Backpacking Trip 2010

The time to leave Sarasota has arrived; we’re leaving tomorrow. The enormity of what I’m really doing has finally sunk in. Last night was our going away party and it was one incredible night! I said so many goodbyes, too many it feels like. Although originally I was dreading the goodbyes, specifically the guy I love, I am relieved that the built up and looming goodbyes have come and gone. Leaving and the trip have always been two completely separate entities for me…leaving meant letting go and saying goodbye to finally follow my dreams and the trip means starting over and searching for life, searching for myself. The thought of leaving and letting go has never affected my thoughts about the trip, negatively or positively; they’ve always been in their own little storage bin in my mind and heart. Now that the goodbyes are over, I feel so strange to be in Sarasota still, even though it’s only for one more night. I feel like the only person standing in a huge empty movie theater, staring at all of the vacant seats. I’ll never see some of these people again, these significant connections in my life. Then some of them I know I’ll see again, and yet again, some of them I’m not so sure. The unknown has always terrified me…especially and most importantly (to me) when it comes to my relationships with the people who mean the world to me. What this trip means to me and my soul can not be put into words. The impact of me deciding to take this trip ended up being and meaning so much more than I had even anticipated. I had no idea just how much personal growth I’d experience leading up to the trip. The hard part is over now and the next part of my journey awaits me, just around the next bend. It came so quickly, June did. And just like that, I’m going, going, gone. I will keep everyone up to date on my travels as often as I can and will sincerely do my best to do so as frequently as possible. Tomorrow we’re leaving to Jacksonville, which will be the last leg of pre-trip plans. Then, we’re off! I can’t believe I’m moving away from Sarasota! And I can’t believe I’m going backpacking through Central and South America for the next four months!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The next time I write in my blog, my feet will be in international soil! Til next time….xoxo

My mind is a constant wheel of thought…more like a tornado, of late. I want to stay awake as late as I can, to get as much out of the day that I can, and I have been (although the results of staying up so late haven’t always been productive, more thoughtful and contemplative than anything). What sleep I have gotten has been interrupted by the ever constant wave of thoughts that now seep into the surface of my sub consciousness. My appetite has been derelict, more like virtually non-existent. As much as I am in love with food and taste, I am okay with my current state of hunger, rather lack thereof. I have too much to do; I don’t even think about it, more about the ball of emotional pain and uncertainty presently residing in the pit of my stomach. More important thoughts and feelings to have and to feel…I am aware that the primary content of my blogs contain a certain vulnerable desperation, and as they should. I realize my blogs are public and I’m not sure who is reading them, if anyone, but I want you to know: do not allow my most vocal desperations overshadow the root of the emotions I feel regarding the trip. Do not allow these detailed meanderings sway you to think I am not the three e’s: exulted, elated and ecstatic. I am all of those and all of the feelings that exist in the rainbow spectrum of emotions, with or without a word to accurately explain them. I know as soon as I leave and am finally surrounded by the world I fiercely crave, I will be fine. Right now, I’m experiencing the “breaking away.” Breaking away is always the hardest part of starting over….letting go. My heart feels like a hysterical, maniacal animal, trapped and caged and uncertain of what to think, say or do; it’s arduous to let go. My mind is a whirlwind of thought, reflection and criticism. This description can not describe the precise and exact emotions running through my veins, and is not all of what I feel; there is exponentially much more. I know once the break is made, relief will flood from the tip of my hair to the end of my toenails. I am beyond curious of the unknown, mostly because I am terrified of the unknown. I’m not coming back here. I am taking the backpacking trip with Katie, but my trip does not end there; it is only the beginning. After these international travels, I am traveling the continental U.S. I want to see the world, and I will. I am. The trip commences in Central America but it is never ending. I often wonder if people are ever truly happy with their lives, or are they all settling. I knew from the start that I can never settle which is ironic because I have been trying to do just that my entire adult life. I am leaving what I’ve ever known and experienced for good and never looking back, only forward. Also ironic because at the same time, I could stay here, with him, and stay there every day for the rest of my life. It is not in my future (and it is only currently my infrequent present), and I need to let that go more than any thing else. I’ll be in the future in half a breath. I’m in the future now. I can no longer look behind. The time for that has come and gone…I am I and all that I am and all that I know how to be. I am happy in this place, as I know I will be happy wherever my heart shall lead me (and wherever I shall follow).

The enormity of leaving and what I'm leaving for, what I'm leaving behind, what I'm trying to find, what I'm looking for, has knocked me with full force! It's weighing down my mind... Everyone has flaws, it is part of ... [Continue reading this entry]

I remember that night like it was yesterday...after all, it was just "yesterday" that Katie and I were sitting at Applebee's for happy hour discussing the current views on our lives, what we had, what was lacking, and what we wanted. ... [Continue reading this entry]