I Have a Blog?

Hmmm ... hello, I suppose. I don't know why I've been avoiding my blog so much lately, especially considering the stakes at hand: maintaining the ever-distinguished title of The Best Peace Corps Blog in All of Burkina Faso. I don't what to say, really! I've now been here for over seven months, a point of denouement by which whatever was exotic and strange before has now become commonplace and people at home start to forget about you. Well not forget about you per se; I just feel that the magnitude of this whole thing sort of wears off once your American friends don't see you around and their memory of you wanes as they move on with their lives. It seems perfectly natural to me and I'm not bent out of shape about it in the least. It's just something I've noticed at this point.

So, where do we go from here on the blog? I feel as though we're at a crossroads (can't get Bone Thugz out of my head now). I mean, really, I can't talk about how bizarre it is to hang out with my friends over a beer as they prepare goathead soup (eyes and all), or how weird it is that my New Year's Eve consisted of watching fireworks whilst rubbing elbows with Bobo's fabled prostitutes. Because it's not bizarre and it's not weird anymore. For me, it's utterly normal at this point -- almost banal, in fact. I feel completely immersed, safe, and at home here. I look back on the first blog entry I posted after my affectation in Bobo last September, and it seems like an entirely different person wrote that. Back then, I was sick, insecure, cranky, and just over this experience in general. Thank goodness I toughed it out for a few more weeks and gave myself the time to see the light at the end of the tunnel, because that has made all the difference, to crib Frost. Check it: I was hanging out with some of the girls in my courtyard last night, laughing together and carrying on in French and Jula, when it dawned on me how little time I have left here in the grand scheme of things. If you want to draw a parallel to what I'm going through, imagine being told you have less than two years to spend in your beloved home town, where you are treated like a rock star and are privy to the kindest and most genuine people on the face of the earth. I mean, it is going to be devastating to leave this place behind. Wow, what was familiar (America) is now cold and alien, and what was unfamiliar (Burkina) now fits me like a tailored suede glove. Who knew I would eventually feel this way just a few short months ago? Shit is deep, my friends.

Yeah, I don't really know what's going to happen on this blog. I feel that I might become so enamored with my strange (to you) life here that I could alienate my readers. I'm having such an identity crisis right now! But the most wonderful identity crisis a person could ever experience, if that makes any sense. No, it doesn't make any sense. See? I'm doing it already! I'm completely insane. Just know, however, that I will continue with the blog in some way, shape, or form. Just don't expect it to take the same path it was on before. I guess this is the chrysalis phase, but aren't I already gorgeous?

PS: I still feverishly update my Twitter and Flickr pages, so check those out regularly.