There was a time I stayed awake till 7 in the morning, eyes bleeding red, in the dark, staring at this same screen. I made 8,000 dollars that night hitting refresh on the browser, trading stocks, thinking I knew everything. The headphones played Alanis Morisette – Uninvited, Sheryl Crow – Riverwide and Enya – China Roses while Peter slept on the inflatable mattress 6 feet away. I remember all that and the rain, grey like a dirty window, neon lights and pigs floating dead in the river. I remember cigarettes on the beach and confessing secrets and making prayers with those silly incense sticks.
There was a time I left Spain at midnight on a train to Morocco devouring pages of my journal hungry with dreams of snake charmers and desert campfires. I was leaving one of the best runs I ever had and knew it. The first day in Tangiers I almost turned around. I was scared for my life even though I had 5 years on the road by that time. Good thing I didn’t leave. I would’ve missed this:
There was work in Chile, lunch everyday alone to get away from the office, trying to imagine how to quit gracefully, wondering at how most of the modern world can drag themselves through that gutter everyday. I remember calling my dad from the street, looking up at the skyscrapers, telling him how depressed I was. It probably was the worst I’ve ever felt, not in a sad way, but in a desperate way. Sundays I would wake late after a long night of drinking and wander Santiago aimlessly trying to feel far away, to forget that work was Monday. I would watch people in parks and restaurants with their friends and be pleased with what I imagined their lives were like.
There was that time in Israel I put up a flyer saying I was too lazy/drunk to hit on women but that if they wanted to sleep with me I was staying in room 22. We all laughed when I put it up. We laughed about everything in those days. What’s even funnier is that someone actually took me up on it. I still keep in touch with her. Here is a picture of the Moon (the flyer was on a bulletin board inside):
There was that evening in…..actually fuck it. I could go on like this forever. I have a thousand stories like these.
This is what I wrote as I left Salamanca that night:
I´m going to shave my head and catch a bus to Morocco tonight at midnight…me, the journal, a few books, and the thought that I´ve done the best i could here…I´m content…I´m younger than I´ve ever been. For me to say I´ve been lucky is almost blasphemy because i know little of it has been luck, but I´ve been lucky still. Its so hard to recover from the time of your life. The years keep rolling by and there is so much for me to miss, because there has been so much for me to love.
As true now as the day I wrote it.
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