1 week

Hey all... this will be my little space on this crazy cyberworld for the next few years while I'm down in Paraguay working as a Peace Corps Volunteer. It's about a week before I head out to my staging event... 10 days before leaving for Paraguay. Just left State College yesterday, and I must say that I'm going to miss that place... it had truly become my home over the last 2 years. And missing autumn in Central PA is a bummer, but have no fear, I'll be heading down to a nice Paraguayan spring (we'll be tilted towards the sun!) while everyone back here is enjoying the beauty of the leaves changing, falling, crunching underneath feet. I've never really been as in tune with the changing of the seasons as I'm experiencing lately... I think part of it was working at Tait farm... being completely at the mercy of the weather... I expect that the work I will be engaging in over the next few years will deepen that relationship between seasons, sun, wind, rain, soil and human.

Just as a quick overview, if you have no idea what it is that I will be doing (and if you have an interest) here we go. I will be leaving to work as a crop extension specialist (specialist might be a bit of an overstatement at this point in time) in the South American country of Paraguay. I had originally been preparing to work as a beekeeping extension specialist, so over the last few months I have been working pretty extensively with honeybees. I hope to incorporate beekeeping in the work I will be doing, as it is a wonderful skill to learn how to manage and work with honeybees, such a fascinating little creature. I found it amazing how little the bees I've worked with actually became aggressive enough to defend their home by stinging... for all the time we spend manipulating their home, stealing their hard earned food, killing them accidentally when opening and closing the hive... not to mention all the unknown stresses that human beings are imposing on them. Pretty amazing indeed... they pollinate our food, we get perhaps the most delicious food known to humanity (i've become quite a lover of honey)... all for a few stings? For all those who fear these little creatures... i tell you, interact with them and you will open yourself up to a world of beauty. And if you find that you are apprehensive about interaction, do the very least and don't end their lives... we owe them at least that much.

Tangent complete. Agriculture. That is what i will be doing for the next few years working in Paraguay. As for any other details, I couldn't begin to tell you. We will be learning both Spanish and Guarani (a language native to some groups of people living in various lands across the South American Continent). Guarani will be the main form of communication, especially for ag. volunteers working in the more rural areas of the country. I think that's all for now. Pennsylvania has been my home for the entirety of my life... and it has shaped me in ways that i am just now beginning to understand. From the rolling farmlands of my Lancaster home to the mountains and valleys of the places I have come to love in central PA, I have been shaped. we are all being shaped, the real question is if we realize it or not. If we allow the natural world to truly become part of who we are and what we believe about the world, as it must be. Or we can choose to separate ourselves from it, but up barriers that allow us to hide from the world and our place in it. Separation. So often we separate; from ourselves and the ones we love, to the food and water that is essential to our survival as individuals and as a species. Can we engage with the beauty of the natural world? Can we face the ugliness that we are creating in the ever increasingly human-dominated world? Can we find a way to fully enjoy the joys of being human beings while simultaneously integrating our lives with the land? with the world that we have taken for granted for so long? The question becomes not "can we?" but, rather, "will we?"

peace & love
keith