There are dangers of going abroad.
You could get kidnapped by FARC while enjoying a peaceful holiday in Colombia. You could accidentally catch a flight on Phuket Airlines and the airplane could turn into a "flying coffin". You could go down to Mazatlan and eat a salad and become infected with hepatitis. You could get caught up in a bird flue pandemic in China. You could get your ass reamed, as it were, by an angry bull during the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona.
Lots of things could go wrong.
But the unanticipated dangers are the worst kind.
Like the danger of forgetting who you are, the danger of having the compass that guides your decision-making process malfunctioning, or the danger of the gravity of your convictions suddenly being absent, because this place is like fucking outer space, and you forgot; sometimes there’s no gravity here. You should have planned for that, because now you’re floating away into space and you should have been wearing your fucking space suit cause there’s no oxygen here either, you idiot.
There’s the danger of isolation that leads to an annulment of personality, an annulment of everything you ever thought you were. This annulment of personality leads you to becoming susceptible to contracting this horrible disease called loneliness that is not cured by other people anymore. It’s not cured by your fellow expats and it’s not even cured by the people you love the most that are nearby. The cure is still unknown. Studies are being carried out but thus far they are inconclusive. Correlations of variables have proved spurious.
I remember when I first moved to Spain my parents gave me these purifying pills for the water, in an effort to make me safe and keep me from the dangers of life in the big, bad abroad. You just drop one in a glass of water and it kills all the bacteria so it won’t make you sick. I guess they didn’t know Spain was a first world country and the water was potable here. They should have given me a fucking space suit, or better yet, another kind of pill that would make a day to day life of isolation potable.
I guess these are my excuses for why I’ve been silent lately and when I do speak it’s not at all funny or entertaining. I want to read all of your lovely blogs but I look at my reader and I’m overwhelmed right now. I want to post something that will bring you laughs and make you smile, but I don’t have it in me right now.
Maybe these are excuses too for why I just quit my job in the middle of a financial crisis.
-Bluestreak, unemployed and floating off in space somewhere.
"Kaleigh running" by Ryancbriggs from Flickr
"Spacewalk" by AlbinoFlea from Flickr
Posts
26 comments:
sorry lady.
*sighs*
I hope you find the antidote soon.
It was good to talk to you the other day! I miss you! Your blog doesnt always have to be entertaining or funny. Its about you and we all know you are NOT entertaining or funny all the time.
You know why I love reading your blog? It's because I feel compelled to care about your opinions and what you're going through. And that has nothing to do with me and my personal life--because my friends make fun of me for blogging, like, constantly--it's because you are so open, so articulate, that I just have to pay attention.
Everything you write, to me, is interesting and entertaining. Funny is a side effect.
And for the record, I fucking LOVE the first couple weeks of unemployment. So shut up and be worthless. Spend all of your time watching like, the seven seasons of Buffy or something. That's always fun.
But how can you feel lonely when you have blogging friends?
I understand what you mean, though. And I feel for you. Not in a condescending way. More in a self-reflective way. Just because I'm an introvert doesn't mean I'm anti-social, right?
The point of blogging is not to tell the world what toothpaste you use, but to tell your story in a way that makes people think of larger picture, of themselves and the world. And this post did just that.
I use Colgate, but it's not a deal breaker.
Fuck the LOLs. You're wicked compelling without them. And those blogs can sit in your reader in perpetuity.
For the record, I think you finally made me understand exactly what you're going through. I've never been off my continent, and yet this post showed me, perfectly, what the isolation of being an expat can be. Good work, you.
Yowza.
Bluestreak's got balls.
Blue balls, if you will.
Hope you get what you want!
Hey girl...
I know the feeling. I see my reader and I want to read up on what's going on on everybody else's life but then that means I'll probably want to comment too... and sometimes... I just can't deal. I can't deal with the emails from loved ones and virtual friends. I can't deal with having to even BEGIN to think of what to write because how do you describe what you're feeling inside? and if you're not going to describe what you're feeling what's the use of writing anything then?
In my case it's not exactly the loneliness that I feel... it's the lost-ness.. the not knowing who I am and how do I fit in this stupid equation called life... that's my own shitty question and the one that I try to answer to when I have the guts to sit down and have a heart to heart with myself. Otherwise I cuddle up and watch TV and let the numbness overcome until I feel better and strong enough again to deal with... well... with everything else .
How do you fix it? I don't know. I'm still looking. I'll let you know if I make any breakthroughs. In the meantime hang in there, don't ask me how, I don't fucking now, but I do know that we do it somehow.
Fned.
P.S. A job is just that.
They don't have oxygen in Spain! Wow!
:)
Just being silly. I empathise. It will pass. In the meantime, warmest wishes from the Internet.
Dude, big news in the land of Bluestreak. That isolation of an expat, I totally understand that. We had that struggle in Britain, where people are just unfriendly. It's better here. I hope that things turn around for you or at least you get that space suit!
:((
Oh no WAY! Blustreak! Are you kidding me? I have been checking every day to see if you've written anything because I love it here so much.
And, you may ask, "Why do you keep visiting when you could just check your reader Mongoliangirl?" Well, because I don't have a fuckin' clue how to use that reader thing.
I assure you, your next job could be getting paid to help ass smacks such as myself who are lucky to even know how to turn their computer on. It's a wonder I'm even typing this!
So look, don't go getting all sissy la la just when I found and fell in love with your blog only a few weeks ago.
And, you may remember the folks over at Ask recommended I 'dig deeper'. I've been reading all kinds of your stuff to get the balls to do it.
Again, I love it here! Please keep typing.
There's no loneliness that a bottle of JD and a slice of chocolate cheesecake can't cure.
Ok, that didn't really work for me, but it's worth the experience.
If you need anything guapa just holler....last year I showed up at work the day after elections only to find out that due to the results my 3 year long job was finished with zero notice....and that week you sent me Marcelo´s class!!So don´t stress....we are SO overdue for coffee, no tenemos verguenza ninguna! Are you more flexible now? If so, enjoy it because things will work out!! see you PRONTO!!!
I'm sorry you're feeling blah. I've been feeling down lately too. Maybe it's the season change. What season is it in Spain anyways?
I agree with Rachel- your blog doesn't have to be entertaining or funny... it's about you and how you're feeling.
I came to this blogs to make a work for the university, but I am impressed with you, I start reading the posts and I was amazed. I do not have any idea about how difficult can be living in Spain (for an american). Dont be sad, the crisis not gonna take us down.
Esa guiri que aguante.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uJ17NHnbZI
Sorry about my english
I come here for you, not to be amused or entertained. Well, not solely for that.
I'm sorry you're feeling disconnected and lonesome. Alice didn't have a pill for that. It's not half as pitiful as being lonely in your hometown, is it? Because I am.
@miss hell - thanks, y lo siento, tia. I´ll be normal again soon.
@jul - me too.
@rachel - one more month and I´m home.
@Rassles - have a few more weeks before officially unemployed, but yeah, I plan to do something really meaningless during the first couple of weeks.
@people in the sun - yeah, it´s weird how blogger friends can help sometimes more than real life friends. It´s the unattachment that makes you take what they say more seriously at times. But then if I think about it too much, it creates more lonliness. Maybe I´ll do a post on toothpaste to lighten things up a bit around here.
@prayingtodarwin - thanks for that. I guess if I can manage to communicate my story, that´s the point of this whole enterprise.
@xbox - Yes, I have big, blue balls. Either that or I´m dumb as a rock, but the former sounds better.
@Fned - I actually think lost-ness is a better description of what I feel than loneliness. But lost-ness creates loneliness for me.
@Clarissa - thanks, yeah, everything here looks normal, it´s just that for some reason I´m not getting any air.
@Free Man - you have the weather going for you down there too, that you didn´t have in Britain. But yeah, I experience unfriendliness here too and when I go home it´s a huge relief when waiters and people in the stores are so nice. Weird.
@immoral - thanks for your sympathy :)
@mongoliangirl - it´s not that I don´t want to write, I just don´t want to be repetative and have the same shit come out constantly about home, isolation, lonely, blah, blah, blah, fuck me life is so bad. But for some reason that´s all the compels me to write these days.
@joe - that actually sounds superb right now, whatever the effects.
@m.a. - thanks girl, we´ll catch up soon.
@cubicle - weather here is changing and now COLD. I know the weather does affect me a lot.
@mora - thanks for the kind words. And for the clip...que buuueno, me encanta esa peli.
@gypsy - Oh, I was too when I was living at home. That´s why I think it´s more the lost-ness than the loneliness, like Fned says.
Hey, sounds like you're having a rough time. Hang in there and I hope you'll start feeling better soon. I'm kind of in a blogging funk myself these days, and I don't really know how long it will last. I know that isolated feeling too, it used to happen to me from time to time too. Now with kids I'm much more integrated...not that I'm suggesting you go out and have one or anything...they bring a whole other set of problems, so beware. ;)
It's hard, dude, when you look in your reader and you see that so many other people have been able to put something down and they want you to read them and you can't even think of anything to say. It's hard to be funny.
You should become a hooker. Yeah. That's my thoughts.
You always put my feelings into writing so beautifully. Amen to every single word you wrote.
I also have been feeling very detached this last couple weeks? Is it the election blues, everyone is in on the party except us? Is it just the isolation combined with the stars aligning in a not so wonderful way making things seem so dreary and blue?
I don't know, but just when it seemed I was in a groove and feeling good-- I was blindsided with an overwhelming sense of loneliness.
Oh, honey.
:(
when i went home this summer, i felt like i wasn't home. and when i returned to jordan? i still kind of felt like i wasn't home.
it must be in the water...
Hmmm.. Yup. I hear ya.
Post a Comment