This is what you’re doing with your life today

To those of you who follow my blog on the regular, muchas gracias! I’ve been meaning to publically thank you for a while now. I know it’s only a hand full of people, but I think you all deserve a shout out. It’s not an easy task to decipher my ramblings week to week. More than that, however, I really do appreciate your comments and feedback. So un montòn de gracias to Mom, Dad, Justin, Kaitlin, aunties Lisa and Nadine, Anna J., Lisa S., the fine folks at the ECU Department of Cardiovascular Sciences; Mike F., Sabrina and the JFI crew; Levans, Bodeker, Elaine Z., Soccer Mom Soto, Christine V. and the SPC circus; and the other four or five of you that I’ve left off my list- sorry I forgot you and thanks!

To give you some insight on how I compose my blog, at any given time I’m writing/ editing drafts of a hand full of posts. In combination of whatever I jot down in my journal day-to-day, I am simultaneously composing two or three stories, and whatever one I finish first gets posted. So, today is a rare occurrence. What I am about to write hasn’t been scribbled in my journal or randomly edited for a week. Here we go….

At least once a day I find myself thinking, “Ooooooookay Caroline. This is what you’re doing with your life today. This right here is how you are living your life now. This is your reality.” Last Thursday I had this thought as I was walking down a dirt road  in the blistering cold wind at 10:45 am behind 3 men on horseback on my way to a teacher training institute. Allow me to back track about 4.5 hours to explain why I was taking a mid-morning stroll through a cow pasture.

My alarm went off at 6:30 am for the fourth day in a row. I’m not quite sure why, but this week demanded more early mornings than I’m accustomed to. I was at IPA by 8 am to visit a 1st year English History class. I hadn’t visited this group before so I wanted to make the effort to work with a new teacher. Unfortunately, due to my varied schedule, the only time I could do this was for her 8am class. There was also another reason for my visit.Today, I was going to visit another teacher training institute (CERP del Sur) in Atlantida, a town about an hour east of Montevideo. And although I’m pretty darn savvy with the buses, my mentors (and I) thought it best if someone accompanied me on my trip to the CERP in Atlantida. God only knows where I would have ended up otherwise, roaming the outskirts of town with a gaucho probably. On Thursdays, Ivonne, the English History professor, works at both IPA and CERP del Sur, so she graciously let me tag along with her for the day.

Ivonne was nothing but an absolute delight. Despite my serious lack of caffeine, upon meeting her I was immediately infected by her wonderfully positive attitude. After a class about the Roman invasion of the British Isles (yea….I may be an English nerd, but I’m pretty sure I was learning just as much as the other students in this class), we quickly rushed out of IPA, caught a cab to the main bus terminal, and bought our bus tickets to Atlantida. All of this took less than 10 minutes. Now, Ivonne may be old enough to be my mother, but I was STRUGGLING to keep up with her fevered pace. She was going a mile a minute while I was still dragging my butt along trying to wake up (how is it that I’ve been here for 3 months and STILL cannot get a good sleep schedule down? Going to bed at midnight and waking up at 6:30 does not make for a speedy Caroline….not to mention I’m slow to begin with). Anyways, I caught my breath when we boarded the bus to Atlantida. I relaxed a little as we chatted and got to know one another. And per usual in Uruguay, we found that we had an oddly close connection. When I told her I was from North Carolina, she said, “Oh. I worked in North Carolina for a while. I lived in Burlington.” You have to be kidding me. I’m lucky if people here know NC is on the east coast, but this woman lived in my place of birth?!! Yet another shining example of how Uruguay is the smallest of small worlds. In fact, she worked at Haw River Elementary school. For those of you who aren’t current on your NC geography, I’ll break it down for you. Burlington is a solid suburban town in the middle of the state. I would guess that only about 60% of NC residents could point out Burlington on a map (that is if it’s even ON the map). Even at Appalachian, a NC university, I would have to clarify where I was from by saying, “Oh yea, it’s near Chapel Hill.” Haw River is about 20 minutes outside of Burlington in the middle of a cotton or tobacco or corn field. I don’t know if it’s on ANY map. Ivonne lived and worked there! I don’t know if this coincidence impresses anyone, but I know my fellow North Carolinians can empathize.

Ok, back to the bus. After about 45 minutes, Ivonne looked at me and said, “Ok we’re getting off the bus now.” I looked out the window and we were in the middle of nowhere (it might as well been Haw River). We were cruising down a rural highway when Ivonne and I made our way to the front of the bus and hopped off. She then said, “Do you want to walk or catch a cab?” Huh? WHERE is there a cab? We were literally on the only paved road for as far as I could see. I didn’t think we would be coming across any cabs so I said, “Let’s walk.” We crossed the rural highway, and started our 1 or 2 kilometer trek down a dirt road. This is where our story began.

It was a pretty cold day, about 10 degrees celsius (look at the jerk I’ve become using the metric system), and the wind was blowing hard. Again, I struggled to keep up with Ivonne’s brisk pace, but this was mainly because I couldn’t stop staring at the cows in the pastures next to me and the 3 gauchos on horseback in front of me. We crossed another rural highway, made our way down 2 more dirt roads and arrived at the CERP. It was a cute, clean, and surprisingly modern building. Very charming. But why did I make the haul to this quaint CERP? A few reasons. The truth is that most people in the provinces don’t get exposure to native speakers, so for me to come and talk with them was a really nice change. Also, I wanted to invite the students personally to the Symposium I’m organizing for the end of August. I met with 2nd year and 4th year students during the morning and the 1st and 3rd year students in the afternoon. Although their class sizes were smaller than those at IPA (biggest class at IPA= 40 students, biggest class at CERP=12 students), they were just as driven and enthusiastic as everyone I’ve met thus far. Talking with the students was a fantastic insight into the Uruguayan mindset of people who are from outside Montevideo. It was worth every moment of my trip.

So, here’s where the fun begins. I’m not sure what was going on with the weather, but it started thunderstorming in the afternoon. It was freezing in the morning and by the afternoon it was warm and lightning. Bizarre. Since it was pouring rain, another CERP professor offered us a ride to the bus stop (i.e. side of the road in the middle of nowhere). We hopped in her VW bug (circa 1970) and cruised down the long highway. It was about this time, 5 pm, that two things happened. I got hit with a massive wave of fatigue and I got a migraine. I didn’t want to be rude to this incredibly nice lady giving us a ride, but I could barely see straight between the rain, tiredness and head-splitting migraine. So, aside from some “muchas gracias”s and some general pleasantries, I was pretty quiet. She dropped us off in the rain, but luckily our bus came within a minute. I was exhausted, dizzy from my migraine and soaking wet when I boarded the bus.

I don’t think I would have felt so exhausted if this was the end of my day, but the truth of the matter was I needed to rally big time. I was not only making my way back to Montevideo, but back to IPA. I was going to two different language classes. This is where my Thursdays usually begin. I go to two different night classes at IPA from about 6-10:30pm. All I wanted was some dulce de leche and my bed. When we reached Montevideo, Ivonne and I parted ways and I thanked her for letting me shadow her all day long. I got a cup of coffee and despite my haggard look (you would be looking pretty rough yourself after trekking through the rain all afternoon with a blinding migraine), I felt a little better. I visited my two groups then headed back home earlier than expected around 10pm. It was here that I encountered my last hurdle: navigating back home in a thunderstorm. What was going on with the weather?! That guy may have got the rapture date wrong, but perhaps only by a few weeks. It felt like the apocalypse. Luckily, I just got soaked from the rain and not struck by lightning. I arrived back home and within 15 minutes was passed out, face down, in star position, on top of my bed with all my clothes on. Yep. Sleeping in my work clothes. And THAT’S how I ended my day.