Traveling is…
blending in. Trying on someone else’s life, zipping it up and saying “What? This old thing?”. Like an actor dives into a role, traveling for me is all just a game of pretend. Researching the part, buying the right costume, learning the mannerisms and then praying that when it comes time to enter onto the stage, that everyone falls for your act. And for that brief moment you get to no longer be you. It’s a little bit of a thrill, a little bit of escapism. But it’s mostly just satisfying some existential hunger. The hunger to live every sort of life all at once.
Do I pass as a local? No. Never. I’m awkward, monolingual and have way too many mishaps to ever fit in.
But I pretend. I pretend that the bed sheet that we stole to use as a beach blanket throws people off the scent. Or that I look natural holding a massive beer, warm from our hour long hike up the beach to the perfect spot. I imagine that my bright white skin, already full of bug bites, makes me look exotic, not different.
But my imagination can only go so far. I begin to wonder, does this view ever get old? Does anyone ever get tired of the sound of the birds constantly overhead? Has there ever been a time when someone has walked down this beach and forgot to feel grateful? A time when they didn’t feel small next to such a large body of water, caught up in some small insignificant problem of their own?
I want to know how it feels to take something so beautiful for granted. I want to be exhausted by this view.
But the sun is setting. And we must go. On to the next role, the next adventure, the next mishap. For there is only so much time in a single lifetime. Only so much time to be every person, all at once.
About Me
I love telling stories. The feeling of holding someone’s attention and watching their reactions as I take them through the twists and turns of an anecdote can be intoxicating, plus I love making people laugh or surprising them with a plot twist. Their reaction is so satisfying that I practice and hone my epic tales while I shower or clean or drive to work.
I think this love comes from my father who, for years, has held court from his usual seat at the kitchen table. No party was complete without a dramatic retelling of some problem at the electric company that he had solved that week. I grew up watching this, trying my best to imitate.
Even the best stories though have a shelf life within your inner circle. So to starve off the expiration date, I started this blog that documents all the wonderful and silly experiences on my trips. It seems like a selfishly easy way to make each ridiculous story eternal.