being forced to be present.

I was never a big fan of TV. The last time I had a television in my home was when I still lived with my parents back in 1997. Sure, there have been pockets of television-watching in my life, when I would go home for visits or during a brief stint in Australia when I lived with a houseful of Norwegians and an English guy who couldn’t sleep, eat or function in general unless the television was on.

So I was quite surprised when I came down with a curious case of the lack-of-television-blues after moving to Madagascar.

How could I possibly feel this way? I’ve never enjoyed sitting like a lump on a log in front of a glowing screen, being spoon-fed what I should buy and how I should look. But now that I’m in the middle of a fishing village in Madagascar, I suddenly wish I were watching the latest episode of Glee?

Other strange feelings began to emerge, particularly during my second month at site, by far the hardest month I’ve had here. I wanted to be anywhere other than where I was, which as it turns out, is quite a lovely place. I was struggling just to live and failing miserably trying to enjoy myself. I felt irritable with everyone, discouraged by my Peace Corps experience and overall, just plain homesick.

I longed for something to distract me from my self-induced despair, but I couldn’t escape my reality; I was just going to have to deal with living in the moment. In other words, I was being forced to be present, and I kinda didn’t like it.

There was no internet to distract me in its myriad ways. There was no computer at all, in fact, where I could do even the most menial distracting activity, such as finally learn how to use Excel. I couldn’t go out for a beer with friends to take my mind off things, couldn’t go to the movie theater to zone out for the night, couldn’t call up a friend for a quick chat. And, of course, there was no television.

As time has passed, I have begun to really enjoy the simple pleasures of living in the moment. It’s a rare opportunity to step back in time; in a sense I am living as people did centuries ago. For example, a while back I was talking to my dad on the phone, which requires I walk some distance from my village and stand in the middle of a cow field. While we were talking, an ox cart rolled by carrying a large family and sacks of rice. On the other end of the line, 11,000 miles around the planet, my dad was driving down the highway using Skype on his ipad.

Our lives in the westernized world are connected to everything, adding an urgent immediacy to all we do. When I am in my village, I’m not updating my Facebook status, checking email, watching commercials, texting friends or zoning out on YouTube. What I am doing is getting to know my community’s needs, building strong relationships, working on protecting the precious environment of Madagascar… in short, enjoying the life that is actually happening all around me. And being forced to be present, with less and less resistance from me.