One week left of vacation! Prague is hot and cute. Hot, as in I'm wearing a halter top and at 10am I'm already too warm. The beer is good, the tourists are annoying, and wtf is up with the tacky crystal goods and marionettes?? Anyway, I am starting to think about things I will be coming back to in Seattle and what I am looking forward to, versus not. All this time on my own has led to introspection and thoughts about what kind of life I want to live. Anyway. More on that later. For now, I am back to the prague sun!
I am writing from Potsdamer Platz Dunkin Dunuts in Berlin. Today I have walked along the old path of the Berlin wall through central Berlin. What a strange energy this place has - like it's on some kind of accelerated growth hormone, and yet still unsure what it is growing into. I will have a lot of details to write when I'm not paying for internet by the minute. I think I'll go get ice cream now. I am on vacation after all.
I did not expect to end up with a sunburn in Sweden. It has been so incredibly sunny and warm here, and I have seen so little sun in Seattle lately, I have become a sun-whore. My uncle has a nice back deck for soaking up sun. It is also a great help with recovering from jetlag. After two nights I am pretty much adjusted to the timezone and feel somewhat human again. The highlights hasve been: http://www.wanas.se/ and my uncle's homemade chocolate pot de creme. I feel very peaceful and relaxed here, but tomorrow morning I am off to Berlin. Now, I need to get back to my sunning.
I have never before been this prepared for a trip this many hours before my plane was to take off. My two (heavy but small) bags are zipped up. My check-in confirmation is tucked into my passport in an outer pocket. The house is clean and the garbage is out. Every dish is washed! I have my flight xanax in an easily accessible pocket. I am drinking tons of water to stay hydrated. I have been stretching and will do another half hour or so of that before my ride gets here. I have my gels and liquids packaged legally. I picked up extra prescriptions.
I am so ready for this vacation. I've been experiencing a fair amount of turmoil this year so far, and the idea of 3 weeks just doing whatever the hell I want is pretty appealing. I am not going to be overly-touristy, but I am going to focus on taking care of myself (spa day in berlin), writing, reading, and enjoying good food. There's plenty of art and architecture to enrich my time, but I'm not going to force any agendas on myself. I will get up each morning and if I don't have a plane or train to catch I will spend the day exactly however I want to.
ech:
- I ate too much dessert last night and the night before & now I have a sugar hangover
- I'm indecisive about my career options
- I am leaving just when the warm weather is about to arrive
- Heartburn
- Being busy does not seem to lead to personal satisfaction
- Feeling dehydrated
- Packing... too many options!
- The state of my bathroom floor
- Leaving for Europe TODAY!
- I am pretty much ready to leave without last minute panicking
- Going to see Nick Cave in Berlin... Just like in Wings of Desire, eh
- Berlin biennial of contemporary art. Yes.
- I get to use five different currencies on my trip.
- Money in the bank
- Having options
- The airport lounge
Every time I plan a major trip I end up having a few twinges of financial guilt. I could put this money into my languishing retirement fund. I could make a down-payment on a car. I could go to school and learn something useful. I could invest in art. I could donate to charity. I could pay down my debt. I could buy something useful and tangible... But instead I take my excess cash (if you can call it that) and pay for hotel rooms, meals in restaurants, airfare, train fare, museum admission, and other things that cease to exist as soon as the experience is over. My un-frivolous side cringes just thinking about it. Luckily that aspect of my personality is overshadowed by side that believes life is about experiences, and not about accumulating money or things or equity.
Traveling to foreign countries forces me to use my brain in unusual ways. When constantly facing an unfamiliar language, that interpretive part of my brain kicks into high gear - trying to make sense of the landscape. Not to mention having to read and interpret maps in order to figure out where I am. I believe that travel is excellent exercise for the brain, and it also leads to a sense of humility from sounding like a two-year-old when trying to communicate with the locals.
Being in an unfamiliar environment puts "home" in perspective. There's no better way to take a step back and look at what is really important in my life than by leaving it for a while and just being me outside of my familiar space and routine. When I return from a long trip I feel re-invigorated by the things that I enjoy doing. It gets me out of the routine.
It's a classroom out there. I learn more about art and language and history and architecture and other cultures by experiencing them first-hand than I ever could in a classroom.
Food. I like food. And going abroad opens all kinds of doors to cuisine.
Down time. When I take a day off and stay home it really feels like a day of playing catch-up. When I travel I am forced to exist in a world where I cannot Get Things Done.
Yes, it can be pricey, but in the end I think it's worth every penny.
The loathelies:
- When the procrastination of others messes with my bizness.
- How expensive everything is!
- Pants that are too tight.
- Too much stuff.
- The things that lurk at the back of the closet.
- Missed deliveries.
- Anal-retentive project managers who actually use MS Project and fuss over it no less.
- Allergies.
- Leaving for Europe 1 week from today! (I am)
- An organized closet.
- Moleskine notebooks
- David Foster Wallace
- I bought a waterproof pouch for my camera. A pouch!
- Vigorous vacuuming
- Cashews
I suppose you might call it Spring Cleaning, but I call it long overdue. One of the great features of my apartment (apart from high ceilings, hardwood floors, loads of windows, a full-size bathtub, and an excellent location) is the ginormous walk-in closet. It's an odd L-shape, cupped as it is around my smaller bathroom. The main body of the closet extends back about 8 feet, with 10' ceilings, and then there's a little cubby about 2' square off to the right at the front.
Th primary closet-rod is about halfway back, with another behind it about 7' off the ground. What this makes is a generous space to throw shit, out of sight and out of mind, behind the hanging clothes in the inaccessible part of the closet. For three+ years I've been throwing empty boxes and any odd or end I wanted to keep but never see. It had gotten to the point that the frontline closet detritus (shoes, bags, cleaning supplies) was beginning to creep forward and closing the door had become a bit of a challenge. I bought a thingy at Ikea to store towels and linens and I had no choice but to make space for it... so into the depths of the closet I delved.
I knew I had a lot of memorabilia back there, including about 2 reams of letters from my friends in high school, but I had forgotten that I had also stored all of the bits and pieces of my childhood saved by my grandma as well. One large box packed full of folders containing the likes of 4th grade essays. I openly lack sentimentality, and I can't imagine what good she thought keeping every school report and drawing I made as a child would do anyone. I had already thrown out the many locks of my hair she saved from haircuts, and yet somehow I still have a chalk handprint on a napkin made by 2 yr old me.
I come from a family of collectors. The accumulation of nostalgia has surrounded me since birth, and perhaps it a form of self protection to lack sentimentality. At the same time, though, I keep stuff. Almost against my own will. I have a kitchen cupboard that is packed with empty yogurt containers that might come in handy someday. I accumulate books and shoes at an alarming rate. I admire those who can live simply, and I aspire to that state of un-clutter. Right now I still have some work to do. However much I get rid of... it's never quite enough.
- The weather now seems to have summer and winter modes, and it can go back and forth within a single day. Morning: ooh, it's 70 degrees! Afternoon: Why is it snowing?? Or vice versa.
- Men are almost universally interested in women's boots. It seems like it is something close to professional interest.
- You win some. You lose some.
- I have expensive taste. This is not necessarily a virtue.
- It is really difficult to avoid buying things made in China. Go ahead, give it a try.
- Hair salons are ridiculously overpriced.
- I cannot spend less than $195 at Ikea.
- Cheap lamps are not durable.
- Wool rugs shed.
- Exercise makes everything better, and yet it is so hard to find the time/ motivation.
- Thin asparagus tastes better.
- Drinking lots of water improves my mood. Drinking lots of alcohol doesn't.
- Losing weight is not as easy now as it was ten years ago. I think this has more to do with my metabolism than climate change or some other mysterious external force... but either way these are factors I cannot control.
- Political red herrings are more common in the media than political realities.
- Sugar is my most deeply entrenched addiction.
- Moby makes music for ambivalence and/ or organizing one's closet. There seem to be no emotional highs or lows whatsoever. It's just... there.
- Oysters have no real aphrodisiac effect that I can detect after eating a dozen or so.
- Reference books published before 1930 are almost always hilarious.
- In eleven days I will be in Denmark for the first time ever. I'd never really considered going to Denmark before.
- There's never as much time as I think there will be.
Tell me, tell me: what must I absolutely be sure to do/see/eat/drink in BERLIN and PRAGUE? I will also have limited time in Copenhagen and London/ Brighton...oh and Southern Sweden. I know, a bit random, but there is a logic to all of this.
Also, do you know anyone who'd like to share a drink or a meal with a weary solo-traveler? Tell me. I leave on the 13th.
