Thursday, July 19, 2007

Been Home a Week and Still Lost

Returning from Peru has always taken more time emotionally than physically. Physically, it's about 24 hours from the time you head to the airport in Iquitos until you're actually home. Emotionally , on the other hand, it generally takes me a couple of weeks.
This time that's compounded by the damned surgery--the one that saved my life, actually, when my intestines blew a hole and spewed nearly three liters of muck about my insides--that has me feeling so listless and useless that it's hard to get anything done. I wake at 5 AM, check the email, make some coffee, wash last night's dishes, maybe get a load of laundry in and then I'm pooped again and go back to bed--the counch really, as that's where I sleep--for an hour or so until Chepa's baby Sierra, and my and Chepa's Madeleina wake up. Make some breakfast for them and then I'm washed out again.
In Peru, on the other hand, two days after the initial surgery and the eight days they kept me in the hospital I was taking a group out into the deep Amazon forest.
And in Peru I managed to get a column written for Skunk the day after the second surgery.
But here I just feel lifeless. Some of it's the physical. There really isn't much a person can do if they can't lift, push, pull, stretch, walk or run. I lift the baby anyway and hope that god and the angels don't let the surgery get ruined by something as nice as that. Nobody should be penalized for picking up babies, regardless of their physical condition.
The part I'm not keying into is how far my head is from being home, however. I can't seem to t hink straight. I've written several blog entries that are so tedius I fall asleep reading them and so trashed them before ever putting them up. And I havn't got a single good interview under my belt since being back. And I should have several by now as I've got some stories coming due and my new rep (The Houston Press Club recently awarded me Print Journalist of the Year for Texas (circ under 100,000) to try to do honor to.
And instead, I'm this freaking blob. Slow moving, slow thinking, useless waste of space.
I'd better get on the ball soon, eh?

2 comments:

The Grudge said...

I know the feeling. Sometimes after traveling, it takes soo long to get back into the old groove.

Hummingbird said...

Be still and let yourself heal, man.

What would your good friend Julio say to you with his wisdom (and humor) -- what might be his advice to guide you? Maybe you can call on him for understanding or direction?

You know it is not your responsibility if people don't read the information
about trips into the jungle. And heck, if they read your blog at all, they should know you have your own issues just like they do...

Sleep more. Drink lots of water while you heal. Eat right. Ask your children to lay hands on you and let their energy flow into you. Cry if you need to... an emotional release.

I wish you well, brother.

Blessings... (with a smile!)