Please don't wake me (no, don't shake me)

I often compare this experience to a night when I struggle to get to sleep, but after falling asleep have extraordinary dreams and never want to wake up. I have indeed lived dreams and achieved long term life goals in Patagonialand, to the extent that I am having trouble identifying what the next steps might look like. This is inspiring and liberating (the Fulbright dominated my energy for the last 2.5 years!), but the undefined future comes with an element of chaos, pure unrealized potential waiting to be transformed into reality. I owe y’all a thorough discussion of the results of my project in my ‘professional’ blog that I have mostly abandoned, but here I will briefly summarize some personal successes and failures. I will not hesitate to admit that the wood smoke pollution in Coyhaique threw me off guard, in a way that cast a shadow on the rest of my time and challenged my ability to live up to the cultural exchange component of the Fulbright. Conscious of this risk, I actively sought out opportunities to share my work with the community, and my informal collaboration with the local water authority provided a sustained platform for exchange. My adviser recently affirmed, ‘you were no hermit,’ and ‘you lived up to the spirit of the Fulbright.’ That said, I all but prevented the possibility of sustaining close personal relationships by living so far from the city with limited transportation. I don’t really need much (I score very low in extroversion on personality tests), but sometimes it is nice to chat with other young, childless folks on the odd sunny evening. I actively chose my short- and long-term physical health over a regular social life, and I don’t regret that choice. In recent weeks, the director of the research organization I worked with invited me to come back after I finish my PhD, my colleagues have expressed continued interest in collaborating, and my contacts at the local water authority have plans to apply for funding to run with the ideas that I developed during my time here. Considering a return to the end of the world feels heavy, but I am unable to ignore the fact that this region is full of opportunity to make a real, measurable impact in the management of pristine rivers and streams, I could affordably live out my homesteading dreams in a way that’s mostly impossible in the states, and Chilean Patagonia offers many lifetimes of adventures. I definitely need to get my house in order and actively go out of my way to build long term relationships. But when many goals line up in one place, it seems foolish to pass that up.