Perpetual Rookie

Stanley at School...Hot Teacher

Its been awhile since we got back into the groove of allowing you to peek into my world of nuance and notions. We are working our way back into being a bit more settled....even though today I write 600 miles from the address we are officially calling home for the next few months.
Life is funny. Just about the time you get good at something....things change. I have been a rookie photographer in my youth, a rookie cop in my younger days, a rookie explorer in mid-life, and now it seems that writing and snapping pics is something that I am a rookie at.
Does it ever stop? Do those of us, who are normal people, ever get to a place where we do what we do very well...AND enjoy it?I'm not so sure. I have a dear friend who is in the business of teeth. Even though it has provided him with a comfortable lifestyle, the ability to be generous, and a sense of helping people....the job for him became, over time, a ball and chain (his words).
I watch these guys that go out in suits and ties each day to jobs where the break-lady is the highlight of their mornings. Lots of these people drive really nice cars, have nice houses with nice mortgages. They put their kids in school and allow someone else, someone they really don't know fill their kids heads and hearts with values and information that may not reflect the parents.

I really just don't get it all.

I was listening to Stanley talk to a guy at a lecture we gave a few weeks ago....this guy, probably a WWII vet, asked Stanley what it was like being an American and living in Turkey.....Stanley's response set me back. He said "I'm a Turk, I'm also an American". I am still thinking about that and what it means to Stanley, but his confidence and global view is so much deeper and informed than my views were, maybe more so than they are today.
It must be in the way some of us are wired...even though our crew is pretty worn out right now we are all trying to suppress the excitement of returning to Asia next spring, being with our Turkish family and then diving into a brand new adventure...hiking 500km's of Paul's footsteps to visit the villages and do what we do best.....listen and learn from the locals.
So...here I am, sitting outside at my folk's house in Oregon, pouring rain, raging fire in the fire pit, and after three weeks of this I am finally getting good at writing each day. I am updating my Facebook page daily and finishing writing projects I started in Istanbul. And...in just a few days I will leave this therapeutic and inspiring place and head back home.
And then there, I will start the process all over again, trying to get back into a groove of writing each day, once again, a rookie in my own home.