Arrrrr! The Pirate's Life for me!

So, I'm in St. Augustine, FL. The train ride down was a good bit of training--19 hours. It was nice to find that American trains are just as efficient as their European cousins, though so much less social. I should have been doing shots of homemade Absente by the second hour with some Romanian hippies; instead, I sat next to some fat guy who drank Miller Lite and pretended to be asleep just so that he didn't have to talk to his wife or daughter. They were on their way to Disneyworld. Oh, the American dream in action!

I stayed at Sweigart's for a while, but it didn't really work out. Philosophical conflicts, as it were. He insists that the nature of the universe is ύλη, but I insist that it's more of a verb, like αρχή τής κίνησεος. After hours of arguing, we realized that the friendship would have to end, and I left.

So, now I'm at a funky little hostel called the Pirate Haus. It’s a decent place in downtown St. Augustine, with free pirate pancakes in the morning (and yes, Conrad, the owner, does dress up like a pirate while serving them). Besides, it's fun to be able to wander around the hallways muttering "arrrr..." without anyone looking at you strangely.

Anyway, it's confirmed - my ship leaves for Portugal on April 10th. The Legend of the Seas is the name. Yeah, it's a cruise ship. I know a freighter would have been much more romantic, but for some reason, a ride on an oil rig is like 4 times the price! I guess there are a lot of rich people who'll pay a lot of money to forget the fact that they're rich. Now, how much sense does that make? I don't know if there'll be internet or phones on the boat, so I may not talk to anyone for a while - rest assured that I'll be too busy enjoying Bermuda and the Azores anyhow.

So, in the interest of not being completely worthless for the next few weeks, and in order to offset the cost of the boat ticket, I basically went door to door downtown looking for a job. It was actually easier than I thought. Now, I figured that most Americans wouldn't give me a part-time job for 3 weeks, what with all the paperwork and stuff, so I was lucky enough to find a nice little French cafe called La Belle Epoque. Yes, that is pronounced "Belly Poke." Michel, the owner, has no problem paying me under the table (silly Americans and their rules). I just stand in the kitchen, dish out quiche, and try to look superior to the customers (I'm trying to blend in).

You know, I don't know the best way to live life, but I do know that, at the very least, I want to go to sleep every night being excited to wake up in the morning. And I know that, for the first time in years, I am.

Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum.

The Adventure Begins...

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As most of you know, I have finished graduate school a bit early, given away most of my possessions, and headed east adventure. As most of you don't know, I didn't quite make it. Yet.

Here's what's up: Emily and I took our flight from Dayton to Philadelphia as planned, with me, as usual, shaking and blubbering for the entire 45 minute flight.

Yeah, I'm afraid to fly. Don't misunderstand; it's not that I fear my plane crashing; I know it's actually more likely that I'll get killed by a donkey than a plane crash (especially where I'm headed). Strangely enough, I'm not afraid of takeoff or landing either, during which something like 86% of all plane crashes happen (not something like. Exactly. But whatever). Even more oddly, the big planes bother me more than the small ones. I feel much safer on a creaky old turboprop than I do a 767. Why? Well, I figure it goes like this...

When I'm in a wee, rickety McDonnell Douglas, I feel like I'm actually in an airplane, and I can accept it. However, if I'm in a massive Boeing, I don't feel like I'm in the air. It's more like I'm on a huge bus, careening down a 16-lane highway. Then, when we hit the smallest bit of turbulence, and I find myself praying to the god you all know I don't believe in, I realize that I'm actually thirty six FUCKING thousand feet in the air! (Do you know how high that is? Do you really? Imagine falling off the top of the Empire State Building... 28.8 times. Fuck.)Perception and reality cease to coincide, and I find myself in the middle of a psychological paradox. Realizing that I can't be both in a bus and on an airplane at the same time, I start whimpering and pee myself.

Ok, well, at least I'm not alone. Plenty of people are afraid of flying, but it's just something you have to do in the modern world, isn't it? I've flown to Europe before several times, and I lived through them all. All I really need to do is sit down and explain to myself calmly and rationally that everything is going to be fine, right? Right?

Well, if you know me, you know that staying calm is NOT one of my strengths.

Perhaps it was the result of a Dramamine overdose, perhaps it was the cheap American beer, or perhaps it was just years of neurosis finally boiling over in a Molotov cocktail of that famed Rotsinger stubbornness, but sitting on that 767, I decided that there has to be a better way to do it than this. Why can't I have my cake and eat it too, goddamnit? People have been traveling the world for thousands... no, millions of years without airplanes! Why should I torture myself all the way over the Atlantic like that? If I'm going to do this thing, goddamnit - if I'm going to explore the world; if I'm going to head east, young man, I'm going to do it MY way!

So, I got off the plane. My luggage didn't, but that's another story.

What now? Well, Emily and I have been in Philadelphia for the last few days. Nice place, really. Bit scummy, but you know, a fresh layer of scum on the top just keeps everything pure underneath.

Of course, I couldn't ask her to give up her vacation for me, so we exchanged her ticket, and she's sitting at her gate right now, getting ready to board her plane.

Me, I bought myself an Amtrak ticket to Orlando. There's a ship leaving from Ft. Lauderdale on April 10th that stops in the Carribean and eventually ends in Lisbon. I intend to be on it.

And you know, I don't regret anything that's happened. I have no idea what is in store for me - where I'll end up or how I'll I get there. What will I see? Who will I meet. Will I end up giving blowjobs for spare zloty in the bathroom of a Polish nightclub? Will I marry an Arabic princess and inherit the Sheikh's oil fortune? Will I drink myself to death in a coal mining town in northern Siberia? All of these things are possible - how exciting!

All I know know is that I've got my life savings of 4,000 dollars in my pocket and a burning desire to abandon the sinking ship that is the United States of America.

Maybe that wasn't the best metaphor.