuts! I mean I know I don't need all of these things in my life, but goodness you have no idea how much you appreciate them until they are completely unavailable.
Friday was a hard day for me. I got chewed out by a mom who said she's going to take me to the schoolboard in hopes of me going down because I didn't let her child go to the bathroom. Seriously. The child asked at 3:15 and I told her she could wait until after school (which was at 3:30). I explained to the mom that we have scheduled bathroom breaks throughout the day and got handed a new one for not letting children go at their own free will. I would much rather let kids just go when they needed, but these children can't handle the freedom of it. We have to take breaks so they have some sort of schedule and continuity in their life or else they would play in the bathroom all day. Everyone's told me not to worry about it, but it's like I work my butt off and this is how I get treated? I get to listen to a mom yell at me for ten minutes because her child decided to run home after school and not use the perfectly suitable restroom right outside our classroom? I know I should expect these things to happen, but I was definitely frustrated. Now I have to document every time this child asks me to go to the bathroom and write down if I let them or not and all this other stuff.... because in my classroom - where the kids can barely read (nine children read at a 16 words per minute or lower) - I should be worrying about documenting bathroom times and not focusing on if they can read the word 'cat' apparently. Thank you student's mom.
So that was my Friday. And I found out that meth has hit our village... and NANA checks come out - the checks for native people. They were $1500 per person this year and most people out here have at least four children (one of my kids has 20 other siblings - seriously - needless to say not all by the same woman who he's married too... but still... 21 kids throughout this tiny village!), so just imagine all the money flowing through here. This means they're going to buy meth and snow-go the 20 miles to Kiana - a village that voted to go 'wet' and be able to sell alcohol in October- and most parents are going to be wasted for days on end. I'm so nervous for all my young ones. But I have a life out here - and friends - and I'm just not sure if I'm ready to leave it all yet.
The culture out here is to 'drink until you pass out drunk - so many of the high school students see/do this... and the few that do go to college often come back because this mentaility keeps them from being able to excel. It's such a different world here... I just feel like there are so many incredible 'social justice' things I could be doing with my students, but their priorities right now are obviously reading and math.. and I often wonder if my abilities are better suited somewhere else... but then I look around at all the injustices here and I know that right now, at this very moment, I am exactly where I am meant to be. And that's a great feeling, you know?
To know that at this very moment, you are exactly where you're meant to be is an indescribable feeling.. And I know that in two weeks, when I am getting off the plane and hugging my family and friends - that is exactly where I'm meant to be and that I am home.
cheers to finding your place in life, whereever that may be,
Cristina
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