Perceptions of Mama Fly On The Wall: Following My Heart

By LeAnne Strong

By opening herself up to new adventures, she ended up finding herself.

LeAnne chose to become a fly on the wall while visiting with her daughter in Africa, humbly learning so much more about life through quiet observation. By allowing herself to be empowered to try new things, she found she could perceive concepts and ideas that

• Language: English
• Publisher: LeAnne Strong
• Release date: Apr 6, 2016
• ISBN: 9781945058707

LeAnne Strong

LeAnne Strong is a native-born Californian who enjoys travel, bocce, bunco, walking, yoga, meditating, dancing, and is an avid white water rafter.

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Copyright © 2016 by LeAnne Strong

All rights reserved.

Green Ivy Publishing

1 Lincoln Centre

18W140 Butterfield Road

Suite 1500

Oakbrook Terrace IL 60181-4843

www.greenivybooks.com

ISBN: 978-1-945058-26-4

Revised 2016

TITLE:

PERCEPTIONS OF MAMA FLY ON THE WALL

SUBTITLE: FOLLOWING MY HEART

VENUE:

A TRAVEL ADVENTURE MEMOIR

AUTHOR:

LeAnne Strong

PHOTOGRAPHS:

LeAnne Strong and Kristin Strong

perceptions

of Mama

Fly

On

The

Wall

FOLLOWING MY HEART

LeAnne Strong

THANK YOU

I wish to thank all of the people that I have encountered on this journey writing that I have documented or referred in this book. These people have willingly given me their permission to use their first names. I could not have written this book without either their presence in Benin at the time I visited or without their kind help afterwards assisting me with correct information of Beninese word spellings and definitions and also of culinary terms of the foreign foods I experienced while visiting Benin. I have tried to be as accurate as possible by documenting my experiences immediately each evening while on my adventure to Benin. My heartfelt thank you to all named in this book for making it possible to go to print.

I would also like to express my love and thanks to the many wonderful children in all of Benin who befriended and communicated with me without using words due to our language barrier. Many of their photos are included in this memoir. These beautiful children innocently pulled at my heart strings with their interest in me without my even knowing their names.

PREFACE

This is my perception of the years just before and during the years in which Kristin was volunteering in Benin Africa. I experienced many adventures during this time, while following those that Kristin was taking on her own. I share my feelings here in this book as adventures and experiences unfold as I open my eyes to new ideas, to excitement, education, worry, fear and love. Kristin and I both follow our hearts, step out of our boxes, and cross our own lines. I most importantly share with you a feeling of pride in my daughter for the commitment she made to the Peace Corps.

THE FIRST TIME I FOLLOWED MY HEART AND STEPPED OUT OF THE BOX

My plans for my first adventure began with one of my best friends (Linda) in my senior year of high school. Somehow we had never talked about the different colleges or life plans we would have when we graduated. We lived in the here and now. But almost every day at lunch break we did dream of saving all of our money (babysitting for only fifty to seventy-five cents an hour) to fly to Hawaii when we got out of school in the summer. And save we did. I asked for a sleeping bag and backpack on my birthday to prepare myself. We purchased our tickets and called my Godmother, a top model in Honolulu on the island of Oahu, to ask permission to stay with her until we figured out where we would camp on our trip. She sounded excited and was happy we were coming. I remember telling my mom of my plans after I purchased my plane ticket. Her comment was, But you didn’t ask me for my permission! My reply was not sarcastic at all, but rather a statement, I am eighteen years old now and an adult and do not need your permission. I quickly followed this to be respectful to my my mom with, So…is it okay with you if I go? I think she said something to the effect of that she guessed so. What choice did she have now?

We did take that flight to Oahu in June of 1975, arriving at my Godmother’s house to find she was sharing it with two other top models who were in her agency. We went to the Royal Hawaiian Hotel to watch their fashion show and felt pretty special. The drinking age in Hawaii was eighteen, so we did enjoy the night life (although Linda would not turn eighteen until August and it was only June.) No one seemed to mind her age in the nightclubs and we had a great time dancing. We swam, went body surfing, met guys who shared hang gliding experiences on the beach. We took an inter-island flight to Kauai with a mutual guy friend we had met who was traveling alone going the same way. When we arrived on Kauai, my intention was to take a bus to Hanalei where there was camping. We found out that there were no buses available from the Lihui airport to Hanalei. We started walking. And walking. And walking more! Both Linda and our new friend were laughing at me because I had insisted on walking, being naive about the world and not wanting to hitchhike. But after a few hours of hot sun, it was I who put my thumb out for a ride. The road to Hanalei was much different back in the day. There was very little traffic on the main highway. We did hitch rides from various Hawaiians, and I recall one time when (with the help of Linda jogging my memory recently) was an old rickety farming truck that an old farmer was driving that stopped for us. The truck was in such disrepair that we literally had to jumpstart it for him to get the vehicle up the hills!

Linda and I had so much fun in those few weeks. We snorkeled and sunbathed on the pristine beaches most days. We had limited choices of food with our meager funds, and once resorted to finding what turned out to be an almost rotten coconut on the beach, cooking it on our camp stove combining it with a can of spam. This did not turn out to be a good culinary combination, by the way. It was downright awful tasting. After three nights of rain, I am reminded by Linda that I refused to hike up a trail with her and our new friend to a campground and it was at that time that I decided it was time to head home to California.

Her adventure did go a bit further than mine, as she hiked into a wilderness camp to meet other campers. She stayed on Kauai without me for another couple of weeks if I remember correctly. She had always been just a bit more daring and free than I. I truly believe that while you might not be exactly like any one of your friends, you are definitely a piece of them or you wouldn’t be connected in the first place. Linda was the first friend who taught me to step out of the box, and I want to give her due credit for that. Stepping out of the box for me is trying something new and exciting outside of your familiar comfort zone. Though we have both grown apart in lifestyles and distance, she and I are still close friends to this day, seeing each other about once a year. I did call her at the completion of this book to make sure I had my facts straight. She teasingly gave me her usual, My version or yours, LeAnne? I told her I promised to include both. It turned out that there were things I had not clearly remembered about some experiences of our first adventure, and she did not remember a few details that I had remembered as well. Thank you Linda, for being with me on my first adventure and stepping outside of the box with me.

perception

The ability to see, hear, or become aware of something through the senses: the normal limits to human perception.

the state of being or process of becoming aware of something through the senses: the perception ofpain.

a way of regarding, understanding, or interpreting something; a mental impression

-Webster’sDictionary

I had a difficult time thinking of the best title for a memoir that would explain my feelings since my daughter Kristin had decided to join the United States Peace Corps in Benin, West Africa. Was this indeed solely her adventure and not my own as well? I felt like I was being submerged into her experiences with every email and Skype I received. I was drawn into her feelings of stress and frustration, though she was obviously very excited and happy in her new environment. Certainly I did not wish to be in her shoes myself and neither did I try intentionally give her advice on what to do. However, I somehow could not remain unbiased about the things she told me. If I was honest and told her how I truly felt, it could stir up an argument and those moments were precious to me when she decided to call. My solution for sharing the anxiousness I could not help but feel as a mom during this time was to write this book. Now that my daughter was an adult and living half way around the world, I made a pact with myself to try to not comment negatively as I had in the mother role when she had been a teenager, but rather as positively as I could so as to keep our lines of communication open. I of course cannot say I was one hundred percent able to not be negative nor to hold back my motherly advice, but I do feel proud that I did try my best. I felt that she had enough on her plate, and that if she needed me to be there to vent, I was there for her. There were moments when I felt unfairly treated no matter how I responded, but I was sure this had to be natural when someone is left alone to learn and fend for themselves in a strange and challenging environment. Who else could she let down her guard with? Yes, I would take the negative responses and the misunderstandings with a grain of salt. And sure enough, by our next communication all disagreements had been forgotten and she had moved on to a new adventure. This book was my release for the stress I couldn’t help but feel while she was in a third world country, living and teaching in a village of over four thousand Beninese who did not speak English.

INTRODUCTION

Here is my personal perception of following my heart when Kristin was serving in the Peace Corps. I share with you the memorable adventures I found in my own travels during this time, as well as witnessing the amazing culture of Benin to see for myself the life that my daughter Kristin was living.

PART 1

STEPPING OUT OF THE BOX

FOLLOWING MY HEART

CROSSING THE LINE

AUGUST 1, 2012

BEGINNING BENIN

HOW THIS BOOK CAME ABOUT

My daughter Kristin was invited to volunteer with the United States Peace Corps to serve for two years and three months in Benin, West Africa. Where is Benin? I had the same question. The country of Benin is relatively small in acreage compared to the rest of Africa. It is a rural West African country wedged between the borders of Togo, Burkina Faso, Niger, and Nigeria resting in the Gulf of New Guinea. I had never heard of any of these countries in particular, except perhaps on a newscast.

Surely there must be some kind of book out there that had been written to help me understand Kristin’s journey. But search as I might, there was no book out there to purchase. Many books and blogs had been written by Peace Corps volunteers themselves, and though they did give me some insight of the subject, they did not write about the emotions felt by their parents they had left back at home. I wanted to identify with someone else who had gone through what I was going through now.

It was certainly not as if Kristin was going off to college and there would be an expected period of time involved of letting go. I had already gone through that experience four-and-a-half years ago when Kristin had left for Long Beach State University in Southern California. She studied hard to receive her Bachelors Degree with a Major in Anthropology and a Minor in Geography. The degrees she received should have been a clue of what I was to expect. So I continued searching bookstore after bookstore for some kind of self-help book to find out about perhaps other parents who had said their goodbyes to their adult children going into the Peace Corps.

While the Peace Corps is indeed a type of service commitment for the United States Government, it isn’t quite like joining the military. In the military, there are people in charge of you to tell you what to do. You are trained and fed and taught discipline and skills. When you volunteer in the Peace Corps you are taught a new language by submersion, trained in necessary skills and given a stipend to live on. You are assigned and sent to a post (village) to take care of yourself and teach others the skills you have learned. Frustrated by not finding a book out there on the subject of a parent’s perception of the Peace Corps, it was then that this book began. I never dreamed I would ever be inspired to write a book, but now I have been given the chance to realize my own potential to become an author, as well as to document in my own eyes and opinions Kristin’s dream of a lifetime coming true and going to Africa.

This is a perfect opportunity for me to take on the challenge of writing a book, since it was my new resolution to step out of the box, follow my heart and cross the line.

LIFE BEFORE KRISTIN

Upon graduation from high school, I decided to pursue a career as a Medical Assistant because I enjoyed helping people. I went to two years at a local college to achieve my AA degree. This degree led me to careers of a Medical Assistant, Medical Marketing Representative and Cosmetic Surgery Counselor. I have enjoyed volunteering in the Mom and Baby Unit at the local hospital, the tasting room in a local winery, and as an usher at a nearby concert pavilion for many years. I like to stay busy and do not like to let the dust settle under my feet.

I can honestly say that I have been happily married to my awesome supportive husband Robert of thirty years, after dating him and having him as my best friend for five additional years before that.

MY LIFE WITH KRISTIN IN HER EARLIER DAYS AS A CHILD

When Kristin came into my world, my life was changed entirely. I loved my new role as a mother and made a conscious decision to be an at home mom. I chose to devote myself to raising her. The decision was cemented when Kristin was six months old (while working as a Medical Clerk on a graveyard shift in emergency/ trauma at a local hospital) that I needed to give up this job and concentrate on motherhood. I knew that I did not want to work full time as my mother had when I had grown up. I had always thought that I would only have one child, and I was content with that. But on the day she entered Kindergarten, I was so distraught dropping her off on her first day of school that Robert and I decided to have another child, it turns out is Jamie. I remained out of the work force to raise my kids by choice and have no regrets.

Now I would put my career on the back burner indefinitely…never imagining that it would stay on that so-called back burner for the next twenty-two years! I was content being the at-home mom for those twenty-two years and satisfied to be the best mom I knew how to be. I offered my capabilities of being a Room Mom through the elementary school years for both of my children. I remained active in playgroups and moms groups to keep in touch with reality. It helped me personally to stay sane by sharing ideas with other moms so that we were not in this child-raising endeavor alone.

I enrolled Kristin and her brother Jamie in a pre-swim team summer course to make sure that they learned all of their swim strokes properly. I never dreamed either one would actually join a swim team and compete, but compete they did. Joining the swim team was a great family experience, and the best part was becoming a part of a swim team family of good friends for our entire family. My husband Robert was a starter and I a recorder as our contribution for the swim team, and I also had other active roles on the swim team. I volunteered as team mom driver for events of both water polo and swim team for six years.

I knew that I did not want to work full time as my mother had when I had grown up. I had always thought that I would only have one child, and I was content with that.

Kristin’s brother is six years her junior, and he annoyed her growing up as brothers often tend to do. My son Jamie is quieter in demeanor and an intellectual genius on the computer. He has a few well-chosen close friends and likes to stay close to home. Kristin on the other hand, has a zillion close friends from many places around the world, likes to travel and enjoys excelling in competitive and personal sports.

I feel fortunate be married to Robert. We have enjoyed many common interests and activities together such as breath-taking white water rafting, volunteering at a local winery, wine tasting, racquetball, three local bocce ball leagues and lots of travel all over the world. We earned our travel agent licenses together a few years back. It is our intent to concentrate on our home travel agency when Robert retires in a few years. I have also enjoyed taking online cruise specialist courses on my own for our home agency to enrich my knowledge of the world and to allow us to travel more frequently. We have always willingly given much of ourselves to our children, yet also filling our lives with activities that we do with each other as a couple. We have allowed each other to pursue our separate interests as well. This may be why our marriage has been a successful one. And this may also be the reason Kristin has grown up secure and well-adjusted enough to have the desire to explore the world on her own.

WHY I BELIEVE KRISTIN CRAVES ADVENTURE

I would like to share with you how