Dropped

My pocket buzzes, and I look down to see the email I have been waiting for since September. I shudder.

~

I find myself at yet another dance show. The lights dim in a fashion so familiar it is nearly intertwined in my DNA. I have grown up watching dance shows, and I can tell you all about them. I can tell you how easily my body shrugs a friendly arm over the shoulders of my host sister’s opening routine. I can tell you just how I fix my eyes on stage as the lights collect and brilliantly fuzz around the edges, adding more magic to the movement.

My host mom and I sit in the last row in the back. My host sister Fe had failed to purchase the right number of tickets, so while the rest of my family sits centered in the front row, my host mom and I mumble bitter stabs that range from how no one wants to be friends with us to honestly was it really so hard to find a few extra seats to pass me another cheez-whiz to where the hell is the Coke? With orange dusted fingers, my host mom pulls out her camera to record Fe’s dance. Her face puzzles into a fierce determination.

And then a baby shows up. I swear, he literally just appears. One minute, I see colorful polleras and the next, a giant shadowed head is bumping and flying and wailing across the screen of my host mom's camera. As the shadow grows and grows, my mom's brow furrows profoundly. And okay, so I am just gonna go there: the ridiculousness of this baby’s head reminds me of that goat parody on Taylor Swift’s “I Knew You Were Trouble”. Like, one moment you see beautiful dancing and smiles and then all of a sudden BAM BABY FLIES ACROSS THE SCREEN....Okay okay, yes, a wonderful group take on that turn , wow Fe looks JK BABY BE BUMPIN’. My host mom takes a deep breath, clearly trying to focus on getting the most footage she can.

The baby just comes back, bigger than ever. Here, my host mom nudges my arm and tells me to say something to the father, the puppet master of this grand affair. I kind of freak out. I hate confronting people. It's not that I don't have experience confronting annoying fellow dance parents (as the older sibling at my sister's dance shows, I was continually sacrificed for this battle: I would push myself to the front of the line and elbow out older moms to get my family to the front row, laying blankets down like a goddamn pro). But to actually talk to someone? I mean, that's just too much. My host mom nudges me again, this time ordering me to say something. I am flattered that we have gotten to the point in our relationship where she can be the bossy mom, but all I mutter back to her is a frantic, "Pero, ah, um mamá realmente no hablo español..".

She just gives me a blank stare (**so so close to being another Taylor Swift reference). I try to make my eyes big to look cute in defense. Without taking her stare away from me, she taps the man on the shoulder and just wags a big finger in his face. Then, she makes a head gesture that can only be translated as 'shove it'.

And I am in hysterics, exuberating deep-throated shimmies. After the show and for the following week, my host mom continues to make fun of me. Her favorite greeting for me becomes, "oh look, it's the girl who can't speak Spanish!". 

I can only smile as my heart plants ever more roots in Bolivia. 

~

The email subject line reads: CONFIRMATION OF WITHDRAWL FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF DENVER. 

I have officially dropped out of school for the quarter to go work on some farm in Bolivia. The feeling that hits me is incredulousness- riveted on some crux that feels both so close and so far away from home. My heart pounds, but it isn't long until I begin to get lost in my daydreams. I float quietly to that distant fifth moon I know all too well...


I face my critics. They are kind of a motely crew, lined up to interrogate me.

I take a deep breath and walk over to my first critic. 

"Okay, let me have it." I announce boldly. Then, I face myself at age 14. She looks so serious, and also so thin. Seriously, is that a collarbone or a razor blade? She stands kind of shaking under a heavy sheet of pressure. She wants to make it to an Ivy League school and is wound so so tight. I hate to see her this way. But she lets me have it. She screams that I am throwing all her hard work away and that this decision of mine is not the dream we had. She's crying as she sees all her struggled hours of work get thrown away for a farm in Bolivia. I stand there saying nothing. I just take it. Then, she reaches out to pinch my elbow. It bruises, and I instinctually reach up to rub the pain away. I try to muster my apologies through a last look at this girl I used to know. I walk to the next person in line as the pain eases (and I must say I am impressed at the force of that elbow pinch, as this was the same girl who couldn't even lift the bar in weight training class).


As I walk, I feel a haze of light start to warm the horizon behind me. 

Next, I face my privilege- mi privilegio. I embody nearly every privileged identity trait (I am really really not saying this to boast). All of these identities, which have helped secure me a much easier path in life, depend on a world violently tilted in my favor. I was unfairly given not only a clear map in life, but the fucking treasure map (and actually, add on a guide to this. He was there waiting on my mountain trail with warm snacks and gave me sweet nothings of encouragement along the way and he was even beautiful with a crooked smile that swarmed butterflies in my stomach). I face my privilege- my very privilege of being able to abandon all responsibilities to stay in Bolivia. I think of all the injustices that are setting fire across the United States and the World and my fiercest critic scathes me. My running away to Bolivia is not working to even out the playing field or to right oh so woeful wrongs- I am running away with everything I have. I fall to my knees. The air is thick with this burden of truth. I feel a gut punch and my nausea grows. 

I stand up to continue on. That hazy light grows to cover half the sky. 

Here, I face all the love of my friends and family. And I am so lucky because this is a lot of love. I have always been the person to be taken care of, never really much of a caretaker (think I'm missing that key maternal instinct). In fact, I have always attracted mom-types- those who continually look at my flushed face and crazed hair and promptly pick me up to put me back together again. Moms are my people. All this love just looks at me with sadness. I have abandoned them for some bullshit noble pursuit of exploring more of myself. It is bullshit because I am telling them that I need to leave them in order to find a piece of myself when they have uncovered and extracted all the most beautiful parts of me. They are the reason I could ever be considered beautiful and whole and alive. I have left them. I feel a gash in my forehead. It's going to need stitches. 

The light is nearly infinite behind me. 

Finally, I face Noah from The Notebook. Yes, Noah. I am Allie (coincidence that we share the same name? I think not). We are in that one scene where Noah and Allie stand outside of his home and they are fighting as Allie tells him she needs to go tell her fiancé about their affair. Okay, so enter scene: 
I try to reach for the door of my car, but Noah slams it shut. He shouts, 

"You’re bored Allie. You're bored and you know it. You wouldn’t be here if there wasn't something missin'."

I glare at him, but maybe he's right. I could be bored. Then (because this is still my daydream) we start to post-fight angry make-out. It's pretty hot. Maybe he even slips a hand under my shirt but over my bra... Okay, I know I'm getting distracted. But I angry make out with Noah for a bit and walk away with a crooked ankle.

Despite all this- despite all of these truths- I choose the selfish route. I choose to be so selfish. I face all of these critics and these wounds and I frantically search for my defense. Words come up short but there is that light so big behind me. That light has grown infinite, and I know it is that first doubt I had back in September. The doubt that I would be ready to leave South America at the end of December- it was a doubt so deep within me. I know it's a selfish doubt but, and now I am addressing my critics, this light and this power and this huge expanse filled with brightness has propelled something infinite within me I swear. Please. Please. I know I don’t what this light is made of- but what if it's fucking stardust?


When I miss people, I do this thing where I imagine that first hug once we are finally reunited. It's just that first moment where I nuzzle my head into someone's neck and I feel arms wrapped so tight around me and I shut my eyes tight to hold back tears. I stand in front of all my critics, and I start to picture hugs. I see hugs at the top of that escalator in DIA and I smile at hugs all across my university campus and I miss all those pairs of arms so much. But I fill myself with that power. I run and run into the arms of others- love booms above me as words from the late Maya Angelou:

 Love recognizes no barriers. It jumps hurdles, leaps fences, penetrates walls to arrive at its destination full of hope.

The words boom, but I ask myself one last time: am I the biggest coward of all? I used to think the decision to drop out school to work on some farm was brave, yet maybe I shouldn’t be protesting these criticisms. Maybe I should just let them sit...

 But I can’t help but fidget under the accusations. Please, can I just add that I am trying to learn? That I am doing all of this to learn? To learn so so differently? I have spent years with words and I just want to learn with my hands, to feel the Earth, to pulse with an unfathomable greatness. I am trying to learn so that I can be better. Look, I know that this might not be enough and that I should just sit with those valid contradictions. I know, and I am so sorry. I fidget again. I fidget with that warm haze behind me. 

To my dearest critics, I promise I am going to chase the bright bright light. I will hunt the most profound beauty! I am trying to find that fucking stardust.

And so, I press the button to withdraw from school. I drop all of my classes, one by one. I sign the form and scan it in. I press the final confirmation. I drop out of school to go work on some organic farm in Bolivia.

I really don't know what to say. 

Before & After

The Time I Was Going to Save the World

I have always had potential. Everyone throughout my schooling career has told me so.

Like the model student I was, I read those textbooks closer and I made those worksheets neater and I was always so easily the apple of my teacher’s eye.

Then, like any young student with potential, I started to rack up my leadership experiences. I was paving my pathway to success through my carefully calculated volunteer hours at the homeless shelter. Thank god those kids are on free and reduced lunch- I now have the perfect unpaid internship opportunity for the summer.

This volunteer work will look great on my college application.

Conveniently, there was always so much pain in the world to fill my resume with. I got my straight A’s and they told me I was going to be something great so I dreamt myself onto podiums. God, the crowd was cheering and I was waving and I was making people cry in inspiration and I was holding all of the organizations and people I have ‘helped’ on my impressive resume, showing the world that I am not only a model student but a good person.

Don't mind those people’s souls or their dreams or what makes them weep or what makes them come alive, dear Alyssa! All those people in need have already been reduced to your dimensions of 8 by 11.

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Enter.

They told me I was gifted and talented as they wrung bodies in the streets. Please don’t spill anything on our high-achieving classes. They are the future.

But they told me I was the future and that I was gifted and that I was most likely to succeed because I never questioned anything.

I read textbooks cover-to-cover, copious notes and a wicked fast memory, yet I never stopped to fill myself with poetry. I always raised my hand to give them answers- but where were my questions? I always had potential because I looked like them, walked like them, talked like them,

Thought like them.

They told me I had potential and that I was going to save the world.
I never questioned anything.

~

An open letter to myself from that little piece of Universe inside me:

Let's begin with forgiveness. I know that you have made some mistakes along the way. You were so artfully seduced by fictitious notions of success, and you spent many years chasing dreams that were not yours. However, you cannot allow yourself to be paralyzed by this indignant perfectionism- hallowing yourself out only leaves emptiness. Yes, you tried too hard to be Superman and failed to see that what Lois Lane really needed was a systematic shift of the culture of violence that targeted her as a woman instead of those strong arms and red cape. Yes, you should never be Superman. You should be a listener with every figment of your arched soul- let’s bare ourselves open to listen.

You chose to study in Bolivia for a few reasons. The first reason dates back to the sixth grade. It was your very first Spanish class and you didn’t understand a word of it. Mr. Hinkle was talking so incredibly fast that all those unfamiliar sounds blended into something between knock-kneed poetry and a quiet challenge to learn that stream of words. Mr. Hinkle would later share his stories of traveling down the coast of South America and right there under the atypical inspiration of florescent light, you knew you had to get to that place somehow. And then after many more years in classrooms under florescent light, you came to realize that you wanted to hear a different story about the world. I am not quite sure how you knew, but I will forever be thankful to that persistent roar inside you. You wanted a paradigm shift- to understand the world differently. You wanted to shed light on dusty corners that have been violently abandoned and so, you came to Bolivia to listen to a new knowledge (I think this really is the first time you acted to listen rather than to create).

This pursuit of a careful collision between adventure and new knowledge has brought you to the indigenous university. The intercultural context fuels all your pursuits of new knowledge because it reveals all the gaps you were never taught to see. You talk and share and try to connect- of course with flaws and incompleteness. But this time, you are not working to reduce anyone to the little slip of your resume. You are here to learn vulnerably and to value those small personal moments as vital slivers of knowledge. This knowledge- not available in textbooks- is working to revalue humanity. I know that the journey to revalue humanity is not just poetic prose from your rosy-shaded mouth: it is the lethal weapon against the many interlocking systems that function from the destruction of humanity. This destruction was every history class that pioneered American expansion as heroic. This destruction was and is colonialism. This destruction was assigning a market value to a tree.

The systems feed you things to memorize but they never stop to teach you humanity. So here, through small memories and talks about dreams you are trying to transform personal knowledge into power. In the future, you want to work in education reform. It is both infuriating and emboldening that are so many different ways in which the secondary education system needs reform. The two main issues that plague the system today are inequality and an unwillingness to welcome new styles of teaching into the classroom. These two issues intersect intimately- many students have been left behind by the school system because the pedagogic techniques were designed to only value one dominant form of knowledge. So the solution is intersectional. You might not know in what capacity you are going to work to reform education because you are not going to be Superman. I know you will figure out your role some day. Right now, I say that you continue to be a learner. Recognize the deep paradox that the classroom that tried to strip you of your humanity was also the very first place you ever felt alive.

As the little bit of Universe inside you, I want you to know that I will always love you. I will love you more than you could ever possibly know because my love is infinite. I will love all these fragmented pieces of memories and friendship that cement as a mosaic within you- these will become your most powerful allies of knowledge. And I am writing as that little piece of Universe inside you because I am a part of you, I am made of you, and I will be here as you fight for something bigger than you.

Xoxo,

U.