Sitting in the 15-pass on the way here from the airport (here being the Presidente Intercontinental in Mexico City), I had all sorts of half-formed thoughts about wandering, about watching out the window, and about how seasoned tour guys don’t seem to do it. I mean, they take some advantage (a couple of guys went to the pyramids yesterday on a pseudo-day-off – how, I do not know), but all these things and places seem to blend together in their minds, or else they’re so used to it that they don’t care. Never having been to Mexico City, or really anywhere in Mexico for that matter, everything I could see on the ride was interesting to me. They use 8 numbers for their phones here. The first branding I could see from my window (American, Window, Exit Row, starboard side) was that on a wal-mart store in what must have been a suburb. If the tricks of light didn’t deceive (it was dusk, afterall), those suburbs seem to go on awhile.
Anyway, the half-formed thoughts were about how much of the world I have not seen and about how I would like to be able to see it versus how I am seeing the small parts I *am* seeing. Those two positions (what I want and the reality of my recent travels) are on distant ends of a pole, with one glaring exception – someone else is paying. Thinking about the traveling I could get done on the amount of money the tour has to spend to get me around is truly staggering; if I spent 1/4 of the money per day they spend on me, I’d be amazed. Honestly, I’d bet it’d be 1/10. I’d spend it, though. You can bet I’d eat my way around the world.
So here I sit – Presidente Intercontinental, feeling like I’m not connecting things as well as I should. Feeling a little out of touch, and not in the phones, internet, email sense but in some way that I’m not threading things together the best possible way. Like I need to seriously optimize my code to run this new program or something. It’s a hazard, I’d hazard, of living the sort of life where you try to always do the most interesting thing available to you at any given time without sacrificing your history to do that. That’s the first time I’ve written that, or said it, and written out longhand it seems daunting, actually. Like a manifesto. Or something you’d carve on a headstone. There’s an image. “Here lies Matt, having always tried to do the thing that was most interesting. Need I chisel more?”
I have an FTP program on my phone, so I’ll try to snap some phonepics while I’m here to update with immediately. Failing that, I’ll do a big ol’ trip photo update when I get back. Fun times.
