Drinking from the Saucer by Charlene C. Duline is a fascinating memoir of a strong-headed, devout, and idealistic young black American woman who was among the first volunteers to join the Peace Corps in response to President Kennedy's famous challenge to America in 1960.
"Ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country.".
Duline grew up lonely and isolated in an urban Indianapolis neighborhood where her step-father raped and abused and her mother appeared either unwilling or unable to protect her daughter. After one year in college, she left home to live with an aunt in New York - a situation that was different but not much better than the one she left behind because her aunt was an alcoholic.
Wanting to make something better of her life and to serve humanity and her country, she enters the Peace Corps where her first assignment is to Peru. The narration of her experiences in the small towns and villages is a delight. In one instance she was so paralyzed with fright when confronted with a swinging bridge over which she had to pass daily in order to get the mail that a fellow volunteer offered to do it for her. Duline refused and showing the strength of will that shines ever more clearly as the story progresses, Duline steels herself and eventually learns to cross with ease. This strength serves her well as she moves on from the Peace Corp to work in the United Nations and from there joins the United States Information Services (USIS).
During her 25 years with US Information and Foreign Services, Duline is assigned to some of the most troubled places in the world -- first to Haiti, then in Tanzania. She was asked to take over the USIS in Swaziland from where the story moves to Liberia, South Africa, and back again to Swaziland, and finally to Panama during the Noriega Crisis. Somewhere in the book Dunline quips that her arrival usually presaged the eruption of one coup or another.
As a black woman diplomat serving in these troubled emerging nations in very troubled times, Duline had to navigate a labyrinth of prejudice, obstacles, and diplomatic sensitivities, managing to do so not only with competence but with excellence by drawing on her seeming unlimited reserves of determination, confidence, skillful management, and insight. In some ways, her life of service reminds me of that of priests and nuns who are assigned to one place after another with little say in the matter, and sometimes with little advance notice. She speaks of packing and unpacking large amounts of boxes but I did not realize how many until she mentions shipping 400 boxes back to Indiana after she retired. Unable to imagine carting 400 boxes from place to place, I have decided that the boxes she used must have been smaller than the typical cardboard "crates" packing services use nowadays.
What an exciting read this was – at times confusing, sometimes remote, but always fiery, funny, and wise. Within the pages of this memoir we discover and celebrate the strong and vital woman who lifted herself from poverty and prejudice into the complex landscape of world diplomacy.
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Comments: 16
How are you doing? Any new books in the works?
Your article is Featured in the Triple Name Club.
Thanks.
About boxes, I still have boxes unopened from 5 years ago when I moved to the house that I live now!! :-)
how good that she went through such early circumstances and was led to serve. 400 boxes is hard for me to imagine too, though...I've just been cleaning out closets today and I think that will give me new determination to clear things out!