so. here i am back in the states, waiting on VISA proceedings; the earliest ponge can get here is august. while im actually glad to have a little time to adjust to my country on my own terms before he gets here, i didnt want that much time. but what can one do, on vive avec (one lives with it). yesterday we had a little get together at my house and some of ponges relatives happen to live in madison (life is stranger than fiction) so they stopped by. it was nice to speak french and wolof again, but it was odd when they came up the porch into the house and didnt say "asalaam malekuum," though im sure they are used to not saying it to non-muslim americans. ponges cousin is married to the chief of police, im not sure how i feel about that. i doubt it would ever get me any leverage if i needed it and people do occasionally smoke pot at my house so i guess they'll have to be careful about where in case they decide to drop on by.
my mom seems to be demonstrating her new passion for politics in yard signs, things pasted to windows, and bumper stickers. that last one is a shocker, never saw her put anything on one of her cars in my whole life. she and her friends have lots of plans for me to join street theater, teach them how to stilt, get involved in the madison area peace coalition and etc. cant say as i mind, getting involved will probably stave off the sadness i feel at having left the life i'd created in senegal. nothing to do now but create a new one here.
maybe that explains this sense i have that something inside me that i used to have is missing. i feel really..dull or something. and i was right about how i was going to feel disconnected from people that were speaking and instead be thinking about why it is that they think how they do, analyzing their behaviors. this is not all the time, just sometimes.
i feel like ive changed in some drastic ways that i cant put my finger on and yet ive stayed exactly the same. i mean, there are some really simple things like clothing and music taste. but clothing and music, for me, has always been very deeply tied to my identity so thats actually probably a deeper sign than i would initially tend to think of it as.
i am in the process of re-exploring my music, less than half of which i was able to find. i suspect my brother may have the rest. this synthesis of the culture i was in and the culture i am in, where will it lead? will there be a happy medium? this is something i always seek, and usually manage to obtain for periods of time though they may be brief as new information is forever entering the equation.
i dont know where any of my things are and i dont know if it matters. they are all in boxes and i dont even remember whats in them. i lived without all that shit, do i really need it again? why do i have stacks of boxes and a computer and a microwave, toaster, two stereos? and this is not even that much shit for a 22 year old who lived on her own for four years to possess. imagine if my mother and i didnt get along, id be at a friends house right now scrambling for a job instead of being pampered and tapping away at a machine the useless information that fifteen people find interesting for some reason.
not that i am not looking to get a job, its just less frantic for the instant. i can get my paper done first and then do my resume then look. oh the paper. what a mess.
so honorine had a little party for ponge and i and the other 6 MSID students the night before i left. i was not yet done with this paper so i called her and said, honorine there is no way that i will finish this paper if i come to the party. and she said well just come for a couple hours. i said no you dont understand. i need those couple hours, the paper will not be done if i go. and she said well kelly, this party is for you, you have to come. so we talked and she said i should just come and we would call professor sene and it would all be cool; he would let me finish the paper later. so i went and had a good time but we never called sene.
i went to WARC the next day (the day i left senegal) and went to talk to sene. i recounted the story for him and he got really angry. he said i should have called him because there is no way he would have ever told me to attend a social event instead of doing the work i was there to do. he had every right to fail me on the paper. i tried to say that i didnt have his number anymore and i trusted honorine to know what he would have thought, especially since hed been sick. he was offended at this and went on about how he was the academic director while honorine was not at all qualified to tell me such things.
so then after going through this and a few other issues, he told me he wasnt going to punish me. but i had to call honorine in the office and say what i had just said in front of her and him at the same time because she had not mentioned that the question was party or paper, only that with the wedding and everything i wasnt able to get the paper done. only i couldnt tell her anything, i just had to call her in. so she asked me what he said when i told her we had a meeting with him and all i could say was that he wanted to see us both at the same time. it was kind of like lying to her, but i didnt really know what the hell else to do.
so i looked at the floor while i recounted the story for professor sene in front of honorine, knowing she was going to get into trouble for covering me. we really should have talked about what we were going to say in advance, but we didnt and i tend to be honest so there you are. he went off on her for awhile about how this was the biggest mistake she had ever made and social events should never ever come before the work i was there to do and if he were to give me an F where would the responsibility be? wouldnt it lie with her as she pushed me to come instead of doing my work? well i dont know that i agree with that, i think she does hold some responibility but definitely not all. in any case she tried to say how i should have had my paper done already anyway (i cant really blame her for trying to save her own ass, wasnt that what i had just done?) and he said that was irrelevant. the point at which i explained that there was choice a: paper and choice b: party, she should have absolutely said paper.
he told me he wanted to talk to her in private then, and that was the last time i saw either one of them. kind of an ass way to say goodbye.
