"In God We Trust"

Though some people may call The United States a "Christian Nation," it is far from being a nation based on Christian principle and faith. If anything, the easiest way to function in this country is to be lax about your religion, and faith will clash with the "freedom" of these people. I guess it's good we don't hold to religious standards that aren't met by faith, but I'm used to living in a much more religious country-- not so much filled with God-fearing men and women of faith, but a country that has a holiday every few weeks for the sake of Saint someone or Mary Virgin of someplace. All I'm trying to say is that Colombia is flooded with the Catholic religion-- and this is reflected in the holidays. I'm used to a Spring Break that is more often referred to as Holy Week, because we get that week off from school the week between Palm Sunday, Good Friday, and Easter Sunday. The week is more sacred for people, even if only for the sake of religion, but it helps Christians take the week more seriously. It's hard to step back and take the time to take in Christ's sacrifice as we inhale and remember his risen body with every exhalation. With the kind of week I've had, it was hard to crunch out those minutes to be able to really meditate, soak it in, and reflect. But when I did, when I just wrote, read, and thought, I was so humbled, so convicted, so broken, and so thankful. We've learned all about crucifixion in New Testament Survey and I couldn't watch that church Easter play in the same light tonight. We downplay or try to brush past the pain of Christ's suffering. We break it down to flogging, carrying a heavy cross, and the piercing of his hands. As the man playing Christ walked down the aisle with fake cuts and blood as he carried the cross and a Roman soldier beat him on, I noticed some people watched intently, others glanced and looked away, as if hoping that he would hurry up and be crucified already so they wouldn't have to watch anymore of it. I found myself thinking "this is kind of awkward.. are we supposed to just watch him.. or..?" Then I remembered, Jesus went through a lot worse than this, and I felt awkward.. good job, Sierra, you're shallow.

What I came to write about was Holy Week-- how this time last year I had just gotten back from one of the most amazing weeks of my life. This year? I am currently trying to repress this week into my subconscious, from which it will never emerge again. It's honestly a blur, one that I only want to get blurrier. Back to last year. I miss it, I miss it terribly. I miss the faces, I miss the songs, I miss the languages, I miss the river. My little brother got back yesterday from the trip I went on last year to the Amazon. Lilia put up pictures and wrote on my wall that the kids were asking about me.. by name. We were there for 8 days, providing medical care for a few Ticuna villages. Of course, I had nothing to do with the medical stuff, I just played with the kids and painted. I was especially touched in the third village, 2 de Mayo. By the end of our few days there I had accumulated a little gang of boys, ranging from about 6 years old to probably 10. They were my body guards, my buddies, my tree monkeys. I remember the first time I met them was when I was painting bible verses on the outside of houses and a couple of them started following me from house to house. They didn't say a word the entire time, I'm not even sure many of them spoke Spanish. But they stuck by my side, and I put them in charge of designing something to go along with the verses. I gave them each a brush a let them help. Soon enough it started raining and we joined Ruben in the river, playing and wrestling. When everyone went into the jungle on a little hike and we stopped at a fruit tree at the end of the trail, they had filled a huge tree and were throwing the fruit down at me, filling every one of my pockets and theirs with snacks. They ran along the trail, winding in and out of the yuca plants, playing tag, making quick appearances every few minutes as we all walked back. I loved those boys, and I miss them. They taught me how to count all the way up to 4 in Tikuna and they had a great time with my name.. "Sierra, cierra la puerta!!" I love that Lilia and Leo and my brother and the whole rest of whoever went got to see them and play with them, but I wish I could have. I wish I could bring back more t-shirts covered in paintings and hand prints.

On to other things I miss. Friends. Or better said, specific friends. I know people change, but some people just seem to get shadier.. at least the people they are with and places they go. I miss hanging out the way we used to. How we could spend hours doing nothing.. at least it wasn't quite as shady. So I get tired of shady, and I stop coming around. But there are other people involved, and I miss out on them too. The less shady, that is. We all notice that we haven't seen each other in so long, and we all miss it, we all want it back. People started thinking I got shadier, and maybe I did, maybe my life had become slightly questionable-- or at least from the outside. And I wanted to reassure them that I'm the same person, but I might have risked too much by not trusting that they trusted me. I am no circus performer, my balance is all too flawed. I think I had that balance for a few weeks.. but I got tired of shady, I got tired that it was always shady, that it couldn't move from there. So the group I had once neglected, I embraced, and so neglected what I had embraced all too easily at one point. I've been told that I'm really good at making friends. And yes, I think I can admit I'm a people person, but the problem comes when I make friends with people on both ends of the spectrum. I mean, I really do love it, it's diverse, and we know I'm ALL about that diversity stuff! But there's no middle. These different groups never seem to overlap, unless I'm pulling one into the other.. very forcefully. It's tiring, going back and forth. Trying to involve them. It's tiring when I want so badly to pour all of myself into all of the groups, all the while trying to be a responsible student (if you know me well, you know my efforts aren't significant). Some give back so much, and others, though they say they miss me when I'm gone, don't seem to enjoy me too much when I'm around. I carry too much baggage from the other groups, too much "shadiness" let's say. Everyone else in the group is completely giving to the group, but I can't, and I'm not sure some of them are okay with that. I'm afraid what I can give them, if I want to maintain some of the other groups, isn't enough. So I've been trying to give more, but I'm feeling it everywhere else. And so it's all thrown off balance.