2,966º Celsius

I sat at my desk, head buried in my hands, and cried. 

Thankful that my office was at the end of a quiet hallway and that my boss rarely disturbed me, I let the tears flow. With a Kleenex in hand, I sobbed quietly, waiting for the feeling to pass so I could resume my morning work. There was nothing I could do, after all. 

Perhaps that was why it all felt so terribly difficult. Because there was nothing I could do. I was stuck. In an impossible place. With no way out. 

That morning I had sent yet another email asking if there was an update on the maintenance request including an a/c unit for our little apartment. When we had moved in, we were told that the work was planned for a few months later. 6 months later I inquired and was told there was no time frame yet. 9 months after that, I sent another email reminder. Mid-May I was told it would take 4-6 weeks. 6 weeks later, I sent another inquiry about an update and was informed it would take a few weeks for the maintenance request to be completed and was asked to be patient. The a/c would not be installed before August because the budget had already been spent for the next month.

Patience. 

When you put a frog in a pot of boiling water, turn off the heat, and it tries to jump out, do you tell the frog Be patient? After all, if they wait just 30 minutes or more, the water will be less hot. Of course, the frog could be cooked by then, but that is not the point, is it? The point is to be patient. Endurance and all that. 

I texted my husband, sharing my frustration. He told me not to worry about it and that one day all things would be made right. But we are supposed to be Christians and if someone hits us on one cheek, we are supposed to turn our face so they can hit us on the other cheek too, I replied somewhat hopelessly. 

If that is what a religious community is like, then I don't want to be part of it was his astute reply. 

Lately it feels like I'm just sitting in a pot of boiling water all the time. I earn the equivalent of $2.25 an hour; I cannot exchange local currency into USD but the majority of services in the country now demand USD or local currency based on the black market exchange rate. My salary has doubled, thanks to the generosity of my employer, but prices have increased up to 10 times higher. I am limited in how much I can withdraw from my bank each week. Every time I go to the grocery store, prices have jumped, often quadrupling within a matter of days, so that our daily meals are becoming more and more simple. Even staples are increasing in price. Gas stations ration fuel, only allowing you to fill up 1/8 of a tank at a time, if they are even open. Often, after sitting an hour in a line that others try to cut into, we reach the front only to be told the gas has run out. Electricity shortages are starting to hit now so internet outages are a very real possibility. Covid still lurks as evidenced by masks required in all public indoor spaces. Protests against the country's crises lead to roads being blocked with burning tires. And on top of it all, the heat rises, metaphorically and literally. With no cooling system in sight. Least of all an a/c. 

Ironically, I grew up in Africa so my body knows how to adjust to heat. After my cry this morning, I reminded myself that I will not die. We have a fan, thankfully, and our basement apartment has thick walls so the heat does not hurt as much as if we were in a rooftop apartment. We will adjust to summer's sticky heat just as we adjust to the mold that creeps all over our walls during winter's moisture-laden storms. In the end, however, that is not why I cry. 

An air conditioner costs $238. Not much to invest in an employee but apparently, too much for this month and the next, maybe even the one after. And that is why I feel so discouraged. Because I am being told, you are not worth $238. Because it is one thing after another after another. When I'm not fighting lines at the gas station, searching for fruit that is not outrageously priced, or going to the ATM for the umpteenth time to check if they have cash so I can make a small withdrawal, I am sending email after email asking when the maintenance request will be done, when we can get a/c, when the reimbursements will come, when, when, when. And I'm told to be patient. 

According to The Atlantic, "If you throw a frog into a pot of boiling water, it will (unfortunately) be hurt pretty badly before it manages to get out -- if it can. And if you put it into a pot of tepid water and then turn on the heat, it will scramble out as soon as it gets uncomfortably warm" (Fallows, 2006). 

Boiling water hurts. Sitting in boiling water time after time eventually leads to a feeling of hopelessness, just like in learned helplessness, where a person goes through stressful situations so many times they eventually, " come to believe that they are unable to control or change the situation, so they do not try — even when opportunities for change become available" (Leonard, 2019). 

There is hope. According to the same article, CBT that provides support, encouragement, positive and beneficial thoughts, ways to decrease feelings of helplessness and improved self-esteem will help someone overcome learned helplessness. The only problem is, what do you do when the place that sets you up for this behavior is unable to provide any of those positive reinforcements? 

Then you just cry. After that, you wipe your eyes, shut your heart, go into auto-pilot mode, and just get the work done. Because after all, there is nothing that you can do.