Parting words for AZ

it has been an interesting time here in AZ, certainly the best parts have been the times with friends. heck if they weren't here i wouldn't be either! i have a little over a week left before i head east and thought it was time to share some of my sentiments and a few photos.

Ode to Arizona

The desert makes a stunning base

For cacti, canyons and the coup de grace

Lush green courses for the pseudo ace

In the Escalade he must race

Three blocks to walk the furry face

At the bone-dry park he will deface

And then return to the living space

That lacks culture or a trace

of pigmentation beyond a shoe lace.

At the range he will embrace

the khaki clad pal whose club will chase

a shiny white sphere to its hiding place

beyond the trees and such a disgrace

that over drinks they will erase

this detail for the bejeweled blond grace

the plastic girl who is not out of place

with her botox, surgery and at this pace

she will become another test case.

The suburban folk fight to displace

The undesirables who need a space

To live, and as is often the case

They work for those who want to replace

Their homes with pavement and a showcase

To their elitist lives with their illusive tax base

of diversified money they will surely misplace

or loose at the local horse or car race.

Perhaps you wish to visit someplace

With MLB spring training within a walkable space

Where cars abound and almost outpace

The oranges, scorpions and guns without a case

Though there is at least one military base

And talk of visitors from outer space

So might I suggest that you brace

Yourself for anything to take place

But don’t bother with a can of mace

There is nothing here that it can efface.

2011: a time for new adventures

A new year offers hope for the future and a moment to consider the years past. I spent the first day of the new year on the road. I did it on purpose; it just seemed fitting. my destination was 1100 miles from my departure city and I had planned on making stops along the way but for some reason, once I was on the road I just wanted to keep going. so I drove over the mountains, through the snow, avoided the big cities and found myself in warmer weather with wind turbines all around me and cacti straight ahead.

i am now in the american southwest. cacti and palm trees are in abundance, clear blue skies and mid-70s weather are constants, and golf courses seem to be at every turn. i am not a golfer but i am trying to keep that on the down low as i am not convinced i won't be forcibly removed from the area for this obvious affront. aside from the golf factor i also show my 'visitor' status because i appear to be the only person who walks to get to places. car culture is alive and well here. so is meat, jerky to be exact.

plans for continued travel are bouncing around in my brain. as are thoughts of the infinite experiences i packed into 5 months of travel. i am certainly ready for more adventures in the year to come, hurray for 2011!

Nola in December

i find myself walking along a treelined street that boasts homes on the National Historic Registry at every turn. As i look above at the clear blue sky i notice the beads that hang as jewels from the trees, hundreds of them sway in the breeze and sparkle as the sun hits them just right. the streetcar passes at an appropriate southern pace and i wonder again how it happened that i am in New Orleans.

according to the locals it is cool for this time of year, usually it would be in the 60s, but for a few days, the days i happen to be here it is only inching towards 50. with a blue sky and bright sun i can forgive the lack of warmth and revel in being outside without the thought of an umbrella or raincoat. to be clear, i own neither so while i may think of using them in San Francisco or Oregon, i will not. instead i opt for withdrawing indoors or getting wet.

passing the time in the hotel sitting room i listen to the many languages being spoken, admire the architecture of this cerca 1800s building, and ponder the people that have sat in this same antique chair. it is a luxury as a traveler to have the time to sit and just take it all in, at least it is for me. there is no better way to get to know a place than to watch and listen to the people as they go about their daily activities. certainly museums and tours can tell you a lot, but so can just being in the moment with people, and the locale doesn't really matter.

and so today alone i will exchange my antique chair for a seat at a local lunch hangout, a park bench, a church pew, a bar stool, and finally a chair on the veranda.

more travel but this time to familiar places

hours ago I arrived back in the big city I have called home for the last 10 years. It has been about 7 months since I was last here. 7 months, 5 countries, hundreds of new friends, and infinite experiences later it feels as though I never left. I do not like this feeling. Best described, it denies the existence of the last 7 months and it shows how easy it would be to return to my life before.

Of course that is not quite true. I cannot return to what once was, nor would I want to. That being said, it is there, that sense, that feeling and I must reiterate, i do not like it. I did not anticipate this feeling AND am not surprised by it. in fact, it is comforting to observe it in action.

Flannel shirts, skinny jeans and True Colors

You with the sad eyes

don't be discouraged

5 months is a long time to be away and a significant amount of time to be traveling through foreign lands without stopping for more than a few days. i have been back in my home country for almost a month and am feeling a bit more at ease with the world around me (and my place in it) than when i first arrived. i can walk through a grocery store, restaurant and public setting without a flurry of thoughts and images bombarding my senses. i no longer marvel at the size everything or the quick pace at which our society moves. even my meltdowns or shutdowns, as the case may be, have decreased to a less embarrassing number.

oh I realize

it's hard to take courage

now i trip instead of fall.

it is the so called "little things" that cause me to stop mid-run or stare too long out the window or put down my computer or take a deep breath. it is the push to buy buy buy because there are holiday sales. it is the fear that i am losing my language capabilities. it is the realization that snow is on the mountains because it is WINTER. it is the recognition that i can take a hot shower whenever i want. it is the expectation that a car is necessary in this town.

it is the question, "so you are getting back to real life huh?"

in a world full of people

you can lose sight of it all

and the darkness still inside you

can make you feel so small

missing the act of traveling was expected. the longing to experience new cultures and meet new people continues unabated. the missed connections, phone calls and decrease in email has resulted in the painful realization that the distance, both physical and existential, may deter and possibly derail new found relationships and has led to sleepless nights and the inability to express myself in any language.

but i see your true colors

shining through

i see your true colors

and thats why i love you

so don't be afraid to let them show

your true colors

true colors

are beautiful like a rainbow

there are those who are patient, those who understand or try to anyway. those who see something is different and help me to understand or just be with the difference. there are those who want to hear about my experiences or who want to share their own or who don't want anything at all. there are those who work really hard to connect, sending messages so we can schedule a time to catch up as our lives or timezones don't quite seem to match up. there are strangers who smile as you go by, children who laugh at the wind and puppies that bark at your foot. each instance reminds me of the beauty of the moment.

show me a smile then

don't be unhappy

can't remember when i last saw you laughing

if this worlds makes you crazy

and you've taken all you can bear

you call me up because you know i'll be there

i never thought much about the importance of pop culture in our society; a week ago i realized the 5 month gap can cause a ripple of pop culture-related shocks. all of a sudden the fashion world raided my 10th grade closet and the soundtrack of my adolescence was being sung by a group of tweens awaiting their frappaccinos at Starbucks. it appears the ongoing effect of media on how we identify ourselves, and thus how we relate and live our lives means i missed 5 months of talked about tweets, tv shows, songs, movies, food, material goods, personalities and other topics that caught the attention of my friends and family. my much needed and desired media blackout has some negative effects after all. can i get a pop cultural guidance counselor please?

but i see your true colors

shining through

i see your true colors

and thats why i love you

so don't be afraid to let them show

your true colors

true colors

are beautiful like a rainbow.

Photo of the day...Suchitoto, El Salvador

A small colonial city in central El Salvador, Suchitoto was the little surprise you hope for as a traveler. in all honesty, El Salvador was the greatest surprise of my trip. i wanted to like it, i wanted to prove all those people wrong who told me to avoid it because of danger and history and poverty. what i saw, what i experienced was something very different and i didn't have to work to like it. the country and the people welcomed me and i would have had to work really hard to dislike it, and even then i don't think that would have been possible.

In Suchitoto i found a hostel that overlooked Lake Suchitoto and was run by a friendly local family. ok so the hostel was small and the sleeping area cramped, but the location was great and the owners genuinely want travelers to get to know their city and their country. this sentiment, the hope that foreigners will come and get to know the country and culture beyond the negativity and violence which is presented in the media, was prevalent in almost everyone i met in El Salvador. in Suchitoto, people recommended local artists, a visit to the church, local food, a boat ride on the lake, and a hike to the waterfall.

Ah the waterfall, a natural geometric masterpiece. the basalt blocks are in fact hexagonal and during the rainy season (the time of my visit) water rushed and fell with astounding speed. my pictures do not capture the beauty or power; as was the case throughout my trip, somethings could never be captured by a camera and must be held in my memory alone. as a friend and i walked through the outskirts of the town to get here, we were welcomed and directed by locals proud to help us to see 'Los Tercios'. imagine my happiness at discovering that this waterfall was on the land of a local farmer who welcomed us to walk down to the falls and then walk beyond to a marvelous view of the valley and the lake.

the above photo is from one of the streets off of the main plaza near the hostel, you can see the lake in the distance. this street is typical for this town and there were many others that were nearly identical, they even had horses grazing!

changing of the leaves

the act of running brings me closer to myself than anything else i do throughout the day. it is in that time that i feel most alive and am able to observe the world as closely as i was able to experience it when i was traveling.

as the leaves twist and turn in the breeze, making their descent to the cool, damp grass i am finally able to feel that it is indeed autumn and that the natural world is shifting, preparing for the change to come. my understanding of time changed as i traveled through countries and cultures that measure, follow and play with "time" in ways i had never considered. upon return i struggle to comprehend that 5 months have passed, that i missed the summer and all the activities that come with it. i intellectually understand that time has passed, that i had missed out on aspects of people's lives, and yet it all feels the same. or at least strangely familiar.

i wonder if the sense of familiarity is false. is everything around me the same and i am what is unfamiliar? traveling through other countries it was obvious i did not belong and all things were new to me, i was the outsider; unfamiliarity (is that even a word?) was normal. here in my own country i have never felt i fit in but i was comfortable with that, because it was a part of my identity, an aspect of who i was and thus it was familiar. i know how to function in this western world, where to go to purchase a long sleeve shirt, how to find the nearest bank and how to interact with the barista at the coffee shop...but i have forgotten how to say things in English, my heart races as i walk into grocery store and i wonder how to respond in many conversations. i suppose it is not that i do not know things or at least how to do things so much as i second guess myself now. at times i wonder, am i doing or saying it this way because i used to, because it is the best way or because it is something i picked up the last few months?

it is easy here. ok yes of course life can have it´s challenges and horrible things happen, i am not saying that everything is perfect here. what i mean to say is, one could move through life without feeling that they are LIVING. rather one could go through life as if on a conveyor belt, on a continuous, monotonous loop. i am struggling here to find a coherent way to express this thought and the best i can do is say this: there are so many ways in the Western world to distract and distance oneself from people, events, emotions and thoughts; is that living?

...I would like to beg you dear Sir, as well as I can, to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don´t search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.

-Rainer Maria Rilke

it is with this in mind that i continue on a few more steps, gasping for cool air and the sight of a blue bird soaring among the trees.

a week in review (aka week one in the states)

1. a customs agent asked if i brought any number of items with me: fruits, veggies, seeds, insects...YES insects! haha, my reply? "oh you have got to be kidding me, i hope not!"

2. wow the changing colors of the leaves, who knew it was fall?!

3. 5+ hour flight without a movie? jeez, in the buses in Mexico i would have at least 2 movies and a couple of episodes of 3 1/2 Men in that amount of time!!

4. walking through the local Fred Meyer's i thought, do we really need so many choices of _____ (fill in the blank with the myriad of items that fill up such stores)?

5. in response to the person who said, "welcome back to civilization"...

well i am not sure how to respond to this as "thank you" would imply that i agree with the "civilization" assessment. i can guess what is meant by the comment, the western world = civilization. forgive my impudence but why is the western world held as the model of civilization? i ask because i wonder, is not knowing your neighbor a sign of civilization? is suing a teacher for disciplining a child in the classroom civilized? are we more civilized because we own cars, computers and cell phones all the while being one of the loneliest societies in the world? are we more civilized because cashiers can rely on a computer to tell them how much change to give me after paying $20 for an item that cost $3.58?

i know how much we have in our country and generally in the western world. i understand that stability and systems/infrastructure set us apart from many countries in the world. i know how lucky we are and how much we have, still i wonder about the view that we are models that others should aspire to. i understand that "civilization" is used to imply a particular sense of advancement, but in my opinion, it was used invidiously and the discriminatory 'we are better or more advanced than them' attitude was not well hidden below the surface.

surely i am more sensitive to this after my travels. admittedly my first week back in the states has been a difficult one. it seems the 'reverse culture shock' is far worse than the 'culture shock' i experienced throughout my trip. thus, statements like the one above have provoked silence rather than dialog; images, experiences, observations and opinions are piling up in my brain but i fear the release of one will cause all to come tumbling out in a torrent of confusion that will not help me to explain or others to understand.

still, this comment (or sentiment perhaps) needed addressing. i only wish the statement had stopped at "welcome back." this is such a lovely phrase, especially after traveling to so many places where i never knew anyone and never saw a familiar face. in the few instances where i saw friends it felt so good to be met at a bus station or hostel and hear the words "welcome!" clearly three simple words have evoked much emotion and thought, leaving me to conclude that i will hold on to the "welcome back" i have received during my travels and upon my return home because these are the important interactions i want to remember and hold onto. the other comments, well those i will let go.

it figures

in almost 5 months i crossed in, out and through 7 countries. during that time i took all manner of transportation all the while with a small day pack and a good-size backpacker pack. it got to a point where they just became a part of me and thus separation from them was kept at a minimum. i was sure at some point my pack would fall off the top of a bus, get taken from under my eye or topple into the water as it sat precariously on the edge of a lancha. never happened. my pack and i were never separated for very long...until i got on an airplane to go home. you have to laugh at the ridiculousness of it all. OF COURSE the most systemized, mechanized and structured of all the modes of transportation i have taken in the past 5 months would lose track of my bag. OF COURSE!!

as it happens it was only lost for a day and we were reunited this morning. welcome to the good 'ol US of A.

final days

Cancun. basically two days left and i will spend them in Cancun. i came a day early because some friends i met a few weeks or was it a month ago are here and it seemed like a good idea to come so we could hang out. i am sure it will be great fun and i am so glad to get some extra time with them. still, we are in Cancun. i think if there is any place on my trip that is going to make me want to get on a plane for the states, this is it.

my lonely planet guidebooks are no longer necessary. the bus rides are over. i am in my last hostel. soon enough i will be stepping on a plane, and then another, and still one more, in order to return home.