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Itching to Leave, Leaving to Itch
As part of preparation for departure, it is important to identify things that concern the participant. I did a nice long write up about culture shock and a few of my concerns about my upcoming experience that you can read about by clicking here (The link redirects you to another part of my blog). More than anything, I'm nervous about adjusting to a new culture; however there was one unfortunate aspect of the program that only recently dawned on me.
I like to consider myself a dynamic and multifaceted young woman, but when mosquitos look at me all they see is a blood mobile. The sound of my approach rings through the air like the instantly recognizable carnivalesque music of the ice cream truck and all the neighborhood mosquito-kids run after me.
I'm considering tatooing 'line forms here to my ankles' and charging premium prices for a taste of what I've got to serve. Seriously, if Dracula bit me, he couldn't get more blood then those damn mosquitos. It's like I'm a giant piece of chocolate cake. [And while the objectification of women is a serious issue I'd normally take on, this is not that post.]
The point is, I hate mosquitos and they love me. I always get covered in bites during the spring and summer months. I am uncomfortably itchy and can usually be found reapplying a thick coat of calamine to my legs every 3 hours or so.
But I still counted down to summer every year.
Hints that summer was on the horizon began as the days got longer and the weather got nicer. I knew summer was close when I received my letter in the mail from camp, advising me what to pack, a list I religiously read every year, even though it never changed. And summer had to be closing in as my mom and I would spend an hour each year carefully writing "W.LOW" on every article of clothing I owned. Still, the true start to summer and all of its adventures began the moment I retrieved my bottle of bug spray from the cabinet.
For nearly 17 years bug spray was not only a guarantee of summer, but of new adventures, more fun, and care free late nights.
I first came to Colorado in the Fall of 2011, it wasn't until after eight months living in Denver that one spring evening I looked up and realized that were no mosquitos in Denver. The lack of mosquitos is fact #393 on my list of 'Reasons Why I Love Denver.'
In St. Louis, adventures outdoors to catch lighting bugs were always cut short when the mosquitos became unbearable. I spent countless weeks at camp debating whether I'd rather suffer the itch of the bites, or the sting of the alcoholic "anti itch" chemicals. In Denver, I never had these issues, but my endless itch free nights ended when I returned to Michigan and her lakes.
My legs are once again a red dotted mess, but the weather is too nice to stay inside.
Last week, while sitting in the grass flicking bug after bug off my skin, I was torn from my daydream when I realized exactly where exactly I'll be heading *this* Fall, not to a mosquito-free Denver, but into the tropical humid mosquito infested country of Thailand. Into the midst of everything I had escaped in Denver. Over all the other fears and realizations that have struck me as I prepare for the trip, this one hit me with the most fear and horror.
Still, I am over come with nostalgia for the camp years of my life. I have to smile as I imagine every morning in Thailand, waking up and heading outside to cover myself in the pungent, chemically smell of excitement, adventure, and new friends.
