September 4, 2004
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Topic: Moved by my own words
I just re-read the story of the 21-day Outward Bound course I instructed in South Africa. I remember the intensity of that course, and thinking back to it gives me chills now. In one journal entry, I write how I could fantasize being home, with my tv, cold orange juice, comfortable bed, and now I have it, and it’s nothing special. I read quotes from my students and I hear their voices, and people I haven’t thought about in months are suddenly sitting right beside me. These children of Africa, this continent that is so easily forgot because it’s not our own. I play a South Africa cd I have, Johnny Clegg, and I get chills of hope for their country. “Tula mama” they sing, which means calm mother. I don’t want that life to be a vacation. I want my whole life to be surreal, the way it was when I was listening to these students of mine share their learnings from the course. “I see the burned bushes, and I see me before Outward Bound. Now I’ve changed, I want to be like the new flowers that grow.” I think life is lived best when you feel like you’re in a book worth reading. The life I had there certainly was. I think the whole foreigner in a foreign land is what I miss. Right now, my plans for promoting my book fit more into the realm of non-fiction. I’m trying to be an activist for education reform. It’s not a role I see myself fitting so much as the random America leading 8 coloreds and 2 Xhosas into the mountains. But, I’m starting to warm up to playing the role of a writer. I’m realizing that my comfort at the keyboard, with a journal, writing articles, is not a comfort that everyone has.
Writing my book has been like packing a suitcase for a long trip. I’m pretty unorganized, because there’s so much I want to bring along. Usually, I end up holding up my mom at the car as I run back into the house for one more thing. That’s how I am right now. I’m still throwing in another idea or two. And I love that I can do it. It’s just like writing an online journal, except a bit more permanant. However, I am excited by the promise of people sitting down to digest my ideas. To flip the pages. To put it down, and pick it back up again later. There’s so much that I packed into this book, that I’m excited to see how each idea will be read.
So…tomorrow night I will call it official. All further thoughts will be left to this site. I will put a close to this chapter of my life. Perhaps in a few months, I will think back to writing this book, as I think back now to S. Africa. I will think back to the incredible power I had to write anything, and say anything. I think I’ve done myself justice, and I won’t have to constantly feel like I needed to say anything more.
In fact, I’m quite confident that this book can be successful. Whether it is or is not depends entirely on me. It will depend on the effort I put forth, as well as my ability to push on through slow periods like now, where i’m still wondering what the hell i’m doing. but, there’s literally thousands of college students out there who have never met a person like me, and who have never read the types of things that are coming out of my head. and i know that there is nobody else my age running around w/ a similar book, and a similar project as me. I have to say, I am very excited to see how the next chapter of my life unfolds…
