Tengan Sal

“ ‘Have salt in yourselves’ ” (Mark 9:50).

End of the month, and end of the first 15 days in Bolivia. Today was probably the first day where I phoned it in at some moments.

For example, this morning I came down to breakfast after morning prayer and a shower. Usually, the brothers have finished their breakfast and gone, but often there are one or two left I can greet and converse with briefly. This morning all the brothers had left, but there were two visitors unknown to me, a Franciscan friar and a nun whose congregation I did not know. I didn’t know if they were guests here or just passing through. At that moment I found myself thrown off-guard: three perfect strangers. I thought, I’m a guest here, too, and I don’t feel able to welcome them. So I sat scrupulously buttering my roll, avoiding eye contact, hoping not to be spoken to … but I was. I could not understand them fully, but I pretended to understand less than I did to keep the conversation to a minimum. Not my proudest moment, I confess. An opportunity lost.

Then, at Maryknoll, we had the feast of the Comadres to honor the solidarity of the women who study and work here. We had the same elements of food, dance, and music as we did for the Compadres last Thursday. The male students were asked to write coplas for the roasting of the women, and I did. I wrote two, in fact, for staff members. I also asked both of my profesores to let the organizers know that I was willing to play the bombo, as one of the female students did last week. Well, as it turned out, there were no significant roles for the men; we did not sing or dance or make music for the women. This time there were hired musicians to play las chacareras and sing our coplas. Except they didn’t use the coplas I wrote. That, plus no bombo for Brother. I was miffed. I ate my corn-cheese tamale with bitterness in my heart. I offered my talents, but my talents were buried. Phooey!

During afternoon classes I felt languid and made no effort to hide my yawns. (It could have been the tamale.) I found some relief at the third hour of classes. We made our first field trip. On alternate Thursdays we make cultural excursions throughout the city. We boarded one of the trufi-taxis to head downtown, a (mis)adventure in itself. These cabs have no passenger seat belts and not enough headroom for gringos close to six feet in height. My neck hurts. An afternoon torrent flooded many downtown streets, so we arrived late to the historic churches we toured in haste. But tour them we did. I hope to write about the Metropolitan Cathedral, Templo Santo Domingo, and the Franciscans’ own Templo San Francisco in an upcoming post.

When we finished touring Templo San Francisco—gracias, Fray Jorge, for letting us in—and I said goodbye to Profesor Óscar and my classmate Joshua, the Maryknoll seminarian, I returned to the cloister. I yelled at Carmelo, the convent dog who was yapping at me as he has every day since I got here, and flopped down in my room.

All this is to say that my salt lost a little of its savor today. It’s one thing to reach the limits of your knowledge and your energy. It’s another thing to hold back. The former needs no apology. The latter has no excuse. I will ask God to refresh my salt. And I will pledge to do better tomorrow.