Moments

I have been experiencing my time in leaps of realization and ever-clearer days. I know now that I want to live on this side of the world, at least for the plan-able future, and I am slowly clearing away the guilt that clouded my ability to see this and is still weighing me down about it. I don't hate the US, I actually like it much more than I did before I moved to Asia. I love love love my family and friends and would love love love to be closer to them and an in-person part of their lives. But I feel right here, and have an almost unimaginably sweet job: working with kids, working with language, having a LOT of time to study other things and to build relationships on both sides of the Pacific. And I think that a me armed with Skype and happiness makes me a better force than a confused me wherever I'd be able to find a job in the US next year.

I have been putting off finding/buying souvenirs for people. Partially because there is still a box in Iowa with some of the souvenirs I bought the first time I went to China (in 2006) because it is easy to lose momentum in connecting the right things with the right people to mean something. And I don't want to buy more clutter. And many souvenirs are clutter.

But a few days ago I was inspired to go to the beach and pick up shells and offer them to my brother for the business he is starting making t-shirts and jewelry and otherwise using his artistic skillz. I walked barefoot along the seawall and the first two beaches, and put my sandals back on to walk across the field on the way to the smallest beach by the Oreum*, because it's harder to see what you are stepping on in grass and I know for a fact that some weird foreigners like to strap small fireworks to model airplanes and fire/fly them in that field (*cough*). I almost escaped from the tinny sound of music blasting from the restaurant by the biggest middle beach after I climbed down the stairs to the sand, and wiggled my toes through the dry warm top sand to the coolness underneath. I picked up shells and thought about life, and wondered how much time has passed since the first person picked up shells and thought about life at that beach in Hamdeok.

Someone started announcing something over the beach speaker system, but it was far away and in Korean (and didn't seem to be inviting or inciting panic), so I ignored it and kept sidling into the surf and sifting through shells and rocks and sand and seaweed. After a while I noticed that some dark clouds were rolling their way towards me from the west, and decided that perhaps the faint korean buzz was correct, and I should head home. I stopped on the seawall and sat down when I saw a fish jump out of the water, and stayed to watch another 30 fish follow suit (or perhaps the same fish and a few of her pals do a really impressive dance). A dark grey crane stalked slowly from the westmost beach, and a white crane was far enough out in the falling tidewaters that she kept disappearing in the reflections on the waves.

I have had some really good conversations this week and in the last few weeks, and gotten a lot of really good support from all over. I just going to be here for a while. I am going to keep moving on my China plans and other studies, but I am going to try to focus on the moments that happen, and try not to think I must justify my days by what they might build towards in the future.

*Oreum are the "parasitic volcanoes" scattered across Jeju island. They are more or less hills, except that they are 120% cooler than average hills because they were formed by volcanic eruptions.