I'd like to reflect for a moment on the process leading up to Peace Corps service. When I expresed frustration about the interminable wait for an assignment my recruiter reminded me that all over the world people are waiting, spending hours in lines, sitting on buses until there were enough riders to leave, watching for the rain to end or the rain to start. The message was that we Westerners need to acquire the patience required to wait. But there is a use for the time between application and the flight out. The wait to leave is about letting go. You can't leave without doing some of that.
Last week I entrusted my 13 year old dog Pete to the good care of my neice. I've had Pete since he was a pup. Letting go of him is the last in a long line of renunciations, both large and small, which began with the decision to volunteer. To say yes to PC service is to turn away from the other options which, in my case, retirement offered. I don't mean this to sound like a sacrifice. The PC was the best option, as far as I was concerned, and once I decided on it, there was no problem letting go of the others.
I let go of my house when I rented it, let go of the garden I had been bringing along, let go of the rooms I carefully decorated, let go of my kind neighbors, the mailman, the New York Times home delivery. Surprising how often a leave-taking brought a pleasant intimacy. The mailman and I had a long conversation about what each of us were doing with our lives. My tenants, a Rwandan family, and I became friends. I'm invited to Rwanda after I return from Nicaragua.
I had time for the Rwandan relationship to develop because I rented the house, for reasons too long to go into here, in June and staging is at the end of August. I left the house with 2 large suitcases, a backpack, a daypack and 4 cardboard boxes. And Pete. All this stuff was the prodect of a hurried removel from the house and indecision about what to bring. Luckily, homeless, Pete and I housesat for a month during which time I reduced my belonings to the contents of 2 suitcases, 2 packs and 2 boxes. I spent another week housesitting for another friend and after that week, I was down to 1 suitcase, one backpack, a daypack and two boxes. Now, two weeks before staging, I've gotten rid of the boxes. I'm culling through the suitcase to lighten the load. I have never felt better. Letting go is the best.
That's about stuff, however. Luckily, I don't have to let go of friends and family. Homeless for 2 months, I've had plenty of time to travel to see the people who matter most to me. They promise to write me. Some promise to come visit and I think they will. I don't have to let go of the people. We're just taking a break. Pete, however, is another matter. He's 13. That's a hard one.
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Friday, August 5, 2011
Cow Palace 1960
I am reading When The World Calls: The Inside Story of The Peace Corps and Its First Fifty Years by Stanley Meisler. I have 25 days till staging, not that I'm counting, and need a break from the do-it-yourself Spanish, the ESL reading, the books on Nicaraguan history and culture. Meisler's first chapter brings it all back, the germ of an idea Kennedy borrowed from others, notably Hubert Humphrey, and just mentioned at an impromptu talk to students at the University of Michigan, but which became articulated as a full blown policy initiative in a speech he gave at the Cow Palace in San Franciso on November 2, 1960. That speech is a major reason I'm waiting out my 25 days. Here's the story:
In the summer of 1960, I was a fifteen year old student at a Catholic high school in San Francisco. The Democaratic National Convention that year consumed my mother and me. She was the daughter of Irish immigrants who settled in Boston and she remembered the days when "Irish need not apply" for good jobs in her home city. John Kennedy and his nomination validated her, and more than that, thrilled her, and I caught her enthusiasm. We watched the convention late at night on our flickering black and white TV, late because of the time difference in California, late because the balloting went on and on, quite different from the way it is today, and the outcome was close and in doubt to the very end. When Kennedy got the nod, the wild jubilation on the small screen was mirrored there in our living room where my Mom and I hugged and jumped up and down. That nomination so moved me that the first chance I got I went to Democratic Party headquarters and volunteered.
I was assigned to the Youth for Kennedy group. We mainly stuffed envelopes. When school started, I kept up the volunteer work. All those volunteer hours paid off, because when Kennedy was due in San Francisco on November 2, a Tuesday one week before the election (and the day before my 16th birthday), I was asked to come along for the day with the group from headquarters. My job was to give out material to the press corps. I met Kennedy at the airport, literally met him, shook hands and then disappeared to provide the tired and cynical reporters with copies of the speech Kennedy would deliver that night.
We followed him around the city in the press buses as he gave one talk after another. I remember being impressed that he said the same things wherever he went--my first experience with the stump speech. The last stop was the Cow Palace. I was ushered in with the press to a section right below the lectern. I heard him announce the Peace Corps as a major policy initiative. I still have a yellowed copy of the speech. He began by promising arms reduction. He criticized the preparation of foreign service officers, the vast majority of whom had no language skills for the counties in which they served He then propose a "peace corps" (lower case in the original).
"...This would be a volunteer corps--and volunteers would be sought among talented young women as well--and from every race and walk of life. For this nation is full of young people eager to serve the cause of peace in the most useful way. I have met them on campaigns across the country. When I suggested at the University of Michigan lately that we need young men and women to give up a few years to serve their county in this fashion, the students proposed a new organization to promote such an effort. Others have indicated a similar response -- offering a tremendous pool that could work modern miracles for peace in dozens of under-developed nations...."
I was transfixed. I wanted to be one of those idealistic young volunteers. It's hard to believe now how positive the world felt in those few years at the beginning of the 60's before Vietnam and Watergate. Social progress seemed so possible as colonial powers lost their grip in the face of the struggles for independence and the American civil rights movement grew.
It took me some time to volunteer, but now, after a 50 year delay, there are only 25 days to go.
In the summer of 1960, I was a fifteen year old student at a Catholic high school in San Francisco. The Democaratic National Convention that year consumed my mother and me. She was the daughter of Irish immigrants who settled in Boston and she remembered the days when "Irish need not apply" for good jobs in her home city. John Kennedy and his nomination validated her, and more than that, thrilled her, and I caught her enthusiasm. We watched the convention late at night on our flickering black and white TV, late because of the time difference in California, late because the balloting went on and on, quite different from the way it is today, and the outcome was close and in doubt to the very end. When Kennedy got the nod, the wild jubilation on the small screen was mirrored there in our living room where my Mom and I hugged and jumped up and down. That nomination so moved me that the first chance I got I went to Democratic Party headquarters and volunteered.
I was assigned to the Youth for Kennedy group. We mainly stuffed envelopes. When school started, I kept up the volunteer work. All those volunteer hours paid off, because when Kennedy was due in San Francisco on November 2, a Tuesday one week before the election (and the day before my 16th birthday), I was asked to come along for the day with the group from headquarters. My job was to give out material to the press corps. I met Kennedy at the airport, literally met him, shook hands and then disappeared to provide the tired and cynical reporters with copies of the speech Kennedy would deliver that night.
We followed him around the city in the press buses as he gave one talk after another. I remember being impressed that he said the same things wherever he went--my first experience with the stump speech. The last stop was the Cow Palace. I was ushered in with the press to a section right below the lectern. I heard him announce the Peace Corps as a major policy initiative. I still have a yellowed copy of the speech. He began by promising arms reduction. He criticized the preparation of foreign service officers, the vast majority of whom had no language skills for the counties in which they served He then propose a "peace corps" (lower case in the original).
"...This would be a volunteer corps--and volunteers would be sought among talented young women as well--and from every race and walk of life. For this nation is full of young people eager to serve the cause of peace in the most useful way. I have met them on campaigns across the country. When I suggested at the University of Michigan lately that we need young men and women to give up a few years to serve their county in this fashion, the students proposed a new organization to promote such an effort. Others have indicated a similar response -- offering a tremendous pool that could work modern miracles for peace in dozens of under-developed nations...."
I was transfixed. I wanted to be one of those idealistic young volunteers. It's hard to believe now how positive the world felt in those few years at the beginning of the 60's before Vietnam and Watergate. Social progress seemed so possible as colonial powers lost their grip in the face of the struggles for independence and the American civil rights movement grew.
It took me some time to volunteer, but now, after a 50 year delay, there are only 25 days to go.
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