EAGLE VS. STOKES

When you were young you were the King of everything around you….or at least that is the way life could seem to feel at different times or different situations. Boundless energy, boundless confidence mixed with gripping fear over the exposing of the confidence previously mentioned as false and a front all along. I have been the best in certain situations at certain things at different times in my life and everyone has experienced this at some time or another. At those times it is easy to lose any grounding we may have possessed. Arrogance is a foolish and selfish endeavor but a human one that none of us have not at least dipped our toes in. I myself still hold a certain amount at certain times and while the effort to change that has been great for me over the last number of years….it rears its ugly head on occasion. Last week it did just that and taught me a lesson I will not soon forget. I am currently teaching English classes two days a week in a local high school. Tuesdays a...

The following is composed of parts of an email that I sent my dear friend Kate Butler earlier today and also motivated by an email I received from another friend last week concerning a few struggles related to life as we all know it is far from always being easy and those who believe that have just yet to live it.…it has been amended to exclude some more offensive remarks but I thought it conveyed the idea that while I am living an adventure it is not without times where I miss the things that will never be replaced with a random parade or triumphant act of life’s buffoonery. I find it very easy to make a quip or comment but difficult to actually sit down to pen anything significant about my life here as it is really a changing situation day to day. Yesterday I had my first day working in my local school giving English classes in the morning and teaching about small business in an afternoon session.....to say it was not frightening would be the equivalent of saying Priests and Televan...

Dear Diary -As a person of no particular skills at this time- in a country that has castrated me via it having a different language- it is amazing how many things can occur or not occur when you least expect them. After a relatively productive morning slumming in the library and the municipality putting together some surveys for the good people of Illimo I retired to my home. At exactly 1 PM the daily task of seeing how much food my host family can put in front of me to see if I can eat it all commenced….each day at 1 PM there is a serving of food put in front of me that can only lead me to believe that they have full intentions of at some point roasting me over an open fire. I believe they mock me when I exercise, they scoff at how much water I drink, and they laugh as I groan through the last bites of my lunch time feeding. I literally have to retire to my chambers every day and lay quietly on my bed as all blood resources in my body rush to my stomach area to aid in digestion...