Culture Clash

This sounds like such a small thing, but it has really given me a placemarker to start understanding what I was looking for when I wanted to spend some time abroad. I have tried writing that “what led me to this point” post, and every time it is a completely different, albeit accurate and truthful account … Perhaps that is the novel I have been searching for inside of me. At any rate, I am finding it more feasible to write small accounts that will do a better job explaining my tale in small vignettes as opposed to my initial novella. ;-)

Yesterday, we spent the morning with machetes in the grass. I mean, I am the one who said, “I will help you cut the grass.” I had no idea that started with a machete. All in all, I don’t think I did a horrible job … just saying. (My blisters might say otherwise).

While we were conquering our field of overgrowth, in my learning phase, I kept stumbling across bricks buried half-way in the ground. Their crumbling burnt back ends hidden beneath the greens. In the evening, I had the bright idea of collecting those from the field. I figured it would save both blades and backaches in the future.

The area was behind the apartment I stay in, fairly new construction, but I would venture at least a year or two old. These bricks, just castaways letting vines and overgrowth overtake them, were discarded construction leftovers. Trying to be forward thinking in an economy that does not waste, I had the brilliant idea of building a little garden wall around the mango tree that sits behind the corner of my apartment. Elute, my main translator, happened to come across my work as I was finishing up and even he was impressed, asking if he could take my photo.

I don’t know for what reason, but the following morning I went back to the area to find half of my bricks gone. By mid-morning, the entire wall was taken down and no trace of the work was left. I actually was heartbroken over this and went to Elute for an explanation. Later, he came and said that the main caretaker had told the youngest children that all bricks are to be placed in a stack behind the workshop.

Now, if he said this yesterday or this morning to spite my work, or if he had just said this months ago and the fresh site of bricks prompted the little ones to disperse my efforts is left to be debated. I am not going to be the one to attempt that question … I assumed the latter. What plagued me is that these bricks had stayed half-buried in the ground for nearly a year, and no one did anything about them. Yesterday, they clearly were paced around the tree with intent. Yet it struck me that once the bricks were made easily accessible, they were moved because no effort had to be made to find them.

I can tell you that this plagued me between breakfast and lunch to the point of a truly sour mood. When it came time for our morning English class, I even started flippant with a half-hearted feigned interest. I may have even actually uttered, “Who cares?” to a simple question. Once or twice I mentioned the bricks again – sardonic? Maybe that is the right tone … I was met with, um ... well, I was met with nothing.

By the end of class, life had moved on, and I wound up joking and jovial. By lunch, I had forgotten the entire thing. It wasn’t until I wrote my initial journal entry during siesta did the incident even come back to mind...

Because if this had happened at work, in the US, I would not have gotten over it.

I would have complained to my closest co-worker. And then told my boss. And then probably moved the bricks back. And then come home and discussed it over dinner. And when I went back to work the next day, I might have even still been irritated, either every time I walked by the spot in absentia of bricks, or more importantly, if I had put them back, I would have revisited my irritation each time I saw them.

The funny thing is, the wall was not important. My goal was to move the bricks out of the area to make future work easier. But in my pride of a cutesy little job well done, I had completely lost sight of the goal.

In my “at work” scenario, my irritation would have stayed because I would have had people to celebrate my irritation with me. To allow me to dwell in it. Here, that just isn’t available. I built a wall. Someone else saw the wall and moved the materials to their correct spot. The wall might have been able to stay if someone asked, or it might not have. But the end goal of both me and the caretaker – pick up the loose-lying bricks – had been accomplished.

This whole little story takes on relevance as I have seen more and more of my friends, coworkers, and passers-by, get caught up in "The Nothing" of Dwelling on the Negative. On the Differences. On What Didn’t Work Right. No, this is not a political post (haha). It is something much deeper that I have seen our culture spiraling towards.

It has bothered me.

But the really sad and honest fact is, I was spiraling right alongside of them ... of you.

And yes, this absence of being able to move forward without being weighed down IS one of the reasons I came. I see that as a very “American” cultural norm.

I know that “finding my joy” has been an ongoing cognizant effort on my part for the past several years. Some days were better than others. Some weeks were. But there was always a backslide into dissatisfaction and uncomfortableness. An emptiness that was creeping through me. I didn’t recognize who I really was anymore. I heard it in my friends, too. My coworkers. Yes, yes I steal from the Never Ending Story to call it “The Nothing,” but it is an accurate descriptor. In my head, I have known about The Nothing for a long time. I have watched eat up our society and sense of community for many years – and I felt hopeless to it.

Never once did I ever try and counter this negative spiral and distance with people I love or myself with a lack of acceptance. Quite the opposite. I assumed as an empathetic good person, I was supposed to go down rabbit holes with the ones I love. Isn’t that how you are there for someone?

But today, when I complained initially to Elute about this wall, his answer was so matter of fact … and then there was zero empathy to follow. Just a, “Ok. That was a great wall. Are you ready for English class?” matter-of-factness that forced me to avoid the idea of dwelling on this Great Wrong that had been done to me.

And really … it was just a pretty, little garden wall. It was an hour or so of my time. I had a great time building it and was proud of my work. And now, now there is English class. After that, I have some brush to clear, and maybe some clothes to wash, and definitely more Spanish to learn.

In A Moveable Feast, Hemingway wrote, “All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence you know.” I don’t much care for Hemingway, and I care even less for that particular book, but I kept that gem with me.

So, this is my truth: The world is a better place when surrounded with positive people who already believe the world is a better place.