Yeah. Today was a gut-check day. All the stuff I've been putting off, the work projects I THOUGHT I had plenty of time for, the passport belt I could root around for tomorrow, the blog I was planning to create.... All of those things seemed a little bigger and a little more urgent today. Check, check, check. Cue the background anxiety.
Because, in two weeks, Margie and I and the other 23 of us will be cleaning and stocking the clinic at Mountain Top Ministry in Port-au-Prince. We get into Haiti around 10am on the 8th, assuming all goes well, and are open for patients the next day. It's gonna be work. Here's the website for Mountain Top, by the way:
http://www.mtmhaiti.com/
You can like them on the 'Borg, if you are so inclined.
Between now and then, I've still got some chores to do. Mostly a collection of collections that remains (get some bug stuff, find another suitcase, etc.), although one of my "chores" is to finish reading 'Farewell, Fred Voodoo,' by Amy Wilentz. It's an account of her experience as a journalist there, starting in 1986.
I've been watching Haiti for at least that long, myself. I doubt anyone remembers my turn as "Haiti's Ambassador to the UN" for BJ Berghorst's 10th grade writing class. BJ always did a parliamentary procedure unit for his 10th graders, which featured a mini-UN session. Guess who denounced his own government for mistreatment of its citizens? *waves* Hi....!
Rather diplomatically and with obvious amusement, BJ asked me if I was aware that I might "lose my job" (with any luck, right?) if I took the position I was taking. I can almost see him not quite suppressing the twitching corners of his mouth. I was 14 and very smart, of course, and told him I didn't care. I guess someone in Western Michigan needed to stand up for the dispossessed and downtrodden of Haiti!!
So. Ha. Take that, Evil.
