Postcard from Honduras

Friends are asking about the wayward Fuller in Honduras, so I thought I'd be lazy with this week's blog posting and use her material instead. The photo to the left is not one of hers but it is the reason she went there.

Hi guys!

I didn´t really think I´d get to email you for the restof the trip, but we ended up hanging out in a town for a while and I have time to kill.

I am literally having the time of my life. I miss you guys, but I wish we could extend our stay a few months... we have almost finished building the house here. I´ve become a master mason and have been spending all day in the hot hot sun (it hasn´t rained during work day yet) laying mortar and bricks. Let me tell you, it is amazing. there are these awesome little kids who hang around the worksite. I love them all so much. I have so many pictures of them messing around and I know I´m going to miss them like woah.

On our off days we go site-seeing. One day we went zip-lining over a waterfall and then hiked under it (remember when Laurel and I went canyoning? like that, only without safety gear... way more hardcore.) the food is pretty good. The hotel food is varied, and not always authentic or good. but the portions are HUGE! every day for lunch we go to the house of a family who has a habitat house and they cook us these AMAZING meals. Today was one little girl´s birthday so there was food, decorations, dancing and a piñata. so much fun.

I´m taking plenty of pictures, so don´t worry. I can´t wait for a hot shower (ours are cold...) and a hot bowl of pasta e fagioli when I get home. (I´m thinking I may drive home on Friday night, even if it´s really late. Is that okay if I get home at like midnight? I really just want to crash at home with you guys and detox for a few days.) I miss you guys!

did you ever pay my PGE bill or get my ring from laurel? I really miss that ring.

lots of love,
Maggie

Families Served Current FY: 222
Total Houses Constructed: 5,634
House Sponsorship Cost (USD): $4,370

Wait For It

In East Greenwich, RI, last Saturday night, we warmed our backsides against the earth-friendly burn of enviro-logs crinkling in the copper fire bowl on John and Deb Walsh's patio. As John and Brian conferred over the state of the globe, Deb and I took note of leafless maples, birch, and willow in her backyard. She said, "Sometimes I sit up in the cupola (it's a seaside town), waiting. I look out at all this loss, this emptiness, and I know something's coming. I never know what, of course. Just knowing something is coming is what makes this so beautiful." I wanted to ask if she'd read my last posting of similar theme, but I didn't want to retreat to the literal too quickly. So without speaking, for a few moments we waited together. It was uncharacteristically balmy for a December night. The radiating bowl was enough to warm our chilled parts. The moon lit the sky with a pastel teal that reminded me of the northern lights I once saw in Denali, Alaska. The twigs and twisted barren branches we admired cast a filigree of shadows that levitated lively over the matted patches of grass and frozen dirt. Ordinary objects ordinarily overlooked commanded the landscape: a red wooden storage shed placed catercorner on the grounds, the weathered wooden fence, the telephone wires segmenting the sky scape, the row of rectangular houses lined up like yellowed dominoes. I was taking it all in, this mild expression of the season. I knew the real thing, the abominable part I remembered loving as a kid and hating as a young adult was just days away. We were heading back to Marin in two days. Turns out, we escaped a blizzard by mere hours.

It's easy to take in the beauty in the spareness of the season back in the temperate Bay Area; all you need is an extra layer and a fashionable scarf. It's a short wait, though, before the magnolias and acacias start to bloom. But in New England and other regions where real winter happens and happens and happens, they take it like a beating and sport the wear and tear like prizefighters. When it's over, they will tell you it was worth the wait. And not just for what comes next.