The Sountrack

Everyone, at some point or another, has imagined a soundtrack to their life, or a portion of their life. This is my break-up mix. It is a clichéd conceit, for a clichéd experience. But, hopefully, it will help get it out of my system…

This is a little heavy on the Missy Higgins. I first heard her at a concert a month or two ago. I was floored. So young. Yet so many songs. To me, about me, for me. She has become my poet! I have a poet!

Where I Stood (Missy Higgins)

I don’t know what I’ve done, or if I like what I’ve begun. But something told me to run, and honey, you know me – it’s all or none…. I don’t know who I am, who I am without you, all I know is that I should

At the beginning, it struck me how all of your stories from your past talked about an unknown ‘we.’ And I felt an unfamiliar pang of jealousy, at this unassailable, inaccessible ‘we.’ And then I became the ‘we.’ And now there is another ‘we.’ Although to those who don’t know better, the ‘we’s are all interchangeable... But there has never been an ‘I.’ Never a Name-and- I. Only ‘we,’ no matter who it is. And, in this, it is less that you are not able to function on your own, but that you don’t see those others as having their own identity. Only as a they are a part of the being that is you.

You have such a strong personality, are so opinionated, you attract those who feel like they are strong enough to hold their own, who only need a little guidance in life’s big picture. Wanting to relax into your strength, because it is so exhausting to do it all on our own. Only we learn too late that you are only forceful about the little things, the details: the inclinations that give us our personality, the common threads running through our life experience. And we are left with a weakened, an undermined, sense of self. And I am left with nothing but a dependence and reliance on the importance of ‘love’ to get me through all, and give my life meaning.

Fidelity (Regina Spektor)

You gave this to me. Told me it reminded you of me. I listened. I cried. I listened more. I hated myself. My ex-boyfriend gives me what he thinks should be my theme song, for our breakup, from my perspective. This spoke to me, gave words, a song, to my heartbreak. Felt like if only I had been more, been there more, it would have… Then I started thinking, Wait! This isn’t just me; this is you, too. You don’t know what it means to love someone, won’t admit that it requires work, a constant renewal of a commitment, explicit, implicit. It doesn’t have to be hard, per se, but it does require work. Your version of love is teenage.

We heard this song again, randomly, some months ago. The last day I saw you in person. I looked at you, significantly. You say, I am so tired of this song! It is overplayed! A gut jab and twist. Yes, of course this is no longer your song. Our song. Pathetic though it is.

It breaks my heart…

All for Believing (Missy Higgins)

I’m all for believing, if you can reveal the true colors within… I need to find the key to let me in, into your heart, to find your soul…. I believe in what I see, and, baby, we were meant to be. Trust in me.

Sometimes, I feel like I believe you to be a better person than you believe yourself to be, than you want the responsibility of being. It is so much easier to be a bad person, a shallow person, an irresponsible person. Have others think that. You date these amazing women, genuinely ‘good’ people, who by very virtue of their goodness, and belief in you, can validate you as a person. Only you require them to say it for you. You will never take ownership for, the responsibility of, being ‘good.’ And you are certainly now doing your best to prove me wrong, and you right, all along.

Just Like the Moon (Brett Dennen)

And sometimes, sometimes, I only get a sliver of ya, but I’m hoping, I’m hoping for a full moon tonight…

A gift from another person. From his perspective, not presuming to determine mine. I am his heartbreak. A gift in the midst of a realization, of where I am, and where I am not. I am sorry. You are amazing for understanding. For doing your best to understand. To be there for me when I am there. Although not waiting for me, exactly, just being there.

Ten Days (Missy Higgins)

So we’ve put an end to it this time: I’m no longer yours and you’re no longer mine… And it’s been ten days without you in my reach, and the only time I’ve touched you is in my sleep. But time has changed nothing at all. You’re still the only one that feels like home. I’ve tried cutting the ropes, and I let you go. But you’re still the only one that feels like home.

Or six months, nine months… longer…

Nearly 24 hours a day, almost 365 days a year, for close to four years… It doesn’t disappear quickly. It’s not like we fell out of love. Just that I admitted we want different things from life, see the value of life differently, need different things, different amounts, to feel fulfilled, safe, satisfied. And you never admitted any such thing. Only stuck around until you found someone else.

So tell me, did you really think… Oh tell me, did you really think I had gone when you couldn't see me anymore?

Please Read the Letter (Robert Plant & Alison Krauss)

Can it get any plainer than this?

Ah, the infamous letter. What I thought was my blunt, to the point, unable to be ignored, declaration of my love for you, and my plea (Yes, I begged) to know where you stood, so that I could figure out my life. Whether I should try to discover what I needed in myself to be able to come back to you, to us, or if I should, really and finally, just move on.

And, not only did you not respond, you lost the letter.

Unbroken (Missy Higgins)

And you will never, no, you will never see with virgin eyes again. ‘Cause this is the day when everything changes, and your world stops turning.

There were phone calls, emails, letters, face-to-face conversations, hotel rooms, promises, and all I hear, all I am told, is I love you, let us make plans to meet up. And then, finally, after all that, weeks, months later, you say, I have been getting into a relationship. It is probably less than you think, but more than I am telling you. (Don’t worry. I know. That will change.) You set me up, and then knocked my legs out from under me, knocked the breath out of me. Left me nothing on which to stand. And then walked away. No looking backwards. No remorse. No regret.

This is my Neil LaBute moment.

100 Around the Bends (Missy Higgins)

…and I will pretend that feeling rage is feeling real…

I finally understand now how you can make someone so angry at you that they want to jump out of your speeding car.

I want to beat you, break all your bones, pound your face into a purple swollen mass, pour oil over everything you own, rip up every photo I have from our time together, delete every email between us, close my email accounts, change my phone number, never again do any of the things we ever did together, write off every person we knew who would mention you to me, or think not to mention you to me. I am ashamed of every moment that I loved you and foolishly thought your love for me meant something. But I am not strong enough to erase completely four years of my life. If I did, there would be a void too big for me to go on.

… you were everything, for a little while. But I broke it… didn’t I?

You say you want to be friends, yet you do nothing to deserve my friendship. Never allow me to justify considering you a friend if I want to preserve any shred of self-respect.

You lied to me, repeatedly, about those things which ‘friends’ would not feel it necessary to lie.

You hid conversations from me when you were going to meet up with someone after we parted ways for the night, someone with whom everyone, excepting yourself, thought ‘something’ was going on. Fine, but if we are merely ‘friends,’ what is the point?

You promised me a year ago, at my request, that you would let me know if you started a relationship with someone, before someone else gossiped to me about it. You didn’t.

You attacked me without thinking in regards to a situation about which you knew only one side and did not even pause to consider that I would have a justifiable perspective. You abandoned any sense of thought that I was a person you trusted. A person you (had once) valued.

You entered into the giddy newness of a relationship, found someone else to spend time with, travel with, be entertained by, sleep with. And like a totally different story, by a totally different author, I no longer exist as a person. My own identity, myself as my own entity, has vanished. Feelings, heartbreak, repercussions.

You will not tell me what is going on in your life if it involves your new relationship. Although it is clear that the things you aren’t telling me involve that. So what? I am not asking how many times you have sex a day! I don’t want to know!! I am asking you where you are, what you are doing, where you are going.

You promised, even at the end, you would always be there for me when I needed you. Yet when I call, when I write and tell you I do, a conversation, anything real, you don’t answer. Or make excuses about how now is not a good time. And that is the last I hear.

You dangle teasers of friendship out to me, yet keep knowledge of you hidden from me like it is the last power you have over me. You offer light emails, offers of belated presents. All I can feel is rage and bewilderment. How can you possibly not understand how utterly you have let me down?!?!? You give a kernel of hope that you have something good to offer me, yet never follow with the proof. You vanish at the suggestion of a conversation in person. I phrase things ‘wrongly’ in an email, too personally (‘Where are you?’), too accusingly, too angrily, with too much judgment, say anything more than nothing, and you disappear. Don’t respond. Forget about the emails as if they had never been received. I would rather an honest conversation than a kite! How absurd that there is a reality in which to write that.

I keep trying, ‘one last time,’ to reach out to you, ask you to talk to me, help me understand how you could have done this to me, show me your perspective so I don’t think you are as heartless as every single sign points to your being. But doing that requires me to swallow my sense of pride at how I could be so rejected so many times (how dense? how masochistic am I?), and still keep reaching out. When you have made it so perfectly clear that you will not respond.

Yet I foolishly, naively – almost inconceivably – feel that one face-to-face conversation would change everything. That, in person, I could shame you into not lying to me. That if you saw me and remembered who I was you would offer me something real again, something genuine.

So I can reclaim our years together.

…but feeling rage ain’t feeling real.

Peachy (Missy Higgins)

It’s not my fault, it can’t be my fault, that you speak to me the way you do. Now I’m split in two, I’m half me and half you, but I hate us both. Don’t you? No, of course you don’t, of course you don’t. You say life is peachy without me.

* * *

“ ‘The word careless is the key here,’ she said. ‘Remember when Nick reproaches Jordan for her careless driving and she responds lightly that even if she is careless, she counts on other people being careful? Careless is the first adjective that comes to mind when describing the rich in this novel. The dream they embody is an alloyed dream that destroys whoever tries to get close to it.’”

“‘Empathy lies at the heart of Gatsby, like so many other great novels – the greatest sin is to be blind to others’ problems and pain. Not seeing them means denying their existence.’”

From Reading Lolita in Tehran, by Azar Nafisi

* * *

At the heart of it, you have no empathy. Your callous indifference to the results of your actions, or inactions, is not so much a conscious choice, but an inability to see even the smallest sliver of the world from anything other than your own narrow perspective. It is what makes you so terrible at communication. (I used to always joke that my role was to communicate for you to those around.) It is what can allow you to run around in the middle of the night screaming and drunk off of cheap whiskey at a campsite in a National Park, a place to which people retreat to escape the noise of the world, when the situation in reverse would piss you off beyond consolation.

You have no empathy, and I have an excess of it. Which increased as I compensated for both of us, making sure I wasn’t complicit in the sin, until I was unable to function, act with resolution, without second-guessing whether I was doing the right thing, making us both ‘good’ enough. Thoughtful enough. Obsessing over whether we were taking too much advantage of the people around us.

We made a sickly perfect, perfectly sickly couple: you have much higher standards for other people than for yourself, while I have much higher standards for myself than others. With the result that we both expected a lot from me, while your only responsibility was to show up. You used to try and guilt me, last year, after we broke up, into dropping everything to spend time with you when you were in town. And now, in reverse, you can’t even respond to an email.

Let You Down (Dave Matthews Band)

I let you down… forgive me.

* * *

All things truly wicked start from an innocence.

From A Moveable Feast, by Ernest Hemingway

* * *

This is my fantasy world. The final request I have for you. What I could only ask you in person. But you never gave me the chance. I feel so naïve just writing it, thinking it is something I could ask, thinking it is something you could understand.

I want you to tell me, Yes, I did a really shitty thing to you. I’m sorry.

That’s it.

But I don’t even think you believe you did anything wrong. If you have ever stopped to think about it… So I have to find another way to move on.

Good Man (Josh Ritter)

Babe, we both had dry spells, hard times, and bad lands. I’m a good man for ya. I’m a good man.

Another gift. A light in the darkness. Timing is everything, and this is pretty shitty. But it is only getting better. In the beginning, I thought, I don’t deserve someone as understanding as you. You have helped me get to, Yes, you deserve me. Although I know that you deserve all of me. And that I can’t offer right now. But, however it winds up, I am lucky you have come into my life.

Be OK (Ingrid Michaelson)

I just want to be OK… I just want to be OK today… I just want to feel something today….

Open me up and you will see I am a gallery of broken hearts. I’m beyond repair, let me be, and give me back my broken parts…

I just want to know today… know that maybe I will be okay.

Hot Springs: Nature's Indulgence

I have decided that hot springs and wineries (or distilleries, I suppose) make great focal points for travel. Inexpensive sensory indulgence.

I had a bit of a cross section of hot springs on this Oregon trip. The first one I went to was part of a hippie-ish campsite outside of Ashland. It had a thermal swimming pool as well as a hotter soaking pool; however, I spent most of the afternoon wandering around town, and didn't get back until the evening and the end of family hours. Which meant that everyone was soaking nude. I didn't feel like hanging out and chit-chatting naked with young dreaded strangers, so I forked up a little extra and got a private room. It was basically a bathroom with hot water through the tap, except the tapwater smelled vaguely sulfurous. But soaked and read and enjoyed myself. These 20-something dreaded hippies irritate me. I am not a good person. ;-)

The second hot springs was located near the North Umpqua River, a little north of Crater Lake, and a 40 minute hike in through the woods. It was absolutely gorgeous. I got there late in the day, and there was one other person there. Another nude. But more than one pool, so we both had our privacy. There is a main pool hollowed out to be a little deeper, and sheltered by a lean-to, and then a series of three pools out in the open on the far side of the clearing. All the pools look out into a little ravine over the river. The guy that was there was in the lean-to, so I picked out the middle of the three other pools. He left not too long after I got here, and donated a remaining Coors Light to my soaking experience. I couldn't pass it up... A nice enough guy, somewhere in his late 50s, who had been here with a girlfriend or two back in the 70s. He left me a note on my windshield, back at the trailhead, inviting me and my "friends" to his campsite for a camp-cooked meal and some coffee, tea, beer, or liquor. Wigs a single female traveler out a bit, but was a... sweet?... offer, and didn't see him again.

But an awesome hot springs. I understand it gets a bit crowded, but not when I was there.



The last hot springs I went to was on the Washington side of the Columbia River, not too far from Cascade Locks. It was a turn-of-the-century pioneering style bathhouse. Reminded me of the place in Hot Springs, Arkansas, although with much rougher edges. It, too, was relatively quiet, being in the middle of a weekday, and quite pleasant. Had an almost painfully hot soak for about 30-45 minutes, and then was taken out and wrapped in sheets and towels and steamed on a hospital bed for another 45 minutes. Shower, and then good to go.

Hippies, Shakespeare, and Crater Lake

My official destination for this roadtrip was Crater Lake National Park. However, it was drawn to my attention that I could swing by the town of Ashland, Oregon, which I had read about in outdoorsy magazines in the same articles as Asheville, NC. Ashland has a thriving dreaded nouveau-hippie scene, a 70+-year-old internationally-renowned 10-month-long Shakespeare festival that attracts middle-aged Brits, an active acoustic music scene, and enough cool old architecture being renovated to keep a moderate population of craftsman and builders employed (which I learned when I jumped into a conversation between a carpenter and and plumber talking about Pex, one morning sitting on the deck of a coffee shop, while a 20-something guy was talking with some regulars about his gig last night while playing around on his guitar), and is close to good hiking and some hot springs. An interesting place, needless to say.

Arrived at Crater Lake around 4p. I was intending to camp in the park only to find that the place starts to close up for the season around the end of September. On an employee's suggestion, I drive, past patches of early snow, along the northwest rim of the lake, to a camping area just outside the park. The first place I come to has a sign posted out front saying it is closing the next day, October 14. It is cold and dark, with patches of snow under the trees, and there are no hot showers, and I am cranky and not looking forward to another freezing night, and there are no towns big enough to have motels anywhere nearby. So I drive back down the road, take another fork, and wind up at a campsite that is not closing until the 15th. There is a site still lit up by the sun, and somehow this seems warmer, so I make a fire, make dinner, set up my tent, read a bit before bed, drink a wee dram of Macallans, and go to bed relatively contented, and sleep relatively warm.

Crater Lake is pretty much exactly as its name describes. There are not really any big long hiking trails, just a few ascents to lookouts, and paved trails. I suppose if one dedicated more time, there are some through-trails along other areas of the park, but I am here as a tourist. So I do two short hikes, and then drive the rim road. It is beautiful, in a stark sort of way.






But I met a cute and curious little guy. A pine marten.

On the Road. Again.

Got off the Spirit October 9 in Portland, Oregon. My timing for October was based around being back in Seattle by the end of the month in order to get the Explorer ready to head to San Francisco and then Hawaii in mid-November. I had a flight from Seattle on the 20th to fly east and see family in New York and Philadelphia. Thus, despite the Hawaii season being canceled, I still had a week or so to drift before responsibilities of family and being unemployed caught up with me.

I decided to drive a loop in Oregon. Started in Astoria, a town I have always liked and which has a bakery named Blue Scorcher with this delicious-looking artisan bread with a tough chewy crust. It was a worthy place to begin. Drove down the coast, stopping to camp at any place that didn't seem to be too dominated by RVs. Oregon does indeed seem to be RV central. The first campsite at which I stayed was a relatively popular placed called Beverly Beach, and had little heated yurts you could rent if you so chose. As the weather stayed gorgeous and sunny and blue, it also got colder and colder, and I, with my 15F down sleeping bag and three-season tent, was nonetheless freezing. Each night I added layers, until I was sleeping in a thermal shirt, sweater, thermal pants, fleece pants, rain pants, gloves and a fleece hat, inside my sleeping bag, and with a towel and various jackets piled outside by bag to keep in the heat . Sadly, I never again encountered a campground with yurts.

But it was a gorgeous trip, and it had been a long time since I'd traveled on my own. Many of my assumptions about my life had rather recently been pulled out from under me, and while an intense period of introspection was just what I needed at the time, 3:30am freezing in a tent in some unknown place in Oregon can be a depressing place to be. But it was a good trip.

Cape Blanco State Park

Left the coast and drove over a pass on a small road that I had seen on the map, and which was labeled "road closed in winter," but my GPS seemed to think it was a valid route, and it was only mid-October. But I saw my first snow of the year! I am not used to this climate...

Patting my own belly; scratching my own back. Or some such

Anyway, just a quick note to follow up on the previous. When I heard this news about the cancellation of the Hawaii season, I was working on one of the company's two small boats, the Safari Spirit as the Mate/Engineer. Can I say, that is pretty much the first job I have had of which I am thoroughly proud. I did not necessarily have any experience as an Engineer, but I did fine and learned heaps - oil changes on the mains and all three generators, changing fuel filters and raw water pumps, tearing a TV apart, fixing a few small things. No one died or got hurt and we always got things running again. Although sometimes we weren't sure quite how... And additionally started learning the navigation of the River and driving in the locks. Oh, yeah, and it was Fun! Fun crew, great guests, interesting itinerary, beautiful area, rope-swinging off the top deck...

This is why I came to this company. Sigh. All things come to an end...

Paradise Postponed

The economic panic is in full swing.

Our company's owner all of a sudden has taken an interest in how well our little organization is turning a profit, and has sent in one of his trusted to whip ASC into shape. Panic ensues, everything is up in the air, and, not surprisingly, we hear that the Safari Explorer's inaugural Hawaii season, to take place this winter 2008-09, has been canceled. Or postponed, more officially. Not especially shocking, as sales had been low for the new itinerary, and it is a long trip over and a long inaugural season, especially for this dismal economic environment.

So, as people panic, stocks crash, food and gas prices soar, and the companies that aren't laying off huge percentages of workers have instituted hiring freezes, my lovely little place of employment is falling back on its defense of seasonal employment, and sending a new little flock out into the unemployment lines and onto the dole.

;-)

For me, this is not necessarily a bad thing, as I have been talking about wanting to put roots ashore. However, after nine months working shipyard in a dreary and drizzly Seattle, followed by a long, cold and wet Alaska summer, I was looking forward to a few months in the sun. Seattle in November isn't the most inspiring place from which to start a new life path. And the word on the street is the world is imploding and there aren't any jobs to be had anyway. But I'm trying to keep a positive attitude.

So, my two general directions of thought are: Seattle - take any job I can get and build from there; or Korea - teaching English. A friend of mine from Argentina (actually, she's from Iowa, but...) has been over there for the past year and will be returning and it is one of those paths that I have explored yet on which I have never followed through. And it would be so nice to do something new and adventurous and challenging, yet not have to start from scratch, completely on my own... A last travel hurrah?

Although, currently, I am leaning towards Seattle. It's a great town: good food, music, bars. Close to the water and skiing and hiking and wineries. Hot springs. And I have friends there. A few even that aren't sailing on boats. And that has been an aspect of life I have increasingly missed over these past five years of being a nomad. So we'll see. I go back and forth, but seem to be falling more and more often on the Seattle side of things.

"All things truly wicked start from an innocence."

from A Moveable Feast, by Ernest Hemingway

Looking for a castle

On the way out, a quick search for the best castles Scotland has to offer. The candidates?

for Monty Python and the Holy Grail fans...

...and Stirling Castle, what the "experts" say is Scotland's best.

Arguably the most beautiful place in Scotland

Glencoe.
Though no history lesson from me here...

Met a guy at my hostel in Glencoe who was an Obama-supporting Marine from California just finishing up his contract. He was in Scotland for a bagpiping competition, and played the snare drum with a band from the American Midwest. I think they came in sixth.

And now for a history lesson.

Located just a little bit outside of Glasgow, New Lanark is a mill community that was begun in the 18th century. In the early 19th century, the socialist and industrialist Robert Owen took over the mills from his father-in-law and set out to start a social experiment involving humane living and working conditions for the mill workers. Among other things, he forbade the labor of children under ten, and started the first-ever pre-school. Additionally, he had decent housing for the workers (by the standards of the day), some sort of socialized health care, and a mill store that sold higher quality and cheaper goods than were otherwise available. Despite his mill turning a profit, other investors were obviously unhappy with the expense going to the workers' living conditions, and he wound up buying them out.
After Robert Owen left New Lanark (some 25 years after he arrived), he came over to the United States and, with his sons, attempted to found a Utopian community called New Harmony, in Indiana. This experiment failed, and he returned to England. His sons, however, stayed in America. His oldest became a member of Congress, where he drafted the bill for the founding of the Smithsonian and worked towards women's and widow's rights. Of his other two sons one became a geologist and surveyor and the other a professor of natural science.


I must confess. No, I do not remember all of this, only that I read or heard it while visiting New Lanark. I had to "refresh my memory" via Wikipedia and other websites.

Please do notice the Xtra Tuffs

So many pictures; so little to say.

Islay continued.

The Pilgrimage: Lagavulin

Lagavulin. Its standard is a 16-year-old, although they offer two others. Stick with the 16-year-old. Definitely one of my favorite whiskies.

And to finish off the day, a stroll along the coast:

Whisky and walking. Slainte.

Islay. An island of 3000 people and 7 whisky distilleries. Ardbeg, Lagavulin, Laphroaig, Bowmore, Bruichladdich, Bunnahabhain, and Caol Ila. A 2.5 hour drive plus a 2 hour ferry from Glasgow. Worth a visit.

Bob was in England for a meeting, so decided to join me for a spell and offer some assistance with the birthday splurge. He met me in Glasgow and coordinated the visit to Islay.

Port Ellen, Islay

The 8th century Kildalton Cross, similar to those found on Iona, from the time of the early Christian movement from Ireland.

Happy 30th Birthday!!

Not the most progressive choice of vacation for entering into my 4th decade. But it is beautiful, and has been a precursor to many crucial life crossroads. Plus it's gorgeous. And there is so much familiar, yet so much left to see. And what better way to celebrate one's 30th birthday than by drinking single malt where it is made, on a small island off the west coast of Scotland. Oh, I feel so mature...

But first, a trip to Glasgow. The American side of Scotland to Edinburgh's European style, or so they say. The cheaper airport. But perhaps, in a more relevant sense, a place in Scotland I'd never been.

You can't go back. Except, of course, when you do.

A Confession. The less than impressive course of my dedication to this little blog has meant that I haven't written in nearly a year. Surely there was something going on worth sharing en masse... Perhaps... but I only think the past few months are worth going into. So, it is currently the end of October; however, through the ability of the internet to lie so beautifully, I am going to pretend that my updates were timely. Starting with my 30th birthday.