Update, long overdue

Dear gentle readers, if indeed there are any of you left:

This blog is laughably long overdue for a post, many of which I have written (as my Dad frequently says about letters) "in my head" over the past several months. I skipped many stages of the preparation process, then the orientations in Washington, D.C. and Jakarta, then my arrival at my post. I never wrote about the challenges of living in my rustic apartment, of doing everything myself and by hand (no shower, no hot water, no laundromat), and of being the object of much attention (mainly positive but nonetheless invasive to my Western sense of privacy) everywhere I went. Equally neglected were all the joys of my bright and active college students and my overworked yet jovial and dedicated colleagues.

Why am I putting this in the past tense, you may ask? Well, after spending a week in the hospital with an IV in my arm waiting for the symptoms of dengue fever to subside, I lost my resolve and my will to continue dealing with the daily stress of my life there. I also felt paranoid about the possibility of getting sick again, as all reports say dengue the second time around is easier to get and more deadly (we're talking swelling and internal bleeding, medivac you to Singapore for a blood transfusion, weeks or months of exhaustion/depression, fun fun fun!) On top of everything, I (who have been leaving home for extended periods since the age of 9 and have seldom looked back) got the worst case of homesickness I've ever had by far, and was longing in a visceral way for autumn, turning leaves, woodsmoke, chilly nights. (Might have had something to do with the lack of air conditioning and the way I could sweat through a tee shirt at 8 in the morning just sitting in my kitchen having breakfast? Just a hunch.)

All of these factors, but most of all the desire to free myself from living in constant fear and anxiety, contributed to my decision to curtail my fellowship and return home early. I got in to JFK last night, Halloween, and was picked up by my brother, who drove me home to the town where we went to high school. I experienced a welling up of irrepressible joy and deep satisfaction at seeing costumed children and parents walk between clapboard houses with white fences and stone walls and orange leaves still hanging from trees and pumpkins glowing on porches. I don't know when I have been so burstingly happy. The tuna melt with dill pickle and vanilla malt I had at a diner last night might have been nectar and ambrosia. I am deeply happy to be home.

So. About Indonesia, that is all there is to tell. Or rather, there is much to tell, but that is all I will tell now. As I said, there have been many, many times I could have posted about amazing and beautiful and horrifying things I experienced there. Who knows, maybe in the course of processing what I've just been through I will decide to post here again. But I'm not going to promise anything... Perhaps if internet access had been easier in Indonesia, I would have kept it up. In the end, it seems maybe blogging just isn't suited to me.

Keep in touch at hdemunn () gmail () com. Love, Heather