I´m alive! and kickin baby.
So it has been a while since I last touched in here with the ol´ blog. I was just livin ya know? Sometimes you can´t live and write in your blog at the same time. They´re at odds. You enjoy life and be where you are or you walk around thinking about everything you could write and photograph to show to other people.
For example, I´m walking around La Paz and see this brilliant ear flap ornate mountain hat some guy has on. It is rad beyond belief. So I start thinking ¨Hey I bet I could write in my blog to all my friends about that hat, just look at it! Que maximo!...it is hand woven, no doubt...nice color combination, so unWestern, how quaint...I have my camera, maybe I could just get a picture of it so everyone could see how sweet it is...Wait, what the hell am I doing? I´m in La Paz standing in the middle of the street staring at this man but my mind is completely elsewhere! I´m here man, HERE! I´m right here in this sac of flesh and bones with this wind on bearded-face and mountain sun burning my gringo cheeks. Get a hold of yourself man!¨ Thus, I decided I needed a break from the blog for a bit, to get my priorities straight, like we all need every now and again. But man, that was a sweet hat. and hey! I´m back because I decided I had some things to share and I like my friends and family a whole lot.
In case you didn´t already know I´m here on my own for a few months. Holly is back in Idaho tending goats and climbing pine trees. She is also buying a bike, starting a garden, scheming about the world with her brother, enjoying family time, staring at the clouds, swimming in pools of water, and not having to bargain for everthing from a room for the night to a bag of pomellos at the market. She better be practicing Spanish for when she comes back down to meet me. We are both getting to the bottom of this life thing yet going about it our own way. Travelling on your own has its advantages and disadvantages but it is definitely a good thing for me right now.
Going solo abroad is a new experience for me and, I have found, quite liberating. You can think and do things you don´t normally do while hanging out with others, I like to test myself a lot. Like, going on night walks at 3am in small villages to walk under the stars and see if I can not spook myself then watching the sun rise from a good spot. Or sit down with my guitar in a park and sing for people passing by ( I make up words, they have no idea what I´m staying! that makes it easier). Or not shave for months and grow a giant beard. Or stay in the cheapest hostel I can find and make strange food for myself, not having to worry about offending anyones sense of interior design. Not to say I don´t appreciate a good atmosphere, I just don´t mind when its not nice (and very cheap, did I mention Bolivia is incredibly cheap?)
So where have I been in Bolivia? Let´s see: high in the andes (La Paz, Sorata), floating on an island in the middle of a giant lake (Isla del Sol, Lago Titicaca), and sweating in the bustling Amazon bursting at the seams with life (Rurrenabaque, scariest 27 hour bus ride of my life, 4 falt tires, 3 hours stuck in the mud, countless frightening precipices on a way overloaded old bolivian bus. Asi es.). I´ve been moving pretty slow, finding spots that suit me and staying there for a week or so at a time. It is cheaper that way and allows for me to meet locals and find the non-super-touristy things to do. I have been meditating and reading a lot and getting a feel for my post-college self. What have I found? There are several things that I have come to see as important tenets in my life: Nature, Music, Consiousness. Although I recognize their importance in terms of driving and inspiring me, right now they are all woven together in a giant ball of mystery that I can´t really comprehend. I am taking this time in life to unwrap said ball and get a feel for how I want to start weaving my own fabric.
Music is so powerful and beautiful and I feel is one of the few things that we as humans can produce that approaches the timeless beauty of Nature. Being outdoors and in the backcountry, away from people, calms my mind and makes me realize with elevated clarity how a part of this earth we are. It is so easy to forget when we are online and in our cars, but in Nature, the truth of our existence as forms of life that have evolved in cojunction with the world becomes so apparent. I feel drawn towards environmentalism for the reason that Nature is so calming and gives back in infinite ways, I want others to benefit from its protection.
We are of the world, yet... somehow different. We are aware of our existence, we have this things called conciousness, this awareness of our actions, behavior, thoughts. We can plan for the future and mull over the past. Well, who knows elephants and chimps might be able to do that kind of thinking too...Humans make amazing art and films and architecture and poems and writing. I think that makes us different, also we can go beyond thought, we can stop worrying about survival (when we have basic needs met that is) and be purely here, not worrying about anything. Not that we don´t ever want to think because thinking is necessary in some cases, but that we can do away with a lot of unecessary stressful thinking and chill out when its time to chill.
Our minds are so sneaky! Always scheming and calculating. However, there is this wonderful function of our mind that is above all that, a part of us that realizes you are being a little schemer and just Observes. It doesn´t even say anything, it is just at peace with exactly the way everything is, will be, and has been. Slowly but surely, the more you recogize the useless commentary, the false you fades away and there is only this sense of presence and aliveness in the body.
Being in South America has been really good but really sad in seeing seeing the effects of the modern western world has hit a lot of these communities. The Mind is already so vulnerable and all this modern bullshit just plays on that so hardcore. I find a lot of small indigenous communities where there are western brand names everywhere, american 80´s music bumping from cafes, really material violent hollywood movies on buses and shops, super unhealthy packaged junk food from the US...and ads depicting all of it as ´´just what you need!´´ It seems at such odds with the laidback agricultural mountain life of so many of these places. Of course you cant blame them, it does seem super new and exciting from the outside, until you realize theres so many more depressed and unsatisfied people living in the West. I feel like society down here (exported from up there) is building up these walls to trap people into feeling like they need to consume a lot of shit (and then throw it out the bus window) just to fit in and be successful. Very sad. But the small communities that have not been touched are so noticeable where the kids are all smiling and laughing and the air is clean and life is good.
I suppose that is enough rambling, and not very much about travelling. I´ve realized that I´m travelling to see a new way of life and a new continent yet also figure out what is important to me in life. I miss you all and appreciate you so much more that I am without you now! I also miss dark choclate, red wine, and the mountains and ocean of California. And bikes, and music festivals. and mexican food. However, I think it is a good thing that I am on my own wandering without these comforts because it will make it all the more glorious coming back to them when the time comes.
Con muchisimo amor,
Spence
