People thought I was crazy to fly so soon after September 11th 2001. They thought I was crazier to travel to Madrid one week after the terrorists detonated bombs on a commuter train (originating from my second home of Alcalá de Henares), but I did it anyway. Explaining I would not let these evil people ground me and put me in fear of doing the one thing I love most....exploring this world and discovering as much as I can about it.
This Saturday is America's Independence Day. I have been invited (via groups on Facebook of which I am a member) to celebrate our nation's independence with parties and other gatherings throughout Valencia. After all the horror that has happened around the world in the past 10 days or so (especially in a part of the world that is so close to mine), I'm afraid I will be declining invites and spend the day far away from gatherings of fellow Americans.
Am I afraid you might ask? I"m not afraid, I am cautious. These people who hate Westerners and our way of life are cold and callous and want nothing more than to kill for the sake of killing. These savages take pictures with their victims after they have gunned them down in the name of religion and it makes me sick to my stomach and I have mourned for their families and like many other people have spent time trying to figure out where such evil and hatred have come from. We are not born evil...evil is taught...it is witnessed and learned and it's passed on like a virus.
The Islamic State warned the English that they would attack Tanzania, months before it happened and they held true to their word. We as Americans have been warned about the possible dangers and threats we face from ISIS and others on Saturday.
The world was a different place pre-9/11 and those of us who are old enough to remember it know this. I will continue to travel, be a citizen of the Earth and get to know my fellow global citizens, their customs and ways of life. I will not however, put a target on my back. I will not attend events publicly advertised to American citizens in a part of the world in which so much horror has taken place.
I am an American and I am proud to be one! I will not be afraid to live my life as I want, but I will also be smart and ever vigilant of the world around me and not call unwanted attention to myself.
Happy Birthday America!
06 February, 2015
The IDEA of Me A.K.A. He Offered Me His Idea of the World and I Told Him I Had My Own, Right here in Reality.
If you haven’t read the article “Don’t Date a Girl Who Travels,” stop and go read it now. I've read that article at least 100 times since I first discovered it. However, I tend to disagree with the message. All the reasons that the author listed to NOT date a girl who travels, is precisely why men are so INTRIGUED with women who travel. This is my experience:
When I first arrived in Madrid, I was contacted via social media by a “friend of friends”. Someone I knew in passing (who I honestly didn't have a high opinion of when I knew him). Being the kind person I am, I chose to reply to this person rather than ignore the conversation starter. I should have known better. I DO and DID know better.
Back to my point. We ended up having a conversation over Facebook, which carried into Whatsapp, which lasted until right after the holidays (Conveniently enough during the holiday season when things were “slow” for him). While the bulk of the conversation was catching up on life since we last spoke i.e. normal conversation he said a few things that brought me to my current realization:
Very early into the conversation he asked me about Paris (not a fan). I said that my opinion about Paris may change in the future and that I needed “a new memory” of Paris. He then said something I've sadly heard several times from different men throughout my adult life, “We should meet in Paris in the Spring.” That’s when the light bulb went off and it reconfirmed what I've known all along:
This guy doesn't like me, he likes the IDEA of me. I’m spontaneous, adventurous, a risk taker and willing to try anything once. I’m a free spirit who doesn’t stay in one place for too long and I TRAVEL. I’m thousands of miles away, with an ocean in between. I live in a city that is older than the United States. I’ve walked where kings and queens, famous authors, and even Jesus walked. I’ve managed to avoid the traditional roles of women: being married, having kids etc. I am very upfront when in conversation. I don’t have time to candy coat things or to act coy. I don’t have the time for bullshitting. My life is so not “Eat, Pray, Love” but for some reason people like to think it is.
So the IDEA of me, is the fixation. The IDEA of meeting in Paris in the spring sounds like something out of a movie or a piece of literature partly (well mostly) because it’s a fantasy. The reality of the situation would be, that we meet in Paris, I pack the wrong shoes and complain all day about how my feet hurt. It would pour rain the entire time and the lines to see landmarks would be long. We’d get lost, but not the “romantical” kind of lost. Like super frustrated at the other person because it seems neither of us can read a map, we don’t speak French…I could go on, but I’ll digress. Lucky for me, I know better than to put hope in these things.
I’m not real to these men, so they can throw around suggestions like this. It’s like I’m a dumping ground of hopes and dreams. I feel like I should carry a sign saying “Don’t tell me your hopes and dreams, and then do NOTHING about it.”
The farther away I am, the more appealing I seem. I know a guy who travels all around the US and we used to text often. It was basically the same situation. He traveled all over the country, I went out of the country from time to time. He would make all these grandiose suggestions about us meeting somewhere in the middle. The reality of the situation was when we were an hour away from each other, I never heard from him. It’s because I suddenly became real, and I was close by. Reality was interrupting the fantasy (or idea) of us and it freaked him out…again I had been taking every suggestion with a grain of salt. He didn't want me, he was happy with the idea of me, and the “what ifs” that made his life more exciting…
I seem to attract these kind of men. I live an amazing life, but at the end of the day, I’m just like everyone else. There is nothing spectacular about who I am, it’s just the life I lead, and the stories I tell about this nomadic life I lead. But when “shit gets real” these men tend to stick their head in the sand and disappear.
Having moved to Spain I have experienced this first hand. During my undergrad I spent a semester studying at a University in Madrid. I met a handsome Spaniard and we feel in love. It was romantic, passionate, I had never had such a connection with another person ever. When I left to return to the States it was heartbreaking for both of us. I left because I had to return to the states and graduate, not because I wanted to leave him and Spain. For fourteen years we have been in love with the “idea of us.” We were going to move to California and be together. He would call me and I would sit on the phone and sob. Whenever I would make it to Madrid, he was the only person I wanted to see, and I would be devastated for days after our reunions. Now here I am, 14 years later, back in Spain, and in fact living in the same town where he lives (upon his insistence). The idea of me, lasted for 14 years, but now, I’m real. I’m in his town, living here indefinitely. You can see the panic in his eyes at times. He has that “shit just got real” look on his face. Gone is the fantasy and here I am, in the flesh…a reality and he doesn't know how to handle it…and it’s quite obvious.
Because of my lifestyle as a nomad and my addiction to travel, I get dumped on by men like this with their hopes, dreams and aspirations. I read this quote the other day that said, “If you keep telling the same sad, small story, you will keep living the same sad, small life.”
I’m living my dream. Unless you plan on acting on yours…don’t burden me with your fiction.
When I first arrived in Madrid, I was contacted via social media by a “friend of friends”. Someone I knew in passing (who I honestly didn't have a high opinion of when I knew him). Being the kind person I am, I chose to reply to this person rather than ignore the conversation starter. I should have known better. I DO and DID know better.
Back to my point. We ended up having a conversation over Facebook, which carried into Whatsapp, which lasted until right after the holidays (Conveniently enough during the holiday season when things were “slow” for him). While the bulk of the conversation was catching up on life since we last spoke i.e. normal conversation he said a few things that brought me to my current realization:
Very early into the conversation he asked me about Paris (not a fan). I said that my opinion about Paris may change in the future and that I needed “a new memory” of Paris. He then said something I've sadly heard several times from different men throughout my adult life, “We should meet in Paris in the Spring.” That’s when the light bulb went off and it reconfirmed what I've known all along:
This guy doesn't like me, he likes the IDEA of me. I’m spontaneous, adventurous, a risk taker and willing to try anything once. I’m a free spirit who doesn’t stay in one place for too long and I TRAVEL. I’m thousands of miles away, with an ocean in between. I live in a city that is older than the United States. I’ve walked where kings and queens, famous authors, and even Jesus walked. I’ve managed to avoid the traditional roles of women: being married, having kids etc. I am very upfront when in conversation. I don’t have time to candy coat things or to act coy. I don’t have the time for bullshitting. My life is so not “Eat, Pray, Love” but for some reason people like to think it is.
So the IDEA of me, is the fixation. The IDEA of meeting in Paris in the spring sounds like something out of a movie or a piece of literature partly (well mostly) because it’s a fantasy. The reality of the situation would be, that we meet in Paris, I pack the wrong shoes and complain all day about how my feet hurt. It would pour rain the entire time and the lines to see landmarks would be long. We’d get lost, but not the “romantical” kind of lost. Like super frustrated at the other person because it seems neither of us can read a map, we don’t speak French…I could go on, but I’ll digress. Lucky for me, I know better than to put hope in these things.
I’m not real to these men, so they can throw around suggestions like this. It’s like I’m a dumping ground of hopes and dreams. I feel like I should carry a sign saying “Don’t tell me your hopes and dreams, and then do NOTHING about it.”
The farther away I am, the more appealing I seem. I know a guy who travels all around the US and we used to text often. It was basically the same situation. He traveled all over the country, I went out of the country from time to time. He would make all these grandiose suggestions about us meeting somewhere in the middle. The reality of the situation was when we were an hour away from each other, I never heard from him. It’s because I suddenly became real, and I was close by. Reality was interrupting the fantasy (or idea) of us and it freaked him out…again I had been taking every suggestion with a grain of salt. He didn't want me, he was happy with the idea of me, and the “what ifs” that made his life more exciting…
I seem to attract these kind of men. I live an amazing life, but at the end of the day, I’m just like everyone else. There is nothing spectacular about who I am, it’s just the life I lead, and the stories I tell about this nomadic life I lead. But when “shit gets real” these men tend to stick their head in the sand and disappear.
Having moved to Spain I have experienced this first hand. During my undergrad I spent a semester studying at a University in Madrid. I met a handsome Spaniard and we feel in love. It was romantic, passionate, I had never had such a connection with another person ever. When I left to return to the States it was heartbreaking for both of us. I left because I had to return to the states and graduate, not because I wanted to leave him and Spain. For fourteen years we have been in love with the “idea of us.” We were going to move to California and be together. He would call me and I would sit on the phone and sob. Whenever I would make it to Madrid, he was the only person I wanted to see, and I would be devastated for days after our reunions. Now here I am, 14 years later, back in Spain, and in fact living in the same town where he lives (upon his insistence). The idea of me, lasted for 14 years, but now, I’m real. I’m in his town, living here indefinitely. You can see the panic in his eyes at times. He has that “shit just got real” look on his face. Gone is the fantasy and here I am, in the flesh…a reality and he doesn't know how to handle it…and it’s quite obvious.
Because of my lifestyle as a nomad and my addiction to travel, I get dumped on by men like this with their hopes, dreams and aspirations. I read this quote the other day that said, “If you keep telling the same sad, small story, you will keep living the same sad, small life.”
I’m living my dream. Unless you plan on acting on yours…don’t burden me with your fiction.
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