Four Months

Today marks four months to the day that I have been in Trinidad. I've been working at the clinic for about two of those months, and finally do feel like a familair face to the patients who come in frequently. I can't believe the time has gone so quickly--I made an appointment for someone on Friday for June. Laughing, I told him I couldn't think that far into the future. I know I still have more than half my time left in Trinidad, but I can't help thinking how immanent the end is now feeling. Before going home for my "vacation," it felt as though my time stretched endlessly into the future. Now, it feels like it's all slipping away. I keep wishing time would slow down like it did my first two weeks in Cambodia, where each day stretched on and on and yet never felt slow, only luxurious, like lingering in a warm sun patch. (Maybe though, lighting a fire isn't a bad thing, considering I've yet to start my interviews, and I have med school orientation Aug 3.)

I am so blessed. Every day I walk in and see the ocean glittering in morning sun. Wednesdays, when I get up early for CD4 day in the clinic, I can watch fragments of the sunrise. Evenings, I watch it set from my window, watch the sky burst into color and then watch it fade into the silence of twilight. I came back to church, and so many told me they missed me in the short time I was gone, and in truth, I missed them as well. It's a comfort and joy to know I am so loved.

The little things make my day. Today, I saw a woman I kind of consider my "first patient," if only because I took care of her on a day she came in real sick and we admitted her, and I visited her each day she was in the ward, and she came to trust me (and I feel like I know more of her medical history than the doctors did at the time). She greeted me with a squeal and a huge hug, which we both needed. I almost burst into tears to see her husband, who a month ago had to be almost carried into the clinic by two people and promptly set in a wheelchair and who seemed out of it and yet told me he recognized my voice, walking with just her assistance and talking and smiling. The way he took my hand when I greeted him told me he remembered me. The two of them have gotten so much better; it was so lifting to see. On Friday, two women were talking about their experience and allowed me to listen. Today, I found a woman willing to let me write her story and bring a human face to HIV/AIDS. I wouldn't trade those moments for anything.