I'm unsure of myself. This next fall I will be leaving this country, alone. Without any help I will have to make a new life for myself at a new university in the United States. And I'm scared.
I'm scared that I will feel like an outsider looking in. Most of the people I'm surrounded by won't have any idea what it's like outside of their America. They won't understand why I had to go to a private school, or why I didn't really go out with friends on the weekend, or why I was terrified to go out on the streets by myself, or why it makes me nervous to drink tap water. I am scared that by living here I will be so irrevocably different than them that I will be unable to interact with them.
I'm scared I will be alone. This experience of living in the Dominican Republic has changed me so much. Before I moved here I couldn't even conceive the idea that there might be a place where the public schools were not adequate, or a place where beggars with only one arm and one leg hopped down the street and knocked on your window, begging for money to feed himself. But you can't really help him. and if you try there are too many of the poor and desperate to really make a difference. No one has any idea what it is like, and that's all that I think of. I will want to talk about it with somebody, but I know that not many will understand.
But I'm scared that I will lose that. What if I get so caught up in my new American life that I forget what it's like to hear gunshots outside my window? What If I forget how to speak Spanish? What if I become just like I used to be, caught up in my own happy American life that I forget what it is like to be here?
I know I don't belong in this country. I don't belong to or quite understand the culture, and Dominicans frustrate me often. But I don't feel like I quite fit in the American culture either. I feel like a man without a country, and I am scared that I will be in this nomadic state my entire life. I don't want to be in the Dominican Republic anymore, but I don't want to move to The States. But I have to. I have to move on with my life. I can't be in this limbo forever. I'm scared.
I know it might not be what you want to hear, or what you were thinking, but you'll be able to talk easily with a lot of returned missionaries who have served in Hispanic countries, because they do know what life is like in places like that. Yeah, they don't have the same experience of being there for high school, but you also didn't have the same experience as them of serving a mission in a foreign country by yourself. So you will have a lot to talk about. And you'd be surprised how much they'll want to talk about it, because it's a country/culture they lived in for 2 years and grew to love.
ResponderEliminarHonestly, I think you'll be able to easily have a lot of guy friends because of this experience, Kaits.
I know you're worried now, but I love you, and know that you will be fine.
Besides, you're not alone. I will live just 3 hours away. And your aunt and uncle live just 1-1 1/2 hrs away. And your old friends live less than an hour away. And your roommates live less than a minute away. And Heavenly Father lives right by you. And the boogie man is in your closet. And the mail man will also come every day.
See? You'll be fine. :)
you're right. I plan on making intimate friends with my mailman. :D Te quiero!
ResponderEliminarYou girls crack me up! I love what Kierstin said because she is probably the most qualified to understand what is in your future than anyone. She's right, there are so many people who will be there for you and will help you through all the change. I love you and know you can do it Kaitlin! :) Auntie Jenn
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