Taking Things Lightly

It's funny, the way you move in and out of truths in life.

And it's funny the impact perspective and timing can have on travel.

At work the other day (Hugo's, a lovely little pizzeria and cocktail bar on the Wharf in Manly), while pouring Brut for an older couple from the UK, I had one pure moment of presence. They said something simple along the lines of "you really couldn't have chosen a more beautiful place to be" after inquiring about my accent (strangely most people guess that I am Irish or British, not Canadian...not even American...). I stopped, stood there, with setting sun beating down on the back of my neck, with the crowds of teenagers full of goon backflipping off the pier behind me, with the ocean spread out to my right, and condensation from the bottle of sweating champagne dripping down my fingers onto my feet. I stopped thinking, for one moment, about the choices I have to make in the near future, about whether or not I can afford to travel across this country when I've finished this job, about change and circumstance and fear and the necessity to experience all of this and be present and then I just suddenly...was. There. All there. And only for a moment.

When travel becomes a lifestyle, it changes. You change. The "meaning" of travel changes. You are faced with the fact that in order to get the same rush, the same depth of experience from each new place you have to be more conscious...more conscientious of the value of places, and things, and people. Or maybe that is just particularly true for me, in a place like this.

Australia has had its surprises. First of all, my priority when traveling here in the first place was to be with a person (well, more than one. I was looking forward to meeting Alex and May again, whom I haven't seen for 15 years once upon a snowy Canadian winter, as well as my reunion with Adam), and not to explore a place. Sure, no one goes all the way to Australia and doesn't anticipate great things, and interesting places...and I had full intention to travel and appreciate and explore. But my head wasn't really in the whole travel thing. Four months in Ecuador, three of which were on an island in the Pacific surrounded by sea lions and marine iguanas and Darwin's finches, directly prior to a rushed and emotional white Christmas at home (soon to be past tense), before arriving on a new continent dulls the emotional charge one gets from it. I had little expectations. Honestly, in the whole month I have been here, I have been...distracted.

But that's true for all of us most of the time. No need to batter myself over it. The point is that this distraction has made it difficult to see what has been going on around me. There have been so many things I have been experiencing, so many beautiful and ugly and fantastic things here that have been going on around me, and happening to me, and sometimes you just need to sit down and take note.
No judgment. No pressure. Just acknowledgment.

Happenings, circumstances and moments:

a) Sun setting city side on Manly wharf turning the sky into shades of cascading indigo.

b) Getting lost in the labrynth of paths through the Botanical Gardens, finding shade and afternoon reprieve from the oppressive heat under giant Moraceae trees, watching flying foxes hang heavily in the upper branches squawking and punching each other in the face with their little orange wings.

c) Discovering a group of staff twirlers and poi spinners on Shelly beach one random Sunday, and having an Australia Day Eve barbie in the sand (after wading with nurse sharks in the ocean under the moonlight)

d) Sitting on the grass in front of the Rocks listening to a busker play Elton John, with the Opera House lit golden in the background from the sun, and watching the drones of tourists amble by.

e) Singing "Hey Jude" with a group of strangers gathered around one of Sydney's "free pianos" that are scattered around the city to promote music and creativity.

f) Walking through Hyde Park late Friday night and being followed by what we thought was a cat, and turned out to be a adorable but strangely terrifying possum.

g) Dancing up a sweaty storm in "Favela", an amazing bar with a great vibe, to none other than the king of Funky House, Chuck Love

h) Drinking wine til late in the evening while the temperature drops but the air remains sticky, watching waves roll into the shore like slits of silvery silk on Freshwater beach - empty and eerie when compared to the massive hordes that crowd its shore during the day - while a lightning storm rages over downtown.

i) Serving 20 dollar cocktails to couples on their first date, or trying to renew an old dusty relationship, or just out for a night on the water, and watching them watch the sea, and the beautiful view out the sides of Hugo's, and sip their drinks and nibble on pizza and see their shoulders slacken and their eyes soften a bit (ok, a little over the top, but it's true...)

j) Walking out into the city air, after having my hands tied and being blindfolded and led into a performance piece ("the Smile Off Your Face") in a wheelchair, with a momentarily and profoundly new look...or maybe just a new feeling...on life.

k) Watching face after face pass by in King's Cross, obliterated from the nights debauchery, angry or crying or exhausted or sad or lit up, but all the very ugly, the very raw chapter of an Australian night out.

I have not yet seen "Australia". I have spent most of my month here cradled in a lovely house in the suburbs of the Northern beaches, serving wealthy stay at home mom's and dress up dinner dates at a beautiful bar, lounging on Manly beach and trying not to get skin cancer. I know nothing of the rumored hip and mellow Melbourne, the sparkly Gold Coast, the unimaginable Barrier Reef, the bush, the West, or anything else in between. Sydney has been surprising in its aggressiveness, and its endeavors to make such an enormous city somehow come together. I know I am here at tourist time, but the city is in constant celebration. And despite my diverted attention span, I am still here, and still grateful, and still keyed up for the months ahead.

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