One Day, Four Parts. Spain, Day 8

Cathedral in Toledo

I'm on a bus to Toledo. It's very sunny out, which becomes a strong reminder that I should have brought my sunglasses. You don't really think about them when it's cold, dark and gloomy. Then when the sun comes out, it dawns on you. Get it...? It dawns on you? Nevermind.

This post in written in 4 parts. The references of time may be inconsistent because I wrote it over 3 days. I tried to add more pictures, too. Enjoy! 

 
PART 1: On My Own

Trying to navigate with my ripped up map.

I decided to go solo today. Yesterday was fun trekking around with the LA homie to Avila but for a lot of reasons I knew it was best to go alone today. For one, it's my last day and I want to make sure I get everything done.

I also needed a chance to be out on my own. I needed to feel the pressure of having to figure things out by myself. Through this trip I've almost completely relied on everyone else to get around. When in a group I hardly ever know where I'm going. I know I can do it, I just haven't had to.

So this morning it was all me. I left the hostel and found my way to Tribunal metro station. I knew where it was but it's different when you don't have other people to help you. To correct you if you steer off course. This time there was nobody. I was balancing without a net.

My 7-day pass had expired so I had to buy a new one. By the time I finished getting to the platform, there was already a train there with doors ready to close and leave.

Doors closing in 5 seconds.

I didn't really have any time to think. I couldn't study the map. I had to decide whether to get on this train and I had about 5 seconds to choose.

Now to understand this moment, you have know that when me and Simón were going through the city the day before, he was the one leading the way. I had told him that I wanted to start knowing where I was and navigating myself around and not depending on other people. He said, "No worry bro, trust me." I said I don't want to trust you. I want to know where I am and where I'm going.  So when we'd make a turn to go upstairs or to the left in the metro station, I'd slow down to read the sign or orient myself. He's say "Come on, man, I know this is the way." He kept telling me. "Just feel it. You know it's the right way."

Navigating the metro maps

So faced with this train open in front of me, I knew I didn't know. I couldn't be sure. Making a gut decision, I jumped on. Wherever it takes me, I'll find my way from there.


It ended up being the wrong one. Or at least not the one that Ruben from reception laid out for me. But it just meant I had to find a different route. This way took more time, had me running up and down stairs, but I was the one in charge at least. Lost, but in charge.

PART 2: Toledo and the last seat back

 

By the time I boarded the bus to Toledo, all the window seats were taken. I sat next to a girl who looked about my age, but she napped the whole time so we didn't talk. I didn't mind, I dozed on and off too.

In Toledo, I had no route or plan, but I saw a sign that said Maps. Ahead of me in line was that girl, and the map guy explained to us the route to take. When we stepped outside, I just walked up to her and asked, "De donde eres?" She said, "Peru." That changed everything. No way! I've been there! What part? We talked for a bit before I said - Vamos? Shall we go?

Me later with my Peruvian friend

And so off we went. Instant friends. Just like that. We walked around and joked all day. She commented how it was nice to have someone to take pictures of you instead of setting up the timer and running like she did the day before. She spoke Spanish in her normal fast speed and I was able to keep up pretty fantastically. Although she, like many of my Spanish friends, thoroughly enjoyed correcting me and making fun of me when I misspoke.  I can tell pretty quickly that it's going to be a lasting friendship when I see the sheer joy someone has at my expense. I'm happy to provide the entertainment.

We stopped and bought "mazapanes" which are treats of just almonds and sugar. I had to because Sara la Madrileña told me like 3 times I should, and I didn't want to face her without trying them. Then later we stopped for a 2 hour lunch. I ate quail. Cathedrals, walls, beautiful views, a hundred rolling streets and stairs. It was a cute little town.

Remember this was my last day here, and I still had some things I needed to do back in Madrid, like go see the Prado. My trip could be considered a complete fail if I didn't get to any museums. I HAD to get that done. The long lunch had put us behind schedule, and la Peruana was going at a leisurely pace. I was looking at the time and remembering the traffic jam that delayed our return to Madrid the day before. I was starting to freak out. It was a 45 min bus ride back and the Prado closed at 8. 

At 5:30 all we needed to do was finish the route circling through the town without stopping, and then head back. It seemed to take forever. At one point we went up 6 flights of stairs in elevation. I thought, this is NOT taking us closer to the bus station. 

In Toledo

At about 5:45 we were actually done with the route and heading to the buses. The roads were winding. If you traced our path it might have looked something like when Billy from Family Circus goes and gets the mail.


At about 5:53 we were running. It wouldn't have been the end of the world if we missed the bus, but we didn't want to find out. (We got off easy 2 weeks ago with the end of the world- let's not push our luck, eh?).

We finally got to the bus station. She had her ticket; I still needed one. After buying mine, I bolted downstairs to the bus. She was ahead of me and got to the bus line first. I could see her and a lady behind her. The bus driver took my friend's ticket, and said to the lady, "Sorry it's full" and points to another bus. "You have to wait for the next one."  Then he waved me on. My friend had told him I was coming, so I got the very last seat.

We plopped down out of breath, overheated, and laughing at the whole thing. I couldn't believe we had made it. Another 5 seconds or one more wrong turn would have had us on another bus.

I don't even know what to do with those moments.  I think, what's my takeaway for a day like this? Is it that I might not be so lucky next time, so I should plan out my day better and leave earlier? Is it that everything works out for a reason? Is it that God's looking after me and sent a guardian angel to stop the bus?

In the end I don't know if there's any lesson to learn. I think it's just a moment to enjoy. To feel a little bewilderment at how life rolls out, and know that this is one to savor a little bit and smile. It doesn't make sense, but it doesn't have to. I was just happy and relieved to be on the bus, headed back to Madrid. 

 

PART 3: The Prado and Guernica

NOT the famous painter. (Credit: Google images)

We ended up making it to the Prado and saw works of famous Spanish painters Velázquez and Goya. Rembrandt. Durer and da Vinci. Rafael (can't lie I was pretty excited to see work by the namesake of a Ninja Turtle).  

I don't know what to do with seeing that art. There are so many works. There's so much history spanning hundreds of years. There are different styles and interpretations. It's overwhelming. And many are enormous. How do you transport them? Museums have to be huge just to fit the paintings in them. Owning famous art is a sign of wealth partly because you need to own a big enough house and doors to contain them. And, @nathansaxton, how do you frame them or decide how to?

We had a solid hour-plus there, which was enough to appreciate and check off the list.

The famous Prado Museum

But I wasn't done yet. One of my favorite paintings is by Picasso: Guernica. It conveys the horrors of the Civil War in the 1930s.

Here's an excerpt from the book I'm reading about Spain,

Reina Sofia entrance

"At that point, Nationalist leadership decided that the people must be terrorized into surrender. At their request, on Monday April 26, 1937, the German Condor Legion bombed the ancient Basque city of Guernica from the air. Monday happened to be market day and the town was full of people from the surrounding countryside. Those who survived the three-hour bombing were then machine-gunned by the German fighter planes...It was the first time in history that bombers had annihilated a civilian target."

As terrible and morbid as the subject is, it's undoubtedly significant. I always loved that painting. In general, I don't connect with a lot of art. I appreciate the talent and vision it takes to do it, but most pieces don't speak to me. I think I saw Guernica in high school or in my Spanish classes in college, but all I know is I loved it since I first saw it. 

Guernica by Pablo Picasso (credit: Google images)

Well the original Guernica is in Madrid. Only it's not at the Prado like I thought. I still had to go the the Reina Sophia museum if I wanted to see it in person.

The Prado closed at 8 and the Reina Sophia at 9. By the time we got to Reina Sophia, it was 8:30 which is when the last entrances are allowed. Again, made it in the nick of time. She had already been there and it was getting late, so that's when I said adios to my new Peruvian friend.

I headed upstairs straight to the Picassos. Gosh I love his stuff.
Finally I turned around and saw it. It was larger than life. I somehow knew it was big, but it's even bigger than that. And so I just stood there, gazing in wonder, dwarfed in the shadow of this image. 

Apparently it's a big deal. Lots of people come just to see this painting. I have no way of knowing if they're feeling the same as I am. I feel like I've earned hipster status when it comes to this particular work of art. I liked it because I liked it, not because anyone else did, and before anyone else did. Even though it's all mainstream now I still like it just as much. Anyway, that was the last thing I had to do on my list. I saw it just before it closed. I got to see probably my favorite painting in person. What an incredible day!! 

But it wasn't over yet.

PART 4: A final toast with my Madrileñas

As soon as I exited close to 9 I had to book it over to the city center to meet my Madrileña friends so we could say goodbye one last time. They had agreed to extend our meeting time to 9:30 instead of 9 so
I could see Guernica. It worked out perfectly because I arrived at 9:20. Thanks for being cool with changing the time!

It was a goodbye to remember. We went to a pub and ate food and had drinks. We toasted probably a dozen times. Cheers to the New Years. To keeping our resolutions. To el dia de Los 3 Magos. To practicing English for them and Spanish for me. To me not missing my flight.

We had started exactly a week earlier as virtual friends, yet strangers in real life. And now here we were talking about our dreams and resolutions. Teasing one another and encouraging each other. Tomando and promising to meet as a group again.

After the amazing week I had already, I had just wanted to close out the last two days with some checked off tourist sites. I didn't expect for it to be anything that lived up to the other days. But today was yet another fabulous day. 

At about 2 am I walked back to my hostel for one last time. I couldn't have asked for a better sendoff!

...Stay tuned for one or two more blog posts to wrap up the trip. 

 

Spain, Day 7. Anthony goes to Ávila.

Spain, Day 7.

Today was a bittersweet day. Our party of 6 in room 6 had to go our separate ways. Simón and I were heading off to Ávila, the Barcelona girls back home, and the German girls to north of Spain to go back to university. It's crazy we all met only a few days ago. We took our last picture just one table over from where it all began in the Comedor, the dining room. Till we meet again, amigos!

When you have a "hometown" you've always wanted to visit, there's some pressure for it to be good. There's some hype that now it has to live up to. Ávila was definitely worth the trip. The main sight is the castle walls that surround the city. It was just fun mobbing around the town taking tons of pictures. It's higher in the mountains so it's freezing, but we had work to do. We saw everything we needed to in 4 hrs and then sprinted back to the station in time to catch the next bus. There's still some things I didn't see/try but I foresee more brothers/family coming here, so I can finish seeing the city then. Vale?

When I got back to the hostel on my bed there were all these little ripped up pieces of paper. I had no idea what they were. As soon as I started reading them I actually yelled out "nooo waaayyyy!" The Barcelona girls had written little quotes to remind me of our whole trip. English and Spanish words we'd been practicing, funny phrases, things we laughed at or said to each other. The fact that they remembered all those things and then wrote them down, that's the kind of crazy thing I like to do. I remember in Peru I left a note for my Brazilian friends when I left our hostel. But to be on the receiving end of that gesture felt really amazing, actually. It sounds silly, but it's true.
It's the kind of fun but meaningful surprise that will make me smile to think about.

Today definitely felt like the trip is winding down. It's changing from being less about chilling with the people and more about the things to do. I just enjoyed myself at first and now I'm ready to take care of business. I'm starting the think about transitioning home. I'm not ready yet but I will be.

The blog this week has turned into a summary of events and some reflections, but there are tons of more posts I want to write but I haven't been able to flesh it all out. I'm thinking about how this blog will work after I get back. I plan to milk this trip for a lot more posts. There's a lot more to say. This isn't a travel blog. It's a thoughts about life blog, and right now my life thoughts are about this traveling experience.

I'm starting to fall asleep. My body is trying to tell me something. "Duerme duerme!"

The Last and the First.

Dia 5 and 6

¡Feliz Año!

It's been about 48 hours since the last post. That's a lot to catch up on. I'm doing these together because the two days kind of blended into one.

On the 31st, I woke up feeling pretty crummy, considering I only had a few hours of sleep because of staying up late planning my trip. My sinus/allergies/cold thingy was pretty bad, and the day was overcast and gloomy and almost bitter cold. I'm not complaining as much as setting the scene, creating a little drama, ya know.

We went to Retiro Park. It's huge, like Balboa in San Diego or Central Park. Was really beautiful. I can only imagine it in the spring or fall when I suppose I could feel my hands.

Later we went back to the hostel to nap before New Year's. I took an antihistamine and slept like teenager before noon on a Saturday. (Facebook reminds me that "sleep like a baby" doesn't work, because babies don't sleep.) This siesta was probably in the top 3 best decisions of 2012. I woke up feeling like Bradley Cooper in Limitless.

For New Year's here the big thing to do is go to Madrid's main square Sol (it's like Spain's Times Square) which has a big clock and bells, and at the stroke of midnight eat 12 grapes, one for each of the strokes. The grapes have seeds so it's kind of challenging. The other challenge? You can't hear the bells, and there's no countdown that everyone can hear. By 12:03 I think most people called it safe to be the New Year and started shoving grapes into their mouths.

But I'm not there yet. After I woke up feeling like Bradley Cooper, the Barcelona girls and the West LA Persian homie (whose main Spanish word he knows is "Simón!") and I went to a Syrian restaurant and hookah lounge. It was about 10:30. Simón and I were the only ones wanting to go to the Sol, so we slammed our food and booked it over there.

I didn't mention that of course it was cold and drizzling. Because I was feeling somewhat like that super human guy in Wanted who can shoot wings off of flies, this only excited me more for the night. I mean of course it has to be raining and cold and slippery when you spend New Years in Madrid. Movie sets pay lots of money to set up that kid of ambience. It was awesome.

We met some Americans while pushing our way through the crowd because they recognized some English swear words homeboy was saying. We spent midnight with them and ate our grapes. Madrid's Sol plaza is the one they show on TV. So if you saw any pictures of a clock in Spain at midnight on your TV or online, then I was there at that place. If you look closely in the reflection maybe you can see me standing there in the crowd, with a bunch of grapes stuffed in my mouth.

After that we followed the Americans to an Irish bar the Dubliner. We were one of the first ones there and they were playing good music. It got packed after a little while and we were dancing and hanging out. Or at least I was dancing.

Soon afterward I had to leave because I was supposed to meet up with the Barcelonas at 1 am. Simón was having a good time so we parted ways and I headed to find the girls. We met up at a cafe and there we waited for my Madrid friend Sara who had spent midnight with her family. I actually didn't think she would come out, but I'm glad she did.

We found a bar and got bebidas and danced. There we danced swing, the twist, all the single ladies, and finally got to do some salsa. Oh and a conga line! cant forget that. It was a good mix and good time.

Next we left to look for a new place and ended up at a Funk and Soul lounge named Mader Faker (*ahem*), which had, well, 60s soul and funk music. Not the type of scene I would have guessed I'd be at. It was a small place and we had a blast. The four of us danced and joked around for the next few hours, taking pictures and meeting other people from Ireland, Holland, Scotland, and other places. Very simple, but when you're with awesome people you don't need much.

At 6 or so I suggested we find another place, so we left. To decide our next move, the girls were feeling tired, the Churros were too far away, lots of places were closed. The night was ending. I was still feeling probably something like Spider-Man in that moment when he first discovers how to web-sling himself between the city buildings and lets out that long yell of excitement, so I didn't want to go home yet. We extended it a bit longer by getting some pizza at a place that reminded me of Brooklyn pizza on 4th ave at 2 am, but better quality and pre-made like No Anchovies.

At this point Sara decided to take a taxi home. We said our good nights, and the rest of us headed back to the hostel. We didn't want to wake our roommates with our conversation and laughter so we goofed around with Reuben at the reception downstairs and walked around the halls. Finally at 7 or 7:30 am we went to sleep.

All in all it was an awesome night. Couldn't have asked for a better one. I'm telling you...that nap was amazing. But more amazing? My Spanish friends! (Awww)

Then today the 6 of us roommates all exchanged stories when we got up and eventually got ready and went to Fres Co, a buffet much like Sweet Tomaoes or Soup Plantation.

I had a scary moment at the end of the meal where I almost choked on a nearly frozen dried apricot. It just fell into my throat wrong. I could breathe enough that I didn't feel like I was dying, but at that moment I didn't feel like I was really living either. It was pretty terrible... Like someone was lightly choking me (I know, sounds so pleasant). I ended up being fine after a few hours but there were some moments I wasn't so sure there wouldn't be some lasting pain. By the way, a goal for this year is to learn CPR and get First Aid certified. Call me inspired.

After that the Barcelonas and I went to the circus. It was similar Cirque do soleil. Really incredible show.

So that's how I spent my last and first days of 2012 and 2013.

Tomorrow (now today) I'm going to Ávila, a medieval town that I feel compelled to visit.

Thanks for the continued comments and "likes." I wish I could "like" them
all back! Keep 'em comin'.

Brindamos! *Tchin tchin* a 2013!

Spain, Day 4

It's 4:30 am here.

I have a post I started earlier but instead of writing on my blog I decided to sit down and actually plan out the logistics of the rest of my trip. I've just been hanging out, eating, walking, and going with the flow, which has been fun and awesome. Pero para aprovechar the time I have left, I needed to make some decisions. Thanks Sara y Ana for pushing me to sit down and take care of business!

Today I:

Went to Miguel Cervantes' house. Very cool.

Toured Parque Europa. It was freezing, but fun.

Confirmed that I love tinto de verano.

Played guitar in the hostal lobby for about 2 hours entertaining my friends and guests. Some surprise requests were Cranberries' Zombie and More Than Words. Not so surprising: Wonderwall! But still I really enjoyed hearing them shout out whatever they think the English words are and singing along.

Now maybe some sleep. Last day of the year! The next post probably won't come in until 2013. See you next year!

(Photo 1) Las profesoras
(Photo 2) Ice skating. They have a lot of outdoor rinks here.

Spain Day 3

This morning my catch-up post took quite a bit of time to write. My friends had to wait for me to eat. By the time I got to where I was supposed to go, they were gone. (I don't blame them. They waited long enough and needed to meet up with a friend.) I felt like a total butthead for making them wait. I asked like 4 people if they had a cell phone I could use, to no avail. I asked for a phone bank or Internet cafe. I found one 2 blocks down. When I got on the Internet, I realized I had no way to contact them via a computer. The app was on my phone and they didn't have wifi (pronounced wee-fee). So I decided to call them instead. The connection was bad so I couldn't hear her well, so I called the lady at the front desk over to speak to my friend. I said - I need to know how to get to my friend. The lady kept shouting into the phone the address where we were. I said no, I am going to her! I need directions to her. She wasn't listening. So apparently I speak Spanish fine but other people don't hear me fine. I asked another lady later where the bathroom was, and she told me, "oh different parts but mostly I'm from Turkey." Um, what?

Later I met up with Sara and Ana and we had a nice dinner. They spent most of the night correcting my Spanish and tomorrow I'll get to help them practice English. At this point I'm more comfortable speaking Spanish in some ways. I find myself saying or typing things in Spanish even when I can use English.

Ok, and here's another scary thing: My phone is starting to autocorrect in Spanish! 'Ta loco.

Tomorrow we go to Alcalá de Henares. That will be fun.

My wise thought of the day:

This whole traveling thing seems too easy. The ticket was expensive, sure. But there's way too much of an upside. I literally knew no one in Spain a month ago. 5 weeks ago I didn't even have a serious thought of going to Spain. And now I couldn't imagine it any other way. These friends I've made feel like we've known each other for years. It makes me wonder what other adventures are knocking on my door down the road. What other people are waiting for me to introduce myself to them, if only I'd step outside my door and move.

On loss, faking confidence, and self-defense

Hi everyone,

I guess it should happen that as I put more effort into this whole blog business, I would have to work out some kinks.

Yesterday all day as things occurred I was mentally deciding how I was going to write about it that night. So when we got home late last night (late is an understatement: it was like 5 in the am) I was still determined to post something. From 530-630 I wrote a beautiful entry on my iPhone in the notepad. Here i was, in, bed, all lights off excepr for the glow of my screen, with my 2 roommates sleeping and probably hating me. I haven't even met them, they only know me as te guy who rustles things and shifts and zips/unzips bags constantly. Anyway my arms kept falling asleep because of the position I was in but I was determined to finish what I needed to say. I poured my heart out into this thing.

Maybe you know where this is going.

By the way, something I learned that you should know: the iPhone has an undo feature. You just shake the iPhone and it lets you untype or undo the last action. wish I knew that last night. Try it out and practice. If you have another phone name sure you know how to undo, save, etc.

The end of it is that close to 7 in the morning I was frantically trying to undo typing over what I had just crafted so meticulously. It was just moments after I said, "I'm done, it's good, I'm finished," that it vanished.

I was disappointed, but I was exhausted and needing to sleep, and within a couple of minutes realized that it wasn't coming back. I went to bed not wanting to believe that it was gone.

What has surprised me is that I wasn't devastated. I was strangely OK with not be able to post it. Most of the satisfaction I got was in writing it, in staying up late almost obsessivelu determined to finish, and putting down in words what I needed to say. It was this morning that I was clear headed enough to look up the undo feature, and by then it was too late. But that didn't bother me. Lesson learned, now I know for next time.

So that's what I wrote about today to make up for yesterday. I thought you should know why I didn't post, and also hear that life will always include loss and it sucks and that's OK.

It reminds me of one of my favorite poems- "If" by Rudyard Kipling.

"If you can (...) watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings,
And never breathe a word about your loss"


Well, I definitely "breathed" a word about the loss of my blog post, but I'm not going to lose sleep over it. I slept pretty astoundingly come to think of it.

Ok I still need to tell you highlights from yesterday. This is the abbreviated version:

At breakfast in the hostel I sat myself down at a table with 2 girls from Barcelona, pretending to be confident and at ease. We hit it off and had an amazing day enjoying the city. I'm going to pretend to be confident more often.

I got my luggage back (more about his in the draft below)

My friend Ana I got to meet for the first time yesterday. I said a lot of things about her in the lost post, but all you need to know is she's even cooler in person. So she's awesome, and so is Sara.

Lastly, and this is a serious one I spent the most time on, boils down to this plea from me: please go to a self- defense class in 2013. It's not about learning karate moves, it's about being confident, thinking clearly, and using mostly your voice to set boundaries for yourself. Everyone needs to. If you're in Tucson I recommend Combat Fit. Some classes are free.

I went to the clubs with a group from my hostel. It was awesome and fun, until I noticed some creeper approaching women and getting way too friendly with them. It was none of my business until I saw the girls saying no and trying to pull away. He was very aggressive, but just charming enough that it kept going on. I almost lost it. I started intervening. My friends thought I was crazy and getting worked up over nothing, but I was basically witnessing assault before my eyes. My blood was boiling and I couldn't stand that.

I could type up the whole exciting endeavor but in the end I feel like I did the right thing and kept my cool enough not to do anything stupid. A little less self control and I would have. The girl from my group thanked me later and confirmed the guy was as much of a creep as I thought.

So please, take self-defense. It will help protect yourself or someone you love or even a stranger in another country.

I have to stop somewhere. So I'll leave you with the only thing that saved from yesterday, which was the following items. This whole blog post isn't polished, and neither is what I wrote below. I'm not even going to do a final read through. Que será será.

¡Nos vemos!
.........
(Original post. First draft)


I don't want to do a play by play of my trip. That never works out. I get caught up in the details, and then it turns into a story that's too long. Some of you might call it an "Anthony story". I guess there's a reason it got that name.

First of all, thanks for reading. What's a blog without readers? I guess that would be a journal, and I already have one of those. And thanks for commenting, mom and Ana! Thats pretty cool to see comments. You still can if you want to

When I was rereading my post from yesterday (I tend to read whatever I write over and over again) I found some egregious errors. I won't tell you what they are. I also wanted to add more in. I saw a perfectly great opportunity for amazing alliteration and I blew it. But you know what? I'm not going to fix them. Like I said, mistakes are OK and I could go on correcting forever. It's time to move on.

Even with the jet lag and lack of sleep and what not, I've felt great. I went to bed at the equivalent of 7 pm and woke up at 2 am. Right now it's 6 pm in Madrid, but that still only 10 am in Tucson. My point is, I have no idea what time my body thinks it is, but with my schedule this last month I think it gave up a long time ago. I think I've been on Spain time for awhile now.

My luggage got to my hotel this morning. I was planning to go retrieve it at the airport, but when I went to the front desk to rent a towel and gave her my name, she got up and left. After a minute she came back and yells "una sorpresa!" (surprise). It was like Christmas in Spain. No, but really I was pretty happy.

It might have gone something like this:

Me: (hand on hip, glaring)
"Where have you been? I've been up all night worrying about you."

Backpack:
*slouching, stares down at the floor*

It could have happened that way. But it didn't. That would be ridiculous.

Why vs. Why not

I'm going to Spain and I don't know why.

Seriously. I'm on a plane pretty much smack dab in the middle of the Atlantic, directly above where the massive tectonic plates diverge, forming a new spreading sea floor (see, I was paying attention in geology 101), and I don't have a particularly solid reason.

Oh sure, there are plenty of good reasons. (because it'd be fun, to practice Spanish, etc) But none of them seemed especially compelling at first. Or at least I'm adept enough at talking myself out of things that these reasons could easily be dismantled and locked back up in the "someday" box where we keep all our crazy dreams. Usually when a good reason started sparking that hope to life, one good spray of "maybe later" would put it out.

But there was one nagging thought I couldn't push out of the way.

It was the question: "Why not?"

I halfheartedly tried to extinguish the question with the usual weapons: too much money, but that seemed like not much of an obstacle in the long term; I didn't have time and I had too much to do: even I laughed at those. I knew I didn't stand a chance. I was defenseless. It wasn't even a fair match.

(I think one of the reasons I couldn't even consider that rationalization is that I listen to people older (and wiser) than me. If they have traveled, they recommend it strongly because it was the best decision they could have made. If they didn't travel, there's almost always a tinge of regret and the words: I should have, you should while you're young and you have the chance. Just do it because it never gets any easier...So for anyone who's actually said those things to me: I actually take it to heart!)

So I'm not sure why I'm going to Spain; I just know that sometimes the question isn't why, it's why not. And somehow lots of things seem to fall into place when you think from that perspective.

I'm a teacher, which means I spend most of my time dishing out advice that later comes back to haunt me (or help me). Aside from being a teacher, I'm also an advisor to a hodgepodge bunch of students in what we call advisory groups (mine calls itself Avila's Awesome Advisory, because, well, we're awesome. :)

We have a poster in our advisory room we've been using all year. No matter what subject we're on, we always find ourselves pointing to it and reading it. It says, more or less,

Watch your thoughts
They become your words
Watch your words
They become your actions
Watch your actions
They become your habits
Watch your habits
They become your character
Watch your character
It becomes your destiny

Our talking point is that problems usually arise at the action stage, and it's important to catch them before they turn into habits. But by then there's already a lot of momentum. At that point the idea is out there manifested fully, causing conflict and tension in the open. What would make the real difference is if you can guide/alter/ train your thoughts before they go anywhere else. They are small then, but they are dangerous for what they can become.

Where I come in as their teacher is usually to say "words do matter"...."watch your words." Because if you think something, and then say it, you're speaking some idea into existence. When I hear the students utter phrases like, "shut up or I'll beat you." or "gosh this sucks I'm going to kill myself," they don't think it's a big deal. No harm done.
And yet I point out to them that they very quickly and comfortably are doing the first 2 things, and the very next step is action. There's very little safety net between words and actions, even if it seems like a big leap.

So as I sit here squished in this middle seat during my half-baked plan to traverse across the world, I'm thinking about that poster. And I believe the "thought sequence" can work in the positive too.

You just have to be so careful. Because it started a month ago with a fleeting, cavelier whim to go to Spain. It wouldn't go away. And then I mentioned the idea to someone, putting it into words, and then to a few more people. And by then it was too late. "Why not" was already on its way with reinforcements, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Quick- what's the first crazy dream of yours that comes to mind? Maybe start on the medium scale. Not a life dream perhaps, but an out-there hope for 2013. Something you have serious doubts that you could actually accomplish it. You don't think you would actually do it.

Got one?

Now go ahead and ask yourself:

Why not???

(For the truly daring, put the idea into words and leave in a comment below!)