I don't have to tell you that I was ready to go, ready to leave behind Los Angeles for a few months and get away from everything I know. This "Getting Away" from everything I'd known and believed had been a big priority for me in recent times, for I felt that it was time to take a step back from my life to see what really matters and what was a real, true part of me, or what was something that had been imparted to me from society or family and was something that i might want to let go off.
This trip, which was devised over half a year ago, I realize, had been in the works for years, many things had been leading up to it. My restless nature, my dissatisfaction for parts of my life, like where I lived, like what I do, and the direction that I felt I'd been going. I'd been close to this trip, dipping my toe into the idea of it while going through Asia, but I hadn't gotten my footing under me, I didn't have clear through line then, I was wondering, unfocused, not ready. This time, I was setting the intention before I got going, and I would follow it to the end of the line, and maybe it will change, evolve as the trip goes on, but it would be there from the start.
And so I waited, I waited at work, I waited at home, I waited at the beach, although more pleasantly at the beach then at work. I half heartedly packed, shopped for goods I might want to take, but I knew that it didn't really matter what I brought, because as long as I head my head about me, I could get through any scrape. I took long walks, tried not think about anything, I played video games, because they are an excellent time killer. I started to read at least three books, anything I could do to kill the time before the trip finally began. I was like a bullet in a gun, just waiting to go off.
Excitement was an issue, excitement has always been an issue for me. I can be either manically enthused or completely unemotional, before settling into my normal go-getter state. So before Friday, when people asked me about it, I was un-enthused, I would say all the rights words, like, "oh yes, I am really excited about the trip. Can't wait." But I wouldn't give the appropriate emotion to back it up. And that wasn't necessarily the truth of it. I was excited about the trip, but it was just that I knew once it had started it would be akin to starting a new life and I didn't want to tamper, color it with possible false, unreasonable expectations, and I also didn't want to set myself for any kinds of disappointment. I felt like it would be better just to go in without expectations and be open to anything.
Of course, Friday came, and feeling it coming the next day and feeding off the excitement others had for the trip, I bounced and bounded upon the city, the streets, and stairwells with extreme glee, you know, like Tigger might. I celebrated the night of leaving with some of my closest friends and said goodbye to many others
And like the the gun that had been sitting in the cabinet, loaded and ready to go off, Saturday morning arrived and the metal crashed together, the flame was ignited, and I was shot out of city of Angels; past the fires and smoke that burned the skylines and mountain tops of the valleys; past the desert plains and signs screaming "Congress caused the Dust Bowl;" past the gas stations, Starbucks, mini-malls, and Outlets that line our better known freeways; and out of my mind and body, just a clear voice singing my freedom out to the whole world.
And that's how the trip begins.
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