March 23, 2007 – America Is Not The World

It’s just about that time, huh? Time for me to shuffle off to….wherever.

I’ve decided that my first stop will no longer be New Orleans. I’m going to stop off in Houston first to visit my uncle and some friends that I haven’t seen in years. Hopefully they can hang out on a Sunday night.

As the day approaches, I feel more and more like Gary Cooper in Meet John Doe. I’ve been talking this trip up so much that, even if I wanted to back out, I couldn’t. I’ve told everyone that I’m going. I’ve done preparations (not as much as I probably should have) and, now, I’ve decided on a date.

The main difference is that I don’t want to back out. Sure, I’m scared. It’s a scary notion to just drop everything and drive around the country for six months. It’s fucking scary as hell. So much could happen to me and at home. Hell, my mom is getting married while I’m gone! That’s a big-ass change!

But I know that this trip will be good for me. It’s going to shake me out of my lazy stupor. Maybe show me what I really want to do with my life. Maybe help me move on from things that I need to move on from. Maybe even show me that there are other places out there besides Austin, TX.

Actually, I don’t know what this trip is going to do besides maybe show me things that I’ve never seen before. The most that I can really hope for is to get a new perspective on the country I’ve called home for the last 31 years. Show me sides of it that I’ve never even dreamed about and put me in touch with things that I never knew existed. If I get some kind of epiphany out of it, all the better. If I don’t, then I’ll be ok with that. I’ll come back to Austin a better man than when I left and realize that, indeed, Austin is my home and that I have the best friends and family in the world.

But enough about that: I’m having a party tomorrow night. I’ve invited a lot of my closest friends and peripheral friends to party down with me one last time before I take off. It’s always interesting to see my friends interact with each other on semi-neutral ground. So many of them have never met each other or, if they have, it’s only been once or twice. Some of them don’t even like each other too much, or at least wouldn’t hang out under any other circumstances. In fact, just the thought of some of them hanging out together is a little bit funny to me. Ok, it’s a LOT funny.

My friends are a funny lot. I have them from all different parts of my life. I tend to collect them and not let go. My friends from my years at the Evil Video Store are completely different from my friends from my last job, who are completely different from the people I hang out with a lot now. I have friends who are devout Christians and friends who are devout Church Haters. I have friends who would do anything for their loved ones and I have friends who believe that tough love is the best way to go. Some of my friends have been hording their money for years and will never want for anything and some of them live paycheck to paycheck and can’t save a dime.

But there’s one thing that ties them all together: somehow I’ve managed to find them and bring them into my life and I love them all. I don’t know how or why, but there it is.

One of my closest friends asked me if I would be lonely on the road and how it is that I can just leave all of my friends behind for this long. (She wasn’t accusing me of anything, just curious.) I told her that I came to a realization a while back when one of my friends was trying to get me to move to New York City: the world is really small these days. In a world with e-mail, cell phones, text messages and wifi in every part of even the smallest towns, it’s hard to lose touch with anyone. You basically have to TRY to leave someone behind. Sure, I’ll go a few months without talking to someone, but I always have their number/IM name/e-mail address with me. And, eventually, I will get to them and drop them a line. I have a friend who lives in China now. I haven’t lost touch with him in all of his Asian adventures.

So, yeah. As I’m traveling around this 3000 mile wide country of ours, I will have all of my friends and family in my pocket and on my back. (And I don’t mean that in a sarcastic way….for the most part.) Not only is this blog a way to keep in touch with everybody, but I will check in with people occasionally. I’m sure I’ll get bored and lonely on those long stretches of road in Minnesota or those long, hot nights camping along the Eastern shoreline.

I can’t wait to get the trip underway. It’ll be hard (no matter what I say) to leave everybody, but I know that I’m never too far away from them. And I’ll be seeing some awesome things along the way. It’s going to be an amazing time.

But first, I have to see Sean Lennon in concert. (Yeah, that’s part of the reason for the delay in leaving. I’m a Beatle freak. Sue me. Besides, his new album is great!)