Impressive, sir!

One of the constants of Peace Corps service is talking about the things you miss: food, places, weather, freedoms...

Sometimes it is almost taken for granted that the thing PCVs tend to miss the most are our family and friends that have been physically absent from our lives for an extended period of time.  The activities that I did at home, the things I ate and places I visited, don't mean as much without being in the context of the people I did them with.  

So when I talk about missing something like eating a Chipotle burrito, watching a hockey game or going for a run at home - its not only the action I truly miss, but doing the action with someone I love and miss.  

The other day I needed a laugh.  It was just one of those days where things didn't go right, the heat got to me and the lessons I taught at school flopped.  In Cambodia as in America, people can have bad days.  

So I tried to think of a time where I laughed until my sides hurt.  A Cheetos commercial immediately popped into mind: 

You may not think this commercial funny.  Hell, you may find it downright ridiculous and a complete waste of your time watching it now.  But when it first aired on TV I happened to watch it with my younger brother, Scott.  For some reason it really tickled us.  

Sometimes you are just in the right mood at the right time for something to come along and really make you laugh and enjoy something, even if you can't put your finger on what it is.  I am pretty sure Scott and I laughed at this for well over half an hour and then YouTubed it again after we stopped laughing, only to restart our snickering.  

During the bad day I had recently, I laughed mildly when I YouTubed this, somewhat disappointedly as I thought that it would bring me out of my funk.  

But when I wrote the dialogue from the commercial into a text and sent it to Scott, I couldn't control my laughter.  I think it was because I knew that he would read it, laugh and it would again connect us in the same ridiculous way it did some months ago.  

It worked anyhow.  And, not that it takes 9,000 miles and six months of absence to learn this, but a big thing the Peace Corps has helped me to understand is the power of companionship and how much more enjoyable the events of our life can be when we share them with people we love.