Well, here we are again
Staying up all night the night before a big adventure has been a tradition of mine since I can remember. I honestly can't believe the last time I flew overseas and didn't stay up till at least 3 or 4 am getting hammered alone and listening to amazing music, getting amped up for the experience of losing myself in the world and its myriad languages, airports, and byzantine alleyways.
I guess there is still an element of that in me. It's almost 1:30am and I'm a little drunk, pumping Tupac through my headphones at dangerous levels in anticipatiton of my journey tomorrow that will eventually take me across the Pacific Ocean to Beijing. I mean, all the ingredients are there for a typical JV overseas adventure extranvaganza: I've got no visa for the country I'm flying to, didn't start packing until hours ago, don't know where I'm going to live when I get to Beijing, let alone where I'm even going to go when I get to the airport in NYC tomorrow, or where I'm going to fucking sleep tomorrow night.
But things are different now. I'm 33 years old and going overseas to live out of a backpack for months on end. My gut is straining against my old shitty jeans, with a plain white t-shirt trying desperately to hold it in instead of one advertising some sweet band. I'm drinking red wine out of a nice stemmed glass in the fucking guest room of my mother's house instead of straight whiskey I found in the couch cushions of the BOTH house. I spend more time reading about College Football than working these days. My greatest achievement of the past few months was going to the shitty suburban gym near my parents house for two consecutive weeks before making an ass of myself drinking too much at my friends' beautiful wedding.
In spite of all this I honestly don't really feel depressed, and maybe that's the most depressing thing of all. I'm thankful for how easy my life is, and I really am thankful for the fact that I'm going to ditch any kind of responsibility and go off and get lost in foreign lands with a bunch of 24 year olds and their backpacks. But the truth is, the chances of me achieving anything worthwhile in the next couple months are nearly zero: I will not work off my gut, I will not finish the projects I've been diddling with for the past two years, I will not learn enough Chinese, and I will not really learn anything of value outside of the best draft strategies of the next MTG card set.
I feel like when you get to this point in your life you are supposed to have kids and get married, so that you can give up on life WITH A GOOD REASON. The chances of this are approaching zero, I haven't had a girlfriend since 1997 and I don't see the chances of this improving in the near future.
But all is not lost! I will soon be living in a foreign land, surrounded by interesting people and awash in a sea of novel experiences. The fantasy part of my brain will take over as it always does in these situations, my self-image being magnified to solar levels and my slip in mediocrity being masked by the dream of 1000 unicorns. A slow slide like this is easily overcome by malleable expectations. I'll probably hardly remember this post next time I'm sitting alone in my parent's house drunk, with no particular plan or vision outside of immediate life experiences.
In spite of the tone of this post, I'm kind of ok with all this. The last year I spent abroad was amazing, a life-affirming experience at every turn. The optimistic part of me thinks that this low point is just the calm before the storm, that once on the road I'll be reinvigorated with the awe for the vast variety of life experiences that I've been witness to in the past. Whether or not that's true, at least I'm old enough now to accept what comes no matter what it is.
Maybe that's the trade off of age, and if so, it's one I'm willing to accept.
I guess there is still an element of that in me. It's almost 1:30am and I'm a little drunk, pumping Tupac through my headphones at dangerous levels in anticipatiton of my journey tomorrow that will eventually take me across the Pacific Ocean to Beijing. I mean, all the ingredients are there for a typical JV overseas adventure extranvaganza: I've got no visa for the country I'm flying to, didn't start packing until hours ago, don't know where I'm going to live when I get to Beijing, let alone where I'm even going to go when I get to the airport in NYC tomorrow, or where I'm going to fucking sleep tomorrow night.
But things are different now. I'm 33 years old and going overseas to live out of a backpack for months on end. My gut is straining against my old shitty jeans, with a plain white t-shirt trying desperately to hold it in instead of one advertising some sweet band. I'm drinking red wine out of a nice stemmed glass in the fucking guest room of my mother's house instead of straight whiskey I found in the couch cushions of the BOTH house. I spend more time reading about College Football than working these days. My greatest achievement of the past few months was going to the shitty suburban gym near my parents house for two consecutive weeks before making an ass of myself drinking too much at my friends' beautiful wedding.
In spite of all this I honestly don't really feel depressed, and maybe that's the most depressing thing of all. I'm thankful for how easy my life is, and I really am thankful for the fact that I'm going to ditch any kind of responsibility and go off and get lost in foreign lands with a bunch of 24 year olds and their backpacks. But the truth is, the chances of me achieving anything worthwhile in the next couple months are nearly zero: I will not work off my gut, I will not finish the projects I've been diddling with for the past two years, I will not learn enough Chinese, and I will not really learn anything of value outside of the best draft strategies of the next MTG card set.
I feel like when you get to this point in your life you are supposed to have kids and get married, so that you can give up on life WITH A GOOD REASON. The chances of this are approaching zero, I haven't had a girlfriend since 1997 and I don't see the chances of this improving in the near future.
But all is not lost! I will soon be living in a foreign land, surrounded by interesting people and awash in a sea of novel experiences. The fantasy part of my brain will take over as it always does in these situations, my self-image being magnified to solar levels and my slip in mediocrity being masked by the dream of 1000 unicorns. A slow slide like this is easily overcome by malleable expectations. I'll probably hardly remember this post next time I'm sitting alone in my parent's house drunk, with no particular plan or vision outside of immediate life experiences.
In spite of the tone of this post, I'm kind of ok with all this. The last year I spent abroad was amazing, a life-affirming experience at every turn. The optimistic part of me thinks that this low point is just the calm before the storm, that once on the road I'll be reinvigorated with the awe for the vast variety of life experiences that I've been witness to in the past. Whether or not that's true, at least I'm old enough now to accept what comes no matter what it is.
Maybe that's the trade off of age, and if so, it's one I'm willing to accept.