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“Do your little bit of good where you are; it’s those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world.”

Posted January 21, 2023 by katry
Categories: Musings
Tags: Africa, Ghana, learning a language, Peace Corps, Shopping

I am bereft. My Boston Globe did not come. I hunted all around the front yard and even under the car. I came inside and wept.

I wanted more than anything to be accepted to the Peace Corps. I had taken the language test the spring of my junior year then sent in my application in October of my senior year. I heard in January. I was over the moon.

The day I left Philadelphia for Ghana I remember standing outside the hotel waiting with everyone else to board a bus. The luggage was piled behind us. We were allowed 80 pounds so the pile was scalable. The Peace Corps had sent us all sorts of information including a suggested list of what we might want to pack. My mother and I took that list to heart and began shopping. The first purchase was luggage. I chose red. Even now I have one bag left from then. While I was in Ghana, I stored the luggage in my armoire because I didn’t need it. It got a bit of mold. We bought two sets of sheets, the suggested amount, two sets of towels and one giant bath towel. We went clothes shopping, all summer clothes. We also bought a couple of pairs of sandals. One lasted three rainstorms, the other all two years. We bought two years worth of toiletries and two years worth of underwear in assorted colors. What was difficult about all of this was we had no idea what we’d find in Ghana. Peace Corps gave us wonderful information about Ghanaian customs, government and schools but nothing super-useful, nothing about life between breakfast and bed. Keep in mind we’re talking pre-internet. We got books, brochures and ditto sheets with that familiar smell.

It didn’t take long after training to realize the best part of Peace Corps isn’t Peace Corps. It is just living every day because that’s what Peace Corps comes down to, just living your best life in a place you couldn’t imagine. It is living on your own in a village or at a school. It is teaching every day. It is shopping in the market every three days. It is taking joy in speaking the language you learned in training. It is wearing Ghanaian cloth dresses and relegating the clothes you brought with you to the moldy suitcases. It is loving people and a country with all of your heart from breakfast to bed and forever after. Peace Corps doesn’t tell you that part, the loving part, but I expect they know it will be there.

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Guinnevere: David Crosby and Graham Nash

Posted January 20, 2023 by katry
Categories: Video

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Almost Cut My Hair: Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young

Posted January 20, 2023 by katry
Categories: Video

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Long Time Gone: Crosby, Stills & Nash

Posted January 20, 2023 by katry
Categories: Video

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Suite: Judy Blue Eyes: Crosby, Stills and Nash

Posted January 20, 2023 by katry
Categories: Video

Comments: 4 Comments

Posted January 20, 2023 by katry
Categories: photo

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And all was silent as before, —All silent save the dripping rain.”

Posted January 20, 2023 by katry
Categories: Musings

It rained all night, a whole inch of it, and it was still raining when I woke up. All in all it is an ugly day, a warm ugly day at 41°. I have no plans, nothing on my dance card until Sunday when I get to go to the dump, be still my heart, and perform at a uke concert at the mall.

My world is quiet. The rain has stopped except for the few drops which fall from the roof when the wind blows. The dogs, on the couch, stretch and moan. Nala is behind me. Henry is beside me. Both are curled into balls. I love the warmth from Nala leaning against me.

When I was a kid, we had an encyclopedia my mother bought one book at a time when she grocery shopped every week. The books had red covers. They were always kept in a bookcase in the living room. I used to pick one book randomly, open it then read the page where I landed. It was one of my favorite ways to spend time when I was stuck inside the house on a rainy day.

My grandmother, my father’s mother, was born in 1898. I always found that unbelievable, a whole different century. She never worked outside the home. She raised three kids. My father was the middle. We didn’t see her often even though she and my grandfather lived in the same town, just across town. After my grandfather’s death, my father used to visit er every Saturday. Once in a while I’d go with him. My grandmother always gave my father a couple of gifts like candy fruit slices, Circus Peanuts and a carton of cigarettes, Paul Mall’s.

While I was growing up, we mostly ate meat and potatoes, my father’s idea of a perfect meal, but, when we kids were older, my mother served us more exotic foods like her ground beef with bamboo shoots and chow mein. My father, however, seldom deviated from his meat, canned veggies and mashed potatoes. He was an easy man to feed.

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