Welcome To the Cedar Grove

There are three women, wisest in the world.
They live beneath a vast spreading ash-tree.
One is Urth, the second Verthandi, and the third
is called Skuld, the elf-queen. They are the future
and the past, they are the present with its potential
and its history. They are fate, they are fortune,
they are the laws of cause and consequence.
Our lives are bounded by these laws. Your fate,
my fate, the fate of nations - all are in their hands.

--Scandinavian Poetic Edda

Similarly, we must continually sift through our experiences, determining which patters we will find productive to continue and which should be eliminated. At any point in time, we have the power to conrol the future.

Except that we don't - not always... and rarely to the extent, or in the directions that we often need - otherwise there wouldn't exist such phrases as, 'when life gives you lemons, make lemonade,' because if we had the power to conrol the future, we wouldn't have lemons in that... unless of course we chose the lemons, which begs the question... Did I know how tough this was going to be and choose it anyway? There were things I knew and things I didn't know going into the experience, that's for sure... and I've found that my experiences were matched by another colleague's, in almost the same way. One thing that makes 'dealing' with everything that much more difficult is feeling like I'm not understood, that my feelings are not valid somehow... *shrug* I don't know; that it should all be someone easier. Not the first time I've been 'away from home' right?

So I examine the experience, one thing at a time and in all honesty, put it out there... take what you will, or not:
Uploading my CV to the website was something I did, but didn't expect to hear anything from anyone. These websites work for other people, right?

The first time the guy called, I turned him down out of hand. Yes it was because of the commitment to Cruisetrek. When he called back five minutes later, to give the news of the short term of the contract, I was still afraid to consider it. But many irons in the fire, and something had to turn up... and I was at a stage where I was desperate to work. I was struggling for money, my reputation with people in my family, people who cared about me was suffering. Patience and the ability to help me; support me, by those that love me was suffering, wearing thin and my own self esteem was right at rock bottom. So I said I would consider it - and there began the roller coaster ride that led me here.

The interview wasn't like anything I'd ever experienced. Hindsight tells me the decision had been made on the strength of my CV alone. I don't think I was asked a single question you expect at interview... educational practise, classroom management, underlying Philosophy, nothing... and was practically told on that occasion he would make the offer. That was Tuesday. The offer was made on Wednesday.

Thursday I spent so very much of the day back and forth in a state between indecision and panic, certainty and tears because I couldn't do it. I must have swung back and forth between whether I was going to accept the job or not. Obviously I did. And then the real fears set in. And I didn't want to let anyone down by changing the decision, by going back on what I'd said I would do, and all of the postitives it would bring.

I had four days. Four day to decide what I might need in a place I had no clue about - to decide what was important to take and what I could leave behind, and a limited amount of space to take what I needed. Four days to prepare mentally, and emotionally for being away from everyone I love, everyone that gives me strength, and not knowing when or how we would talk to or see each other. I buried all of that... tried to embrace the experience instead of acknowledging and accepting that fear, and working through it in the best way possible in those 4 days. Was it pride? Did I not want to appear weak?

I flew to Cairo. I was told that I would be met by someone from the school. In my naivety I was expecting someone from the SLT... even another teacher, no... it was a driver. A strange Egyptian man who spoke little English. To contextualise this also - it was 11 at night. I spent over an hour believing I was being kidnapped - sold into slavery or something. Of course I wasn't. I was taken to the hotel where I was being put up for 3 nights... while I got 'settled' with the person that the head teacher had said would share with me.

It. didn't. happen. Not that way at all. Because the housing agent the school uses to find the apartments couldn't find us one where we wanted to be. The girl and I that were going to be sharing were left to fend for ourselves. Okay for her, she was already in an apartment, I was nowhere. Another staff member whirlwinded me along, took me under her 'wing' as it were, helped find somewhere for the girl and I, and things I needed - a friend to a degree, though that's another story. The other girl decided she didn't want to move from her original apartment into another one in the same area. She'd wanted to share because it was a different area. I was left in the lurch again. It turned out all right, in a way, as I have my own place, and the girl I was to share with left in a hurry only a few days later, but that's not the point. The point is, my early experiencee was less than ideal, heightened the fear and left me defensive and closed off - to everything and everyone, and I don't think I've ever truly come out of that. Sure I have moments... moments when I dare to do things, and in those moments I feel almost almost normal, but they are few and far between. The rest of the time I'm stuck in this... twilight zone of just throwing myself into the job at work, coming home to talk to the one I love in the evening, and knowing that I'm doing at least something for our family... I don't want brownie points, mostly because I hate the way I've been with everyone. The way it's all affected me, I feel that weakness that I never watned to feel in the first place. I should be better than this. I shouldn't be affected by this. And I know that's a hard line to take as well, and there will be people out there saying I should give myself a break, but when something like this has changed me in the way it has I can't accept that. I won't.

And just in the spirit of open honesty, to have everything out in the open, there isn't a week gone past where I haven't cried on at least three or four days... sometimes crying myself to sleep. Not for sympathy or 'poor me' do I say this - just because it is. I cry for being lonely, yes, self pity, but worse - I cry because I am hurting the one I love instead of making her feel loved. I cry for her pain.