Ramblings

Hello all, it's House. I have avoided blog duty since I've been here, but it seems I cannot avoid it any longer. Part of the reason I haven't wanted to blog is because I feel like I should have something profound to share with all of you, some life-changing experience that will uplift all you faithful readers, or at least something new to tell you about our time here in Kolkata, but I just don't really feel like I have anything like that.
A lot of things have been troubling me lately. My mind has been filled with questions to things I thought I knew and I just feel like everything I though I knew is changing, but yesterday I got a few moments of clarity; like when one of your nostrils has been clogged up all day, and for just a few minutes you can breathe though both nostrils and it feels like the greatest thing ever, and then you go back to clogged again. I digress. Anyway, Kelly and I have been working at Kalighat, and it has been really tough. Two days ago I was holding a frail, tiny, dying woman in my arms while she cried. Due to a language barrier I do not know why she was crying, but from her eyes I saw pain and fear. I was so frustrated because I wanted to offer her words of encouragement; I wanted to tell her that it would be okay, that there was hope, that I knew what would happen when she died. But even if we did speak the same language, at this point, with all the things we've been experiencing and seeing, I just couldn't.
Yesterday she was in a little bit more lively and kept uttering the word, "talk" to me. She just wanted some words, even if she didn't understand them. I found myself telling her anything that came to my mind; I told her about a time my brother took care of a scraped knee I had gotten playing street hockey. I told her about my brothers recent wedding, about how much I love surfing with my dad, about the days in summer when as a kid we would play pickle until our moms called us in. I shared with her how I'm nursing one hell of a broken heart, and how I wish that it would just stop hurting. Then I found myself wondering why in the world I'm worried about my broken heart when this lady is dying right here in front of me.
After I left her yesterday, Kelly and I met up with Kolt to get some much needed exercise and kick around the soccer ball. This is when the clarity came for a few minutes. As I ran around in an open field with my friends, I felt my heart beat fast and hard, I felt the sweat drip off, and I felt alive. I realized that for this moment, I had what those women at Kalighat didn't have, and I cherished every second of it. I don't know any answers......I don't even know all the questions, but yesterday, with a crowd of men watching because they had probably never seen a white girl playing soccer, I felt alive and happy and glad to be here. So there it is.

Katy

P.S. Kolt, Kelly and Cat are all vomitters. I am the one with a nasty arm disease. Vic is the trooper, and Rhoman is MIA.