plankton on the nile

i finally got my ugandan medical license.  i finally became 'official' and 'legal' and all those sorts of things, which is fantastic, but, it also means that i have to figure out what to do with all of those sorts of things. i suddenly have to make it.....real...my being a doctor here.  i mean i've been seeing patients and doing house calls and testing people for malaria on the football pitch, but now it comes the time to....commit....in a real way and this is kind of scarey. 

the license came at the same time as mike was beginning to ask me what i was doing here in uganda.  what my mission was, and was i accomplishing it? he was looking at me and my days and asking a very reasonable but challenging question- are you doing what you came to do? which gave me pause....

because lately, i've been feeling like a piece of plankton floating along on the waves.  because lately i've been feeling blown about like the wind. untethered. even aimless.  going through the many motions of life, but only doing that.  lately, i've been wondering what i'm doing here? (the new eyes helped, but still...)

so yesterday i started at the university clinic and in the small ways it was wonderful, but in the big ways it hard and eye opening and humbling.  in the little moments of connecting with the patients it was great and i felt useful and helpful and purposeful. but in the bigger ways, the systems ways, the culturally challenging ways, it was hard hard. 

it made me realize that you can take the girl out of america, but you can't take the america out of the girl. it made me realize that change is slow and then,, actually even slower than that. that change requires the belief that something needs changing......hmmmm.  that here relationships matter most, and people don't express when they are upset because everything 'is fine'. 

it made me understand mike better. it made me understand his days.

when i got home, deflated, we talked.

he asked me again, why i'm here and what i want to do. 

i told him i want to improve health and healthcare systems and he told me that i'm just beginning and what did i expect?

i told him i felt swallowed by africa and really right now i would rather to go sit on a parisian bridge looking over notre dame and eat a pan chocolate. i told him that this piece of plankton wanted to ride the nile north and land in the mediterranean, hopefully heading toward france.  or italy.  maybe florence.... the ponte vecchio... i told him that maybe front porch medicine was more my cup of tea, because at least i had control, at least it was just me deciding what was best. 

'but that doesn't sound like what you came here to do' he said.

'yeah, but right now that is what i want to do, the europe part, not the front porch part.  i mean, i don't know if i can do it.' i retorted.

'it's been one day of clinic.' he reminded.

'true.....i guess i should get back on the horse.'

and i thought about it. we came here because we believe that God cares for everyone and we should too.  we came here to try to teach what we know in a culturally sensitive way.  we came here to serve the people of uganda.  we came here to practice what we do and how we live, with justice, and mercy, and to walk humbly with our God. 

the question i should be asking myself at night as i go off to sleep is not how many people were correctly diagnosed with malaria, but did i love justice, and practice mercy and did i walk humbly with my God? did i love people well, was i patient, was i accepting and kind, was i gentle?

thank God God gave us days that end in nights and start again 12 hours later.  thank God for sleep and rest and food and families and forgiveness and trying again.

today i tried to live in my moments again.  to not be swallowed.  to breathe. to enjoy the nile and be okay that it's not the mediterranean.  and tomorrow, i will go gently back to clinic, quietly and gently, to practice justice and mercy and humbly walk with my God.

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