I uses to be good at this. Packing and preparing for a haul across a country, across a border, across an ocean. But sometime in the last few months I seem to have lost my travel mojo. You know: the internal system, the thing that keeps me together…sharp…on track when I’m about to hit the road.
Does anyone say that anymore when they’re actually flying to their destination?
Mentally, I keep a list of items I’ve lost or think I’ve lost while away. The accumulation hurts. It worries me. As though my failures to return with the same or slightly heavier poundage are chips in the emotional cladding I carry along with my bags; cracks in the armor that thickens and hardens against the noise and struggle of my day to day life.
It is not a good feeling to lose what’s important to you, no matter its actual worth.
Espressoing
A few more days
A final Hi meeting
The local neighborhood bar has a quiet time between six and nine. It is a place that specializes in coffee, beer and seasonal menus. There is just enough of each for a satisfying snack and effective buzz. After the time when the laptop lids close and before the social gatherings start -- there is a sort of twilight*. Often this time is a fugitive ground rife with creative inspiration and meditative work -- of the kind that results in personal reward.*twilight may refer to civil, nautical or astronomical variety depending on your social or terrestrial condition
A man positions his mouse on the edge of his browser window. He clicks, holds and drags the viewport first left then right. The content of a video game promo micro site responds and adapts to the available space. To the man, this is more delightful than the game itself.
A man laboriously moves his piano down three levels onto the subway platform. Classic vocals and strided chords -- he played so well I swore he was blind. Oblivious to the heat on that August stage, he was most in touch with his audience -- whom he elevated with his music.
A woman should do exactly as she pleases no matter what a man may think.
As the Dalai Lama once said, "It is a time when there is much in the window, but nothing in the room."
"No one understands me," she said. Her grandmother was silent for a minute. It seemed she was searching for an answer in the star speckled sky. "But no one understands anyone in this world, darling. We are all unique. It is what gives us a sense of wonder."