Yesterday wasn't an exciting day here in Britislava. The sun came out, and contrary to that being a good thing, that seems to contradict the communist style grey buildings to too great a degree. After the usual jog, shower, and Mcbreakfast, I Went to a nearby mall to see a movie-I knew Jurassic World was playing in 3D-but it seemed to indicate not until 6:00 pm, so I walked around main street, bought a new shirt, (something other then my Hawaiian shirts), and had a huge lunch at a vegetarian restaurant. Then I went back to the hostel and took a nap.
Later on, I took the streetcar to the other end of town to see where it went. (no where exciting) And then back to the movie theatre for Jurassic World, it turns out it wasn't playing (the times/dates were all in Slavic, so it is possible I misunderstood). I watched part of Ted 2, but thought it was stupid so I walked out, had dinner at the Slavic Pub, where I was charged for 2 glasses of wine even though I just had one, (the waitress told me that the menu just lists the price for 1/2 glass of wine, and since I had a full glass it was double the price). The whole meal was still less then 6 euros. I went back to the hostel ,did laundry, and hung out in the bar.
My stay in a relatively boring, small city, had me ask myself the following questions:
(1) Why did I stop working when that is the normal thing to do?
(2) Why wasn't I content with my normal life-gym in the morning, work all day, reading at night-Bill Maher on Friday nights-beach on the weekends?
(2) What am I doing at 45 years old, and looking at least that, when I am hanging with 20 something year-olds
(3) Why do I feel like I am back in college?
(4) What will life be like when I get back?
Part of these questions may be due to a simple venue-the hostel.
(a) At 5:00 oclock every day, there is a sausagefest on the outside patio. By this, I don't mean a gathering of mostly men, although it looks like that sometimes. For 1 euro and 50 cents, you get a sausage. I haven't participated because I don't eat sausage, and would rather eat local foods. But to see 20's something men and woman bullshit, laugh, flirt, etc and not being part of the group (nor have I been for a long time), causes one to think about life.
(b) At 10:00-the patio closes, and the people from the sausagefest move to the bar at the hostel. The bar is once again full of people in their 20's, and the tv is always tuned to VH1-Classics, which are music videos from the 80's and 90's. To be sitting at a table alone watching the videos for "Glory Days" and "Summer of 69", and being probably the only people in that bar old enough (and sadly enough, maybe the only one alive) to remember watching those videos on MTV when they came out, prompts serious introspection.
