Today was my final day, for real. I didn't have to come in until 12 so I slept late which was really really nice. I love this job, but I do not love waking up at 6 am and the two-hour commute. If I work in rural health, if I work in health care, if I work at all, I will need to not commute so aggressively. I will also need to have a lifestyle that doesn't drive me to stay up late. Here, its pretty good if I don't go out or do anything social or am sick. If I just get home, watch some TV, eat some food, chat with Pilar and write a little, then I can get to sleep by 10 which makes life bearable the next day. The problem is that I like to watch movies with friends, go out to dinner, call my mom, read another chapter. I am also sick a lot and that seems to make me stay up writhing around hugging an ice pack. Going to sleep at eleven is completely rational but it guarantees me falling asleep on two of three buses the next day.
The solution to this is to alter one part that’s putting pressure on the system. I could either find a job/lifestyle where I don't have to wake up very early or find one where it's cool to go to sleep early. I feel like after I have kids it will be much easier and socially acceptable for me to go to sleep early. So I'll just wait that one out till I reproduce and keep falling asleep on the bus.
Enough about my circadian rhythms, what actually happened today? We had a long meeting with the principal of one of the high schools, Ciudad de Puembo. The Leci and the Duk had gone to a program about adolescent health in the morning about staring programs in schools, basically health classes. They presented her the syllabus with specific classes about nutrition, hygiene, exercise, sexual health (I don't know what that contained, but I'd like to). The principal seemed keen on the idea but kept stressing that her students had psychological problems and needed counseling. L and D said that that was part of the program, self esteem, but they weren't really trained to address psychological issues. The principal showed us a notebook that she had created where every page addressed a class or a child with problems or a family or something. It was all very disorganized and also completely illegible. The office was also very large and in one half was a conference-like room where a family was talking to a school worker. Apparently this family had a lot of problems. The principal told us all about the problems in a whisper while the family was in the room. To me, this is about as rude as you can get, and it was clearly making the Leci and Duk uncomfortable. After the principal had shown us the entire notebook and explained the home lives of several problem students, we reiterated the plans and left.
Back at the center, things were pretty slow. They didn't give out appointments because of the training, so there were only a few people waiting. Three babies got vaccinated, a woman reviewed her Pap smear results, and I took many people's blood pressures. I'd been having splitting facial headaches for three days so the Duk checked me out and told me I had sinusitis. The benefits of working at a doctor's office: free antibiotics!
The church bells had been ringing all day signaling a death in the town. It was an old woman, a friend to everyone. Carla's grandmother, even though I thought Carla was Marci's daughter. Marci and her daughter (so far's I know) Michelle and I stood outside and watched the funeral procession: a clunky banda de pueblo, young girls (Carla included) with florist bouquets, pallbearers of comically different heights, fifty or so towns people dressed in a mixture of black formal and work clothes, crying or laughing or just walking along. Marci cried, Michelle got bored, and storm clouds welled up behind the crowed.
Even though I'll be hopefully coming back at least one day after I get back from the Galapagos, it was hard to say goodbye to the Centro, and the Leci especially. I gave her The World According to Garp in Spanish because its about a badass (read: feminist) nurse and traveling the world and being goofy. I hope she and I will keep in touch, and I really will work at it. She's a good person, an interesting person, a hard working person, and we definitely have the same-place-and-time thing going on. Well, I was in her place on her time. I hope I helped her some. I hope I wasn't a burden after the first ten times or so. Those times, I know I was.
The Duk had her car so she drove us all to Quito. She dropped off the Leci near the Trole to meet her boyfriend. We got the Duk's boyfriend who was blandly handsome and smelled excellent. They dropped me off at the Universidad Catolica in a drizzle. It was a pretty long walk home but the rain didn't bother me even as it got stronger. I felt like I was really outside for the first time in a few days. My head felt clearer. And don't attribute that to the antibiotics, I just took my first dose at 8.
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