Hasta luego, amigos This columnist departs to seek peace south of the border BY PAM STEAGER

It’s a lot harder than I thought it would be, sitting down to write my last column. As in almost all relationship endings, there is too much left to be said and too little time to say it. It’s good to know when to leave, however, and this is that time for me. Refinancing has given me some money to spend and I’ve decided to put it where my mouth has often been over the past 15 years of writing this column — into gender studies and peace building.

Believe it or not, that’s the actual name of the master’s degree program I’ll be entering in a few weeks at the University for Peace in Costa Rica: gender and peace building. I’ve always said I wasn’t going to pursue graduate studies until I found something I was passionate enough about to commit the kind of personal and financial resources required. I didn’t think it would take me 20 years to find it, but there you have it. I think it will be worth the wait.

Costa Rica, a country about the size of New Hampshire, is located between Nicaragua and Panama on the Central American isthmus. That’s the narrow strip of land connecting North America, at the southern border of Mexico, with South America at the middle of Colombia’s northwestern border. It’s like an umbilical cord connecting the two continents, and I think it might be a good location to feel the flow of who’s nurturing whom. The "rich coast" country — so named by Spanish invaders because they thought they’d found the mythical city of gold — was later left alone because the envisioned riches were never found. Go figure.

Now it’s considered a paradise because Costa Rica is one of the most bio-diverse countries in the world. Turns out it was a good thing to be left alone by the developers. I’d like to see it before it becomes an amusement park. Still considered in many ways a Third World country, Costa Rica has a 93 percent literacy rate and a good health-care system.

In 1948, the year I was born, Costa Rica was the first country in modern times to abolish its army. In that tradition, efforts to establish the University for Peace began at the United Nations under the leadership of the country’s then-president, Rodrigo Carazo. The resolution that established the Charter of the University was adopted by the General Assembly of the UN on December 5, 1980 — my birthday. This place and I seem destined to meet.

I’m looking forward to leaving my homeland. Not because I love it any less, but because I want to keep on loving it. Traveling outside the country has always given me a greater appreciation for what we have here, but it’s more than that this time. The United States is in trouble, and this has everything to do with our relationship with ourselves, each other, and the rest of the world. I’ve been spending a lot of time and energy on the first two. Now I want to get to know the world better, to study its complexities. I relish the opportunity to meet and converse with students from 32 countries about such topics as human security, international law, human rights, diversity, democracy, development, economy, and sustainability. I look forward to living among another language and culture, and relying on my legs and public transportation to get me around. I want to think globally in a more informed way, so I can act locally in a more informed way.

And so, dear readers, I bid you a fond farewell. It has been a distinct pleasure to have this soapbox to stand on 293 times over the last two turbulent decades. I mentioned this column in my application to UPeace: "Although I often bristle at the term ‘women’s issues,’ my columns present topics and perspectives not covered as thoroughly, or at all, in the mainstream American media or even by male writers in the alternative press. Over the past year, however, as my peace activism has increased, my columns have been sounding like a broken record." Time to take that focus where it belongs and open up this space for a wider range of topics and voices.

I thank Rudy Cheeks for giving me the opportunity to initially use his column space to spout off when I needed to, and later to share that space on an equal basis. I thank the many editors I have worked with over the years for their part in helping me learn the style and content dance that writers and editors everywhere have been dancing forever, but especially my first and last — Ty Davis and Ian Donnis. I thank all you readers for reading what I’ve written, but especially those who’ve taken the time to write, e-mail, or talk to me in person about a column. Whether in agreement or opposition, it’s always good to hear from you. Two-way communication is what makes relationships work and worthwhile, and I encourage you to talk back to the media much more often.

Through the miracle of modern technology, I will be adding to the vast world of information and communication online via a Web site and/or blog. If you’d like to know when it’s up and running, just send me an e-mail with "Web site" in the subject line before the end of the month. I’m also pursuing establishing a video conferencing link between students and teachers in the Media SmART program in Providence and their counterparts in Costa Rica. Guess that and my studies should keep me out of trouble in the tropics, but keep an eye out for eruptions of volcanoes or civil unrest in the region.

If nothing else, I hope that "That’s What She Said" has encouraged you to respect and take responsibility for your own life and relationships, and the life and relationships of this great land of ours. The tattered bumper sticker on the car that I’ll sell before leaving, reads: "Democracy: It’s not what we have. It’s what we do."

It’s time, folks. Time to vote consciously with our money every day, with our voice as often as possible, and with our ballot every couple of years. I hope I’ve encouraged you to not lose hope or your sense of humor, to keep an open mind and heart, to question everything, to keep it simple, and to take it one day at a time. Better yet, take it one breath at a time. I hope I’ve encouraged you to let go of either/or thinking and to communicate with, and love, one another. Know that I’ll be doing more of the same when I go global. Vaya con diosa.

Pam Steager can be reached, for a few more weeks, at pamsteager@earthlink.net