Momentos – Apr 2015

These are my Momentos, short personal diary entries I write daily – since 2013 – and publish monthly. Some links are affiliate links.

1

I once met a guy in Budapest. He was like an Australian Brad Pitt, and super cool to boot. I remember thinking, “If I have any gay tendencies, this man should bring them out.” But there was nothing, no attraction. And so I concluded once and for all that women were the only creatures who could do it for me. Now, three years later, in this bar in the Bywater, I’m having to rethink that.

2

Low energy the past couple of weeks, sleeping a lot more than usual, and productivity has slowed quite a bit. I’m trying to ride the wave instead of fighting it. February and most of March was a flow, right now is the ebb. So I’ll sleep in if I feel like it, take some naps, give myself a break for not being as disciplined as usual. Everything comes and everything goes.

3

The lads down at Clay Square sure do talk a lot. Some can ball, but most are pretty bad, and lazy. Yet they still talk themselves up. Incessantly. Words from Bertrand Russell come to mind: “The fundamental cause of trouble in the world today is that the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt.” Of course, I could be wrong about that 😉

4

I stop for a few minutes in the middle of a neutral ground cutting through Cadiz. It’s close to midnight and the city seems sleepy. I stay there, just breathing, feeling a breeze. Somehow, in these moments, it’s easy not to think. I move on and two blocks down pass an elderly man wearing a cowboy hat, standing on his porch. I speak to him, and he speaks to me.

5

I’m writing a guide about working online. I had a step-by-step freelancing plan in mind, for people who aren’t very computer savvy, who have little/no qualifications. Then I realized I was making a ton of assumptions. The plan sounds good, but I haven’t tested it. So I’ve started a little experiment, coaching a handful of people to earn $10/hour online within three months.

6

Meditating in the living room. A thought sneaks in: what if she walks in and sees me sitting here, doing nothing? Won’t she think I’m weird? I catch that thought and break it apart. Where did it come from? Why the concern? I realize it stems from my teenage years, when I was teased quite a bit for anything out of the ordinary. The kid inside me is still scared to defy expectations.

7

Generally, upon entering a new situation, I’ll take a wait-and-see approach. I look around to see what behavior is acceptable. Even playing basketball, I’ll usually let others set the tone, then see how I can fit in. This can be an advantage in some situations, though not so much on the court. But I wonder: is this tendency natural, or habitual?

8

Twelve years ago, back in Ireland, I started a little website about my favorite basketball team. I left it in capable hands when I waved goodbye to New Orleans five years ago. Now they have giant watch parties that players and staff sometimes attend, and they exchange emails with the team’s front office. Nice work, Bourbon Street Shots.

9

Putting together another travel presentation for tomorrow, going back through my photos and Facebook posts from the past four years on the road. Man, some good memories there. Easy to forget sometimes, all the paths crossed, sights seen, breaths taken. It’s been a blast. Even the down times. Those were beautiful, too.

10

I’m falling in love with The Moth, and live storytelling in general. This one is a gem, makes me think of my cousin and appreciate parenting all the more. I stood up and told some stories to a bunch of people tonight, including my favorite memory from the four years past. A few words, about home and family, made a grown woman cry.

11

There’s that hole again, that empty feeling. And my brain’s eager to slap a band-aid on it. Maybe junk food, maybe a movie, maybe that girl I hung out with last night. But no, fuck all of that. Brendan Behan once wrote, “At the innermost core of all loneliness is a deep and powerful yearning for union with one’s lost self.” So let me sit with this a while.

12

Kelly McGonigal calls it the what-the-hell effect, when you stumble just a little and then say, “You know what, fuck it, I might as well derail this whole damn train!” That’s why you don’t just break your diet with one cookie; you eat the entire pack, and then another. I could very easily have derailed my whole damn train today, but knowledge is power.

13

Lots of goodbyes this week, leaving this city in two days. I’m ready though. I used to consider New Orleans a second home, but I realize now that home is more about time than place. Stay away from anywhere long enough and familiarity fades. It’s not this city that I love, but the feeling that I once belonged.

14

I sit and watch ten people tell stories in a packed little theater on St. Claude, thinking there’s a lot of power in a story well told. Makes me want to get back into speaking. But I’ll hold off, for now at least. Greg McKeown has been drilling it into me that I can’t, in fact, have it all. Or in the words of Thomas Sowell: “There are no solutions. There are only trade-offs.”

15

11:59 p.m. as the megabus pulls out. My last day in New Orleans, and it was a good one. Lunch with the first friend I ever had in this town, then a surprise invite to the biggest ballgame of the season, free food and great seats, home team coming through in the clutch. But it was easy to say goodbye. I woke up this morning excited, ready for the home stretch.

16

People sometimes ask if I’m doing this trip around the world without airplanes because I dislike flying. But that’s not it. Few people appreciate flying as much as I do. Or airports. Like the one I’m in now, standing at arrivals, watching families and lovers reunite. They let their guard down for a few seconds, and you can see what really matters.

17

Picking up the rental car, I get chatting about my travels with a chap named Jay at the front desk. He’s blown away by this working-online-from-anywhere thing, like it’s far beyond his reality. But he seems like a smart dude. He knows how to work a computer. He’s fluent in English and Spanish. Absolutely no reason why he can’t do similar.

18

I’m getting better at watching my thoughts and emotions. The past couple of days, driving down through Florida, visiting places like West Palm Beach and Miami, seeing all the plush houses and fancy cars, I notice discomfort. It’s as if I have an aversion to wealth. Or maybe it’s just grand displays of wealth. Hopefully the latter, because I fully intend to be rich.

19

I arrived in the Americas thirteen months ago on a giant freighter. I leave atop one of the biggest cruise ships in the world, floating out to sea with a view of South Beach, past million dollar homes on private islands, jet skis buzzing around like flies, wind surfers and paddle boarders in the distance, sun low enough to make for an interesting sky.

20

The perfect morning begins at 6:30 a.m., a spectacular sunrise on display as I head to the well-equipped gym for stretching and free weights, followed by a twenty-minute meditation session out on deck with an Atlantic breeze. Then it’s basketball drills on an empty court, a quick shower, and a slow breakfast over a good book.

21

Upping the meditation to twenty minutes per day aboard this cruise. I’ve been reading a few books on the topic, such as 10% Happier (highly recommended). Sitting in silence out on deck this morning, I let my itches go unscratched and watched as they took care of themselves. There’s probably a life lesson there.

22

I’ve been recognized a handful of times from the blog. The best was the guy in Hong Kong who approached me while standing in line at the supermarket. I never thought I’d be recognized on this cruise, where 59 is the age of the average passenger. But I was wrong: Anita and her husband are fellow bloggers and have been traveling the world for 2.5 years.

23

You can bleed money on one of these cruises if you’re not careful. The initial fee was cheap enough ($750 per person), but there’s a daily service charge of $13 a head, $120 for their cheapest massage, $180 a week for unlimited slow internet, and it’ll cost you $5 for every t-shirt you want laundered. I’ll do without the massage, stay offline, and wash my socks and jocks in the sink.

24

Some people say every place has a personality. Machu Picchu feels spiritual. The house down the road gives you chills. New Orleans has a soulful vibe. I rarely pick up on that kind of thing. If the Atlantic feels different to the Pacific, I haven’t noticed. That said, I like to think such vibes are real. Perhaps I just need more practice, more presence to feel them.

25

I’ve been spending a lot of time on this cruise working on my life plan, figuring out my goals, priorities, what my days will look like once settled in Amsterdam. It’s all very idealistic at the moment — plenty of time set aside for reading, meditation, reflection — but that’s okay. As Eisenhower once wrote, “Plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.”

26

Our seventh consecutive day at sea. They put on some good shows here every evening, all complimentary. The last two nights we’ve seen comedy. Tonight was improv, and they did a great job of it. Took me back to my days in NOLA when I dipped a toe in the improv waters, learned about yes-and, free-falling, and invisible children.

27

A day off the ship in Medeira, a Portuguese island a few hundred miles off the coast of Morocco. This counts as country #35 on the trip. I’m impressed with Funchal, the biggest city on this rock. Beautiful views, flowers everywhere, a good mix of worlds old and new. We walk the clean streets and visit the botanical gardens, me butchering the local lingo all the while.

28

One of the best things about this cruise has been lots of time to read. Mockingbird was remarkable, Jules Evans’s school of philosophy is mesmerizing, and so far so good with the mayor’s bio of Winston Churchill. I’m realizing that the ideal lifestyle I’m seeking to create for myself must involve at least an hour a day to simply sit and read a book

29

We’re in the Mediterranean now, breezed past the Rock of Gibraltar late last night. The waters are calmer here. We catch glimpses of the Spanish coast and see plenty of ships throughout the day. In a little more than two weeks I should be home in Ireland, this 3.5-year journey at an end. But it’s not excitement that I feel. More a sense of peace.

30

I could talk about Barcelona, which is fantastic on first impression, but what’s on my mind more is self-esteem. Branden writes about the gap between what we think and how we act. Thinking one thing and doing another, not being true to yourself. That’s what kills self-esteem. Lately, I’ve been stepping up my efforts to close that gap.