Subjective Babble

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There has been some commentary made to me to the effect that the purely expository narrative of mine grows dry and tiresome. In fact, I view it similarly. At times, I find it almost a chore to relate the pure events of my travels, devoid of their more emotional content. The question of course is then, why would I choose such a path of masochism? Here the answer is not immediately explicable. I would say, briefly, that I don't have a choice. It's something I find necessary and unavoidable. In other words, the feeling I have when I don't record (publicly and/or privately) is less desirable than the slight difficulty involved in the subjugation of the natural will which I'm forced to effect in my pure expositions.

If none of that made sense, fear not. It was entirely unimportant. The end result is that, although I am accustomed to relating narrative on these pages, today's daily babble shall be somewhat more subjective.

Somewhat coincidentally, today was, barring degree, microcosmical of the broader feeling patterns which solitary travel effects. I awoke somewhat hungover (somewhat typical) on the floor of an apartment in which lives a student from Ohio currently working in a wine boutique here in Bordeaux.
(How I got here is a short story: I wandered into her shop one day and we ended up talking for hours about wine, her teaching me and me -- to a lesser extent -- teaching her. So on and so forth, and she offered me to sleep on her floor if I so desired. I did, since the hostel here is a €20 a night rip-off. So, I am currently enjoying a free place to sleep.)
Mornings for me (as beginnings) are disorienting, anxious. There is always much concern over money and the coming day's events. I am seldom more than mostly business and the rest nervous. This is how I feel more generally at the start of backpacking, before I have gotten into the hang of maneuvering through cities, protecting my belongings, and interacting with speakers of an incomprehensible language. I soothe myself with the rituals of living out of a pack: putting away my bedding, locating each personal belonging and storing it deliberately in its designated place; rolling my clothing, checking for my passport and cash stores -- securing these; then collecting the objects which I need for the day and placing them in my daypack. This calms in the manner of all ritual -- the mindless exercise of that which has become at once habitual and essential to one's existence. At the end, there is a sense of aesthetic bliss when at last before me is this single object: 60 cubic liters in volume, wherein may be found all which supports my existence. Nothing more. This is reductionism, minimalism, stoicism -- whatever it may be called -- in aesthetic perfection. The joy of minds which search always for more and more concise generalities.
Today I have bread and peanut butter in the morning. Normally, a hostel provides baguettes and jam and I stuff myself with this white bread so as to save money. It is funny, I think, how totally, single-mindedly obsessed I was with diet back home. Every meal I ate was categorized, quantized, according to an ever-increasing variety of numerical systems: caloric values, macronutrient content, micronutrient density, glycemic index. Now it has all been reduced to just one value: the ratio of calories to euros. This number must be maximized. Such essentiality gives me a small sense of pleasure, even if it be only due to such a dramatic change of priorities. (Change being desirable and therefore pleasurable; this too being essential to my backpacking experience, if it may be so-called).
This morning, also, I feel melancholic, glum. This feeling always descends inexplicably. That is to say there is never an immediate identifiable cause. This is analogous to the feelings of ecstasy experienced at the start of backpacking (e.g. Paris). That is -- as it was difficult to place exactly why Paris made me feel so exquisitely, utterly blissful, it is also somewhat mysterious that I frequently find myself suddenly so low. It has much to do with solitude and also much, I think, to do with women. As pertains to the former, I see why the causality is ultimately not direct, since solitude is not a moment but a process; that is to say, I am not suddenly 'alone,' or more specifically 'lonely,' the moment all who speak my language and all who know me well no longer exist in my immediate geographic vicinity. It instead takes time. It is not until some days, weeks more likely when I realize this sensation has descended. Why now? I am no more or less distant than I was three weeks ago, but now this distance engenders not ecstacy but melancholy! What a change, I think; and this change certainly begs explanation, which I have neither the time nor place for here. A quick, easy, answer is often the lack of women's presence. This excuse is suitable for its immediacy and I often find myself attempting to forge some sort of connection with the girls I meet backpacking. They are, sadly, just girls (so far as experimentation, in its strictly scientific and asexual sense, has led me to believe), and this realization leads only to more low spirits. Upon reflection, however, I always believe this woman-seeking to be substitution. I can explain no more than this. Already I am too honest, and we near the core of my thoughts on human intimacy which are unresolved and therefore un-expressable.
So, I leave, and I begin to wander the streets. Such mindless street walking consumes the majority of my time in travel. I usually walk for 6 or 7 hours a day, and when I first arrive in a city that number is closer to 9. My feet are calloused and rubbed daily raw. Today I don't even feel like stopping to eat, though my stomach grumbles with dissatisfaction. I walk along the shores of the Gironde, past rollerboaders in a skate park, through the shopping district -- again and again passing gorgeous french girls with neither the interest nor the language to speak to me. I feel no better. I listen to music on my headphones, having grown disinterested of the sound of street life. I stop at bar to have a glass of Cadillac wine (a commune in the larger Sauternes region). Here the bartender speaks English and is friendly, communicative; he jokes with me: "Don't mess with Texas!" he keeps repeating. This is his favorite slogan and he says he made a shirt with this written on it for himself, his wife and two kids. Shirt-making is his hobby. He asks to play me chess, and I am very pleased; I have been looking for chess opponents throughout my trip. He kicks my ass. Then his friend plays me, and I kick his ass. Then another friend asks to play me, so I order another glass of wine, underestimate my opponent, and after a painful match I finally lose. All in all, however this experience has made me feel much better. The friendly French I (emphasis on I -- I do not wish this to be a generality) so rarely encounter. My spirits are somewhat lifted, though still I am ready to leave France. I wish to be in the Spanish culture.
This last bit, though, also is typical. The pattern, sinusoidal in nature, is one of immediate ecstacy, melancholy through dissociation, unexpected social connection and commensurate boosting of spirits, and finally comes the realization that without this vaguely altruistic gesture on the part of those surrounding me, I am subject to the whims of my emotion -- that is, I am at the mercy of a subjectively social need. Here follows gloom -- not of loneliness, now, but perhaps of helplessness. Perhaps the two are not so different. Repeat cycle.

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