The Saturday Evening Post - March 19th 2011

Who is Stacey F-Markon?

I hate running.
Well, I hate running without a purpose, like catching a frisbee.
Uh, why do I hate running?
Maybe one day I will go for a run.
Tomorrow I am going for a run.
I like running.
I really like running!
What? Who am I?

I swear, someone must have spent millions of dollars to perform “inception” on me to get me to like running. Did you know I am even thinking about training to run the Kampala half marathon in December? Since when?!

It is crazy what you feel in Peace Corps service. You have good, bad, angry, giddy, etc days. But you don't necessarily open yourself up to change.

This past week I was talking with my friend Kiera about Peace Corps service. You know everyone is different and everyone is going to experience service in a different way. You change with service. I told her I couldn't believe myself that I am running. Yep! You surprise yourself she said.

What else will change? What else will I open myself up to while I am here? I mean really, this is the only time in me and Tony's lives that we will ever be separated from life in the states. It's like going away to college but to the extreme. People change in college but they still have influences around them. We don't have those influences in Peace Corps.

It is a time of freedom really. Freedom to really explore yourself as a person and what you want to become. This new Stacey, I have no idea where she came from but she is there. Its weird and scary in a way. You think you know yourself and then Bam!

But what am I so afraid of? Why not grow and change? Why hold anything back?

I have another year in Uganda to surprise myself. Who knows who I will become. Its shocking and intriguing. It makes me wonder what I have been missing all these years.

I don't know! It's crazy. I am still flabbergasted at the idea of running but I am still going to get up in the morning, plug in my ipod, and run.

I am going to run past my Deputy Principal (who looks at me like I'm crazy), past Peter pushing the water cart, past the Bore Hole, down to the old railway station built by the British, along the tracks, past the brick-makers, wait for the cows and goats to cross the path, run up to the mango tree, turn around and run towards the sunrise over Mt. Elgon and home again.