A funny thing happened on the way to the post office

Enough soul searching. Here's a story: a few weeks ago I got a notice that I had received a package, but that it was being held in Svilengrad - a town on the Turkish border. Working for a wealthy municipality and in a department with some pull, the head of administration offered to have the municipal car drive me there the following week. Super! I mention to a colleague that I have no idea what to say to fight (and yes, a fight is expected) with customs and she generously agrees to go with me. Despite the annoyance, all seems like it will end well.

So, the next week comes and goes. Then this Monday a colleague asks when I want to go to Svilengrad - today or Tuesday or later in the week. Being American I say "today! Let's do it today!" and an hour later someone else comes back to me and says "That's great. You'll go tomorrow." On Tuesday the municipal driver, my colleague Maria and I all drive to retrieve my package. Upon arrival to town, Maria and I look at my claim slip - it has no phone number, no address, no name. It just says I have a package. So, we go to the train station (and what seems to be the largest building in town) and ask where to go. Go to the post office, they say. OK, so we go to the post office and ask the same round of questions. Go to customs, they say, so we head to the building where customs is supposed to be. First job: find customs.

We go to the place we were told was customs and look all around this large concrete building with lots of poorly or unmarked doors. After cleverly piecing together several ill-worded signs, Maria finds the right door. Now, this is something you will have to imagine - it's very Bulgarian and I'd love to capture it on film, if I didn't suspect I'd be kicked out of the country for it: you walk into the reception area (a small, room-size hallway) that is surrounded by opaque or shaded glass and little 1'x2' doors at about chest level. And you stand there and wait. And wait. Now, the glass isn't so shaded or opaque that you can't see that there are people behind it - which means they can see you too. But there's this little game, this little power play that the officials behind the glass play - you wait until THEY are ready. So, in this particular instance, not only are we and one other man standing there waiting, but there is a customs agent cleaning, opening and closing the blinds. This one is bent. Straighten. Should we tint them up or down? Up. Down. Up. Down. Down? No, up. Up. Now that one's bent. Straighten. This goes on for what must have been ten minutes. Finally, one of the small doors opens. You bend over (in so very many ways) and begin to explain your situation to the official. They tell you why it cannot be solved. And then you argue.

The dialogue begins with Maria explaining that I have a package. First hurdle: the official argues that I don't. He thinks the municipality has a package (my mail currently, or formerly, went to the municipality) under my name and so to retrieve it I need to be there with an official letter (meaning a letter with about 5 inked stamps on it) from the municipality saying it's OK for me to claim the package. Maria explains the situation (personal package, volunteer, uses business address, etc) and he says "OK, let me chat with 'my boss'" and closes the little door. Personally, I think this means "I need more coffee" but I don't know, because my window into the world behind the glass has just been closed. So, he comes back and gives the same party line. Maria again gives her same story (I think they want to see if the story changes - or they are just bored like the rest of us and want something to do). Again the door closes. When it opens a book appears with lots of handwritten entries and photocopies of custom slips that have been methodically trimmed to their form size. He finds my entry and my custom slip. It's my package from Monica. Form perfectly filled out. Again he argues for the same thing and Maria argues back and then he asks her to translate the customs form for him, meaning he wants to know what I am getting. "Book, foot lotion, foot scrub, foot soak." So, beyond the embarrassment of a custom agent now knowing I have crusty feet (hey, at least I do something about it!) I realize that two of my colleagues are spending their day helping me retrieve my skin care products. It's all so bizarre.

The customs agent finally agrees that the story must be credible (or maybe he just gave up or needed more coffee) so we were sent back to the post office. We walk into the post office (it's a tiny room) and the two women manning it walk into the back, even though they just saw us walk in and customs must have just called and OK'ed the release of the package. They return a couple of minutes later and ask what we want. Maria explains (never mentioning my name), they say OK and magically know what name to look for. Hmmm. Anyway, so placed before me, just beyond the glass, is my package, my package from my sister. So, I look at Maria and say, "Hey, that's my package, but it's not the same one that the other guy listed." She tells the woman there is another package. The woman argues. Maria argues back. The women goes to find my other package. So, just beyond the glass I have two packages. The two women start to discuss if I need to pay taxes. Maybe I need to pay Haskovo taxes, if so, maybe they should ship the packages to me in Haskovo. I suddenly fear that I will never touch my treasures. This goes on for awhile. Then it stops. Much like the last office, there is this critical point where they just give up, for no clear reason. In an instant, my packages are handed to me and we are on our way.

The end. (It's supposed to be an adventure, right?!)

Interdependence

I've been pretty open about all my preconceived notions about what this whole experience would be like. Those notions, though, keep surfacing. One of the major ones I had was that I would come here to be more independent. That I would learn to live from the land and more fully rely on myself for my own well-being. That is the American dream: self-reliance. My destiny, however, has been quite different.

A few days ago I was in a bit of a quote war (that's swapping quotes in rapid fire with another person - think Nerd Fighter) with a friend and I was supplying a lot of quotes by G. B. Shaw - one of my favorite playwrights and thinkers. I came across this quote:

We are all dependent on one another, every soul of us on earth.

I never threw it in to the mix - thinking it too hokey and sentimental. But days after, when all the quotes about society and art and truth had passed from my memory, it was still there. The tsunami and 9/11 were moments in our life where that seemed to be true - the capacity to feel pain and sadness for the loss of strangers was tangible because the number was so great, the event so colossal it was almost surreal. But other than that, we don't want to be connected any more - we strive to be strong and tough and boldly self-defined. I really wanted more of that.

Here I am, in a culture that still values the collective and where self-reliance is really not in the reality of a foreigner. I don't know where things happen. I don't know what the best of anything here is. I don't know how to be polite or even insistent. Beyond gathering the survival basics, I've learned that I need people more than I formerly admitted. My connections, however brief, with family and friends recharge me for a remarkably long time. Sharing my experiences with new friends makes them more meaningful, more fun and more real. Letting people into my world expands it exponentially.

To be perfectly honest, this sharing scares the living hell out of me. In many ways I'd rather learn to live alone, to be more self-sufficient, to not care so much. But I know now that I don't want this because it is better or stronger or more pure - I want it because it's safe. Love, in any form, is not ambivalent - and caring is a hard business.

On another day, a comment from a friend's friend was passed to me: that we all die alone, that we basically live alone and that we, as individuals, are all we really have. I want to agree, as scary as that statement is, but I don't think I do. I think that who we are is out there for people to use and abuse and cherish and adore - and they are out there for us. Perhaps they aren't permanent, but those exchanges - and their potential for greatness - merit our bravery, and should give us more in return.

I've known so many poor matches: people who were overly dependent on someone else, people who allowed themselves to be defined by someone else, people who gave and gave without any expectations, people who made others depend on them. Those matches are part of the reason I wanted to be more "self-reliant" - I didn't want to make those mistakes or be on either side of those equations. But, those pairings are missed shots, followed by the wrongful pursuit of security. Being depended on by someone you also depend on - for something other than scripts and role playing - is like adding another dimension to your world. It's frightening and exhilarating and joyous and mindblowing. We take it with us everywhere - the good and the bad. It is both weight and freedom, rub and gem. As Thoreau said: "The most I can do for my friend is simply be his friend." Opening those doors of exchange is the most I can do for me too.

Emotional barriers to something completely within reach

So, because this issue is particularly personal, I am going to leave it vague. Also, I think most people, especially volunteers, experience this with something, whatever it may be.

There is something I'm not doing here that I am supposed to do, and want to do. It's pretty fundamental and essential for the work I need to do, the work I want to do. But, still, I don't do it. Logically, it's within my reach. I KNOW I can do it, but emotionally I FEEL that I can't - that the glass on the table is completely out of reach. So, when people walk into the room and ask why I'm so thirsty I make a joke about the glass, say I don't want what's in it, give any excuse for not just reaching out, taking the glass and downing it. I can light candles, I can make a four course meal, I can play obscure music and change the temperature. But I cannot drink from that glass. When people leave they remember the food, the setting, their own drink - the glass is only a funny reference, with the jokes even supplied by me. But when they leave, it's just it and me. And a mouth dying of thirst.

You like me, you really like me!

So, I has one of those days - those days that make to you think "I can do this" - those days that make you think "hey, people notice". It wasn't really eventful. In fact, I can't think of a single conversation I had with a Bulgarian (oops!). Nothing happened at work, nothing happened when I came home. But, I chatted and connected with - in addition to my usual, and most cherished, cast of characters - people I had forgotten about, people I lost contact with, and people I never even realized were that aware of me. Just small connections really - playing off of one another, being asked for advice, someone I hadn't spoken to since I first arrived here asking how things were going (and knowing enough details to ask), people noting that they were actually reading this (really, I had no idea), being told by a New York friend that I was missed. I'm not going to complain or rant or tell a story - I'm just going to say we all need those days, we should each be so lucky to have them when we need them, and should be so generous to give them to others.

Saturn's na gosti

Depending on your "new-ageiness," you will either see your late twenties and early thirties as the return of Saturn or, the newer buzz phrase, the quarter-life crisis. Either way the real term is "mind fuck". At some point (after I came here - introspection a little too late) I questioned why I left -- why did I sign up to spend two years in relative poverty, working in a foreign language, living with people I had no previous connection to? I think I was preparing for this - for Saturn's return and for my deepest journey to date. It hit me on New Year's Eve -- the best time to be hit by an emotional Mack truck is at a party where everyone is trying to have fun. Who doesn't like a party-goer who suddenly questions her life, her place in the universe, her needs, desires and insecurities?! In addition to feeling like the worst guest ever (I actually left the party and dodged all these scary fireworks that people here mindlessly throw to cry in peace), I felt like the Mack truck had "Cliche, Inc." written on the side of it. I mean really, who the hell am I? Having a big existential crisis on New Year's Eve? About what I want to change and about what hasn't? About being alone? About not knowing what I want from my life? That is all so fucking lame. Are the biggest questions in my life out of some afterschool special? Please don't let Alicia Silverstone portray me in my biographical movie! I'm here to question my life path, my goals, myself, my relations with those I care about (if you get strangely serious emails at some point, you now know why). It's really hard - the hardest thing I've ever done. I'm morphing into someone else... I'm morphing into someone - I'm morphing into me.

(NOTE: "na gosti" means "visit" in Bulgarian)