Breaking News: Peter Pan OD's on Pixie Dust.

At last, concerned parents can stop locking their children's windows in fear each night. The tiny titan, demagogue of disobedience, has fallen. Officials on the tragic scene refused to comment, but one unnamed member of the infamous gang styling themselves "The Lost Boys" tearfully declared: "Poor Peter. He just kept saying he never wanted to grow up, he just wanted to get higher and higher, you know, to fly away from it all." And so he has, his last hit of pixie dust his final one. Pixie dust, merely one of many names for a notoriously intoxicating and addictive substance, has been suspect in the early demises of many rising artists, including the likes of Oscar Wilde, James Dean, Jim Morrison, and, most recently, Heath Ledger. Nearly all of the mentioned deceased had been heard to say, "I want to live life to its fullest," shortly before shooting for the stars (second one to the left, and straight on till morning, so an anonymous source tipped this reporter). Mr. Pan's alleged supplier, one Tinkerbell, rumored to be a "fairy" dealing exclusively to male minors, has been unreachable for comment, and his long-time nemesis, a Captain James Hook, had only this to say: "Crow now, you little [expletive deleted]."

I do my best to amuse. My apologies for the lapse in correspondence. Truth be told, for the past several months I have not been happy here in Burkina Faso. I have been restless, eager to move on. This has always been my way, or at least as far back as I care to remember: the way of the Dabbler. But my interest in my work, and my reasons for being here, have recently been reinvigorated. I now find myself in a position of justifying my projects to my superiors, and to fighting for the right of "my" village to host another American volunteer after my departure. I do not know if it is a battle I will win. But in my efforts I have re-discovered my convictions for why I came, and why I stayed, and I am starting to learn how my experiences in West Africa have changed me.

A person whose opinions I value recently suggested that my frustration of feeling that I was not a "good" volunteer came from my inability to decide exactly what kind of volunteer I wanted to be. Was I the well-integrated stranger, the spoiled expat, the worldly writer, or the Peace Corps party socialite? They all seemed attractive choices to me, and so I tried to be all of them at once, or each of them during different phases of my service. I didn't come to Burkina Faso to significantly change anything. I came for the arguably selfish reason to learn, believing it to be the height of arrogance to try to "save" someone without understanding them, but I got caught up in the excitement and peer pressure of my more idealistic colleagues, and in my rush to prove myself I made some incredibly naïve mistakes. In my second year I calmed down, and I tried to focus on organizing activities that would be productively beneficial to my village rather than earn me a mark that I could show off as a badge of my competence. (Please note that I am not accusing all of my fellow volunteers of the same fallacy; many of them have done remarkable work.) Today, only a handful of weeks remain before I take my leave of Burkina Faso and return to the United States. All of my personal goals for joining Peace Corps have been accomplished; what remains is the consuming need to fulfill my part of the bargain—not to Peace Corps, but to the people who have been my neighbors and friends for nearly two years. How can I repay them for the things that I learned from them, that they shared with me? This isn't guilt, nor is it charity, that I'm talking about. It is a sense of responsibility.

And here is where I have changed. I have always been reluctant to commit—to people, jobs, locations, anything—for the fear that I might miss something better. Imagine the future as a jarful of candy: you stare at it longingly, but delay approaching it because you're not certain of what sweet you want, while everyone around you is plunging their hands in; you panic, seeing this choice piece get snatched up, then that one, but you remain motionless, so terrified of making a wrong choice that you don't make any at all. As a result of my phobia, I feel like I am standing still, watching everyone I know moving onward, building foundations, and growing up. And, in spite of my best efforts to prevent it, I too am growing up. The Peter Pan life I have devoted myself to, flying from one place to another without direction, must come to an end. I see my friends who are settling down: they're getting careers, they're getting 401Ks, IRAs, mortgages... they're getting married. I observe the stability they are attaining, and I covet it. And yet... if I stay in one place too long, will I grow stagnant? The structure I choose to build, will it climb up into a spire of distinction, or will the ground I settle on turn out to be a mire of mediocrity, in which I will stay stuck? I want to settle without settling, if you can see the difference. I want to go home, but I do not know where home is.

Being a Dabbler, I believe, is not a choice, but a calling. You find yourself intrigued by a multitude of possible paths, and instead of choosing you wander several steps down one, before abruptly breaking off to skip down another, and then another, sampling this and that, promising yourself (and others) that eventually you will find the "right" one. It makes for many amusing stories and treasured memories. And then sometime, perhaps years later, you find that you have arrived back at your exact original starting point. The thirst for experience can be intoxicating, consuming... but at the end of this binge lies the inevitable hangover: who, and what, are you? Is this all there is to life? A series of photographs and accomplishments you can tack up on some wall somewhere?

Perhaps I am making something out of nothing, you think. It is possible that these words are the self-obsessive ravings of a scattered individual who is mere weeks away from officially crossing the chasm between his mid- and late-20s. But I know that at least one reader out there, maybe more, is wrestling with the same damnable Rubik's Cube of a problem: how can one remain forever youthful, if not young, and become venerated without sacrificing vigor? And not that I'm equating myself with the late great Jim Morrison (my record deal is still pending), but I am trying to make a point, of the danger of seeking experience for its own sake, without keeping an eye toward the future, towards advancement, growth. I'll tell you now, I have no intention of giving up dabbling, for when I ask myself that crucial question "What do you want?", I find—to my glee and gloom—that I still do not know. The pixie dust is still surging strong through my system. But when I get back to the States, I am looking forward to starting to move forward, instead of eternally sideways. Simply put: I have found, if you must dabble, dabble responsibly.