Cedar, Michigan

so it seems now to have begun.. i've been here a long time in this place and i can already feel the effects of my separation.  this last chapter hasn't been silent yet i choose to continue this project without explaining my absense, i've just been working my butt off.  today marks the end of my first week back on the road and i've been having the craziest dreams but i can't remember any of them.

i woke up and it was raining.  i don't know what time it was when i fell asleep but the stars forgot to remind me that the clouds like to hang out in the same sky.  it's that kind of rainy day now where you feel wet even if you haven't gone outside in a while.  i love it.  i'm looking at this video that we are putting together and i'm loving every moment of this.  we travel in the forests and parks as well as seasides covered in sunset and the whole while i feel like there is a very tangible purpose to why i am here.

i've traveled so much.  i mean.. shit, i look back at some of the paths i've taken and i never in a million lifetimes would have imagined the story that is currently in progress.  i want that to be reflected in my projects but i'm really not that good at it.  some of this is just for me, my thoughts, my weirdness.

why are you wandering?  are you curious too?  i think i'm onto something but these things take time.  i heard recently that we are just making memories being remembered by our future selves.  shit my pits are stinky.

i'm doin' it.  i'm taking to the road because the road understands people like me.  it's with peace and love in my heart that i declare my love for this country and i leave it at that, i'm not a political person and i care even less about religion these days.  it's true.  recently i took the dusty slate that was my ego and washed it clean like a wet towel cleaning an elementary school chalk board.  now i believe in nothing all over again and i have no opinion of any matter, i just have to live a few more new experiences and form new opinions of everything again from scratch.  i wonder what it will reveal.

see you down the river everybody.  i promise pictures and musings from along the way but for now i'm still collecting myself.  this chapter is going to be a good one.  

Onward again

..and just like that, after a six and a half month commitment to shining boats, a festival in the forest, and a phone call at 11:00pm we take to the road.

Three days before we left

to look for America

there is a nostalgic smile i see in certain people's eyes when we talk about this upcoming adventure across much of North and Central America.  i'm drawn to the generation which grew up in the 60's and their understanding of our need to be free on the open road.  i'm not drawn in pointless admiration for music and style as i'm very aware of the hardships of the era, yet it seems that something from the people of that time called wild souls to explore the unknown.  the idea to modify a minivan and recreate a home for myself and my leaf-in-the-breeze girlfriend hits close to home as young people in the 60's and 70's felt a need to head west and reestablish their own ideas of community.

something feels very different about this age.  it seems in a way that this sense of freedom is almost a ghost wandering the post-apocalyptic modern world and for years people had forgotten that "freedom is just another word for nothing less to lose."  maybe it's my own actions in the past or perhaps my lifelong thirst to explore the planet that naturally brings me to the road but maybe i just listened well enough to the calling in my head that has beckoned me for so many years.  maybe this is also the spirit which guided explorers and ancient scouts who had a hunch that there is much to discover across the hills and seas.  whatever it is, i can maintain that it is the most exciting thing to ever happen to a person, the feeling of waking up in a foreign land and realizing that somehow you made it out into the world.  you are free.  there is nobody to stop you from walking this planet like it is yours.

why are we so unhappy here?  perhaps i want to look passed the cookie cutter suburbs and fast food boulevards seeing sign after sign of burger king, wal-mart and taco bell.  maybe it's not the food or the dull paintings of buildings but the fact that the United States of America has isolated itself from the rest of the world.  Americans feel as if it is 'us and them' when viewing the rest of the world.  people always ask me such silly questions and for a long time i just thought they were only making conversation but there is a massive feeling here that we are alone in the world.  maybe that is why anxiety has leaked its way into our culture and perhaps this is to blame with current political mistrust but i'm sick of criticizing.  the USA is a phenomenal country with endless potential and if the people who belong to this populous would only embrace their freedom to wander to other countries and to learn the ways of the world without turning to the media then perhaps things could be better around here.

we're making a movie.  it's not a movie it's a documentary.  it's not a documentary, it's a project.  i don't know what it is but when it comes to be i consent that it is my offering to the culture from which i hail in hopes that somebody sees it and realizes that there are others who have uprooted from their homes to explore the unknown.  i hope i can do my intentions justice and i can't wait to share some of the beauty of this continent.

fear is always going to be there, it is an airborne disease.  it is going to sink into your veins and it will wrap itself around your brain like the squeezing vines of a strangler tree and at times we don't even realize that we are infected.  i watch fear sneak into my blood in these last few days i get to spend at home.  i doubt my finances at times and worry about finding a job in Guatemala.  i worry that my friends think i'm too far separated.  i can't let these things go untreated for to long, my spirit cannot permit fear to find its way between my wings.  it is in that fear, or understanding of fear, that i wish to continue writing in this blog.  this blog has served as a gateway between my absence and my thoughts which i have shared from all corners of the globe.  much of my energy will of course be put towards the film project yet i will continue to write in here and to connect with those of you who have been faithful to me for so long in their kind words and appreciation for my wanderings.  thank you.