Travel
It burned my finger, forcing me to drop it back into the bag to wait for it to cool. Impatient, I picked it up again, and when the heat became too much I put it between my teeth, blowing out to speed the cooling process. A few seconds later and the soft yellow-brown flesh succumbed […]
“he’s inside, sleeping,” she called to the vehicle. We had settled to a stop in front of a mud home with a woman, colorful lapa held loosely at her waist, bare-chested except for a red bra. She had been bent over cooking something on the open fire in the front yard. “that is my older […]
The mine Dark and dingy, we sat down at a table in the middle of the sparse room and were immediately greeted by one of two women behind the counter. Beers were ordered, and at insistence, a fanta for me. I eyed the place knowingly. Despite the two women and sundry kids – including a […]
They were scattered beneath the sprawling shade of a lone tree reaching for the far-flung gray clouds in a blue sky. When our Toyota pulled up and we all clambered out, no one shifted anything more than a gaze. A child continued to suck from her mother’s breast, another crawled away from his twin, and […]
Scents seize me. Hold me hostage to a moment- a memory. Sometimes the relationship – time and smell – is uneven, smell weighing so heavy against my senses that I can’t recall the memory itself. Cloaked by the heady emotion, I find myself pulling at the edges of my mind, coaxing that morsel of my […]
Last night I had a small meltdown. This was not a “no wire hanger – ever” kind of affair. In terms of melt, it was like stubborn government cheese; it gave around the edges but stayed mostly as it was. But still… It wasn’t anything spectacular or big or especially heinous. Instead, I found myself […]
“Morning-o!” I called out to friends in front of the County Health Department building. “You are busy with work?” someone called after me. “Small small,” I replied; a very West African response which – like adding “o” to the ends of words, I’ve taken to doing. I’m not sure what feeds my inclination to not […]
The rain came running. I could hear it; feel the wind that carried it, before the first drops fell. I sat pondering time and tadpoles while enjoying the breeze until the rain began to run under the door. Walking to the back of the house where Sierra Leone was napping, rain snuck through the small […]
This morning it was a damp patch of dirt, the color only slightly darker than the surrounding cinnamon brown. Yesterday it had been a muddy puddle; all that remained of the vast and fairly deep puddle that had obstructed the rocky road that runs in front of Sierra Leone’s house. I’d watched the water suspiciously […]
Change gon’ come… Time is so relative, despite appearances to the contrary. Sixty seconds to 60 minutes to 24 hours…and days turn into months turn into years. Neat. Orderly. The same for everyone. Except it isn’t. For the last five months time has been this slow moving vehicle transporting me through my Liberian experience. And […]
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