*Peace Corps Volunteer
I chanced across a really interesting article today, "I'm Still Here: Back Online After a Year without the Internet" on my facebook newsfeed no less, that made me reflect on how my own relationship with the internet has changed during Peace Corps. It's the story of a man who gave up the internet for a year, in the hope of making himself whole again, but then found himself feeling isolated from the people he loved. A lot of things in the article resonated with me, particularly the feeling of isolation from loved ones that arises when I don't have access to it.
I have moments where I fantasize about how "pure" the Peace Corps experience might have been like in the 1960s, where people just marched off, saying "Bye, I'll talk to you two years from now." Thanks to the internet, and phone calls, I feel like I'm living three completely irreconcilable lives simultaneously: the life I have with people in San Miguelito, the life I have with other friends who are volunteers, and the family and friendships I left dangling back home. It's disorienting sometimes, and complicated. Over time, though, I've come to appreciate how beautiful my tangled up life is and how much the internet enables me to know what's going on back home.
When I first got to Nicaragua, I was terrified of the internet. I couldn't deal with seeing my friends on facebook, seeing emails about fascinating talks back at college, checking the news and feeling disconnected from everything that was important to me. I wanted to hide from the virtual reminders of home, thinking it would make me feel better, cleanse me, make me more present to my new reality. I wanted to pretend that I could become a Nicaraguan version of me and erase my identity back home.
Over time though, as I've become more settled in here, I've built my peace with the internet, realizing it would be insane to try and live without it. I smile, instead of wanting to cry when I see pictures of people having fun back home (unless there's good food or beer involved) and I cherish the moments when I can get a good enough connection to Skype with my parents or friends. I read articles to keep me mentally sharp. Once in a blue moon, I can even get youtube videos to load. The internet is a beautiful place, inhabited by people I love, and it's easy enough to get to.
At the same time, less frequent access has generally made me feel less stressed out, twitchy, overstimulated. Like the author of the article, I've found that I can really concentrate much better now and that my memory is sharper. I can read, 200, 300 pages in a sitting if it's a good book, just like I used to when I was little, in the age of dial-up. And I write a lot more too, journaling, planning, writing letters sometimes, a homage to the experiences of volunteers of past decades.
As a wise hipster once counseled me when I was trying to decide what kind of tomato sauce to buy: "Life's all about balance."
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