Journeys of a Modern Day Drifter

A New Beginning

So as the road trip portion of my blogging has come to a close, I feel reluctant at ending my trip through my self discovery that this trip prompted.  Therefore, it is with bright eyes and a newfound courage that I embark on a new journey. 

My writer friend and I have decided to start a brand new 20something lifestyle blog.  We will discuss careers, travel, moving, love, lust, family, and our own discoveries as we make our way in the world in our twenties.  There are a lot of articles out there for those in their thirties and fourties on multiple subjects but rarely do you see articles geared toward the younger crowd.  As if problems only start appearing when you get to your thirties.  Well, we’ve devised a solution.

It comes in the form of our blog:  http://rinarika.wordpress.com.  Come share in the twentysomething experience and discuss your own views and ideas.  Let us know from your place in the twenties, whether or not you are currently there. 

Come for a little R & R, stay for a little adventure.

Citizens of the World

Where are you from?  this is the question that has caused me the most difficulties over the years.  That’s because there is no straight forward answer to it.  I am from everywhere and nowhere all at once. 

I was born in the former Soviet Union, a country that no longer even exists.  I moved to the United States and have been living a half life since I was four.  I feel distant and incomplete here.  And yet, I have come to accept many customs as my own.  I was raised in an all Russian family and most of my childhood friends were Russian.  We celebrated Russian traditions and have continued to promote certain beliefs even though we are in a new country.  I grew up in a Jewish community and knew of my heritage.  Only recently, on Birthright, did I finally feel comfortable saying that I’m “just Jewish” and not an avid devotee. 

Most of my life, I can remember being engrossed in the world of others in the form of books.  One book in particular stayed with long after I had read it and reread it.  I became as much a part of the world of Harry Potter as I had the US.  The presence that Rowling created in her books, to me was more than just a good story, it was an escape.  Through it, I had the opportunity to become emersed in the English culture and I reveled in it. 

I marched through my primary education in more than one language.  Not only was I learning English at a rapid rate, I was also learning French in congruence.  With the language comes the history.  I became French by association.  France was my home away from home when I didn’t feel like being in England in my mind. 

As it was, my physical being was American, my soul was Russian, and my spirit was English and French.  I’m a mixed up puzzle with pieces fitting in places they shouldn’t.  So when someone asks me where I’m from, I always hesitate.  How do you describe the whole picture without describing each piece?  In the end, it doesn’t matter where I’m from.  I can be from the US today, Russia tomorrow, England the next day, and France the day after that.  Maybe I’ll be from Brazil a month from now. 

The important thing is not to try to label anyone.  People often try to categorize themselves like they’re some kind of animal that only grows in certain regions.  Well, I’m not an animal and I’m not from a specific region.  I’m a world citizen.  I’m from everywhere and nowhere.  My passport says so.

What it all means in the end

So after this long and intense journey that led me from the glorious mountains of Colorado, through the red deserts of Arizona, towards the shining waters of the West coast in California and Oregon, I have finally found myself amoung the beauty.  I have stripped my mind of all the excess and unneccesary film that tends to cover it when surround by those mediated by society.  When you detach yourself from the system, you find yourself thinking clearer and making more sound decisions. 

I’ve found out that the society as a whole tends to condition people for the roles that they will inevitably play.  School has the pretense of teaching you something new when in reality it molds you into a “model” citizen.  One that follows the rules to a tee, that never steps a toe out of line for fear of punishment, never displays an ounce of free thought of any kind because it does not follow the “guidelines”, one that is a robot working 40 hours a week.  Did you ever notice how early kids have to wake up to go to school and then they get home at 3?  That’s their nine-five.  Only they’re doing it for free right now.  Don’t worry though, as soon as they get out of school, the “advisors” will “advise” them to get their 9-5.  It’s conditioning and training.  Or maybe it’s a striping of your rights and jailing.  However you may see it, everyone gets sucked in because it’s so easy to fall into that trap.

What I’ve been able to discover is something so invaluable that it cannot be expressed in words.  I’ve been able to wash clean a filthy window that has blocked my sight to the true life at long last.  I have been able to take it back in a society that pushes everyone forward at breakneck speed. 

When you remove the multiple layers that you have accumulated throughout your life, you get to the kid in you.  The little boy or girl that was so happy doing just a single thing.  That little boy or girl knew better then what you wanted to do with your life then the adult you does now.  I’ve had the chance to reacquiant myself with my inner kid and that kid has told me that my life’s path had been staring at me this whole time.  It was there everytime I had decided to do anything.  It was in front of my face.  It was just so close, that I couldn’t see the whole picture. 

That little Marina told me this.  Marina, you are a writer.  You have been doing your research since you were old enough to put two words together in a sentence.  You went through your entire childhood with your nose stuck in a book.  You don’t even know what the halls of your schools looked like because you navigated them based on peripheral vision.  Writing is your contribution to the world.  Writing is your path.   There’s a reason why every scholarship you recieved and every contest you won involved writing in some way.  If you were able to make a Finance professor unable to tear his eyes away from your essay on financial industries of tea, you have something worth pursuing.  Not to mention, that same professor couldn’t stop talking about how beautiful your paper was to the rest of your peers for months after. 

This realisation could not have been made if I had followed the norm.  It felt as though I was losing myself amoungst a crowd before but suddenly, turned in the opposite direction because I figured, where the hell is this crowd going anyway? 

So no, I will not go get a job.  And no, I will not lead a conventional life.  No, I do not want to get married in my twenties.  No, I do not want to rent an apartment somewhere.

I want to write a spectacular book.  I want to change the world with my words.  I want to find someone I love with a consuming passion without the justification of marriage to know it.  I want to buy my own house, that I can fix and design and remodel in any way that I want.  I want to think for myself, thank you very much. 

Some of you may like the other kind of life.  You may think that with a job and a marriage comes stability.  I see it as voluntary slavery.  So excuse me if I don’t follow in your direction.  I have other plans.

Some things we’ve all forgotten

Things I learned on the roadtrip:

• How absolutely beautiful and perfect Colorado is

• How to ride a bicycle one handed while carrying a very heavy surf board on sandy roads

• How to fix the chain of a bicycle

• How to make a stellar sandwich made of squash, white bread, ranch, asian hot sauce, bologna, and american cheese(don’t worry, it tastes a lot better than it sounds)

• How to surf the Cali coast(stood up four times!)

• My education in business is not worthless, I helped out a few people and I actually do enjoy it(Andrius with marketing)

• I’m more of a solitaire person rather than a social one but when I’m social, I’m social.

• I’m really comfortable being alone and away from home

• Cars are not invincible as I believe the human body is

• There are genuinely kind people in this world

• Love is spreading

• The place means nothing if it did not come from a special place in your heart

• I don’t really like to drink that much, only do it because of lack of better things to do in a bar

• Not a fan of camping without friends

• It’s ok to like bad music

• Life is meaningless if you continue to run away

• I want to stop running

• Food: It’s not about intake, it’s about nutrition

• Don’t push anything to happen, it will only get harder

• Overthinking things is pointless, just let it happen

• It’s ok to be yourself, not everyone will like you and that’s fine

• America’s cities all look the same

• I’m not the only international citizen of the world belonging neither here, nor there. We belong to the world and each other wherever we are

• Just because I like art and world music doesn’t make me a hippy

• I don’t like huge cities, big ones are fine but huge ones not so much

• I enjoy the act of driving more than the destination most often

• Maybe volunteering is not for me

• I’m not really directionally retarded, but I am when I declare it

• The “secret” works

• Colorado is the best state

• Everyone, everywhere smokes weed

• Fitting into a segment of society is suffocating, people only segment because in the end, humans are a lot like sheep

• There’s no need to be perfect, love yourself for all your flaws. Most people don’t see the negative in you anyway.

• The world is changing rapidly, need to stay on your toes or you’ll end up being very confused

• You can’t ever get lost, there’s google maps

• I am a complete being, not part of a whole, I am the whole

• Your life is not a blank canvas on super expensive parchment paper that you can’t ruin. Your life is a blank canvas on a 50 cent journal that you have to constantly edit with scratchings and eraser marks and multi-colored pens and doodles and sketches. Use it and love it. Don’t put it on a pedestal.

• There is more than one way of doing something.

• Don’t put too much on your plate, it just leaves you feeling stressed and frustrated.

• The interesting spots are the ghettos, not the pristine million dollar homes

• The world is messy and disorganized and dirty. And humans are gross and vulgar and incomprehensible. That’s life.

• Dogs really are man’s best friend

• Leave the past in the past. Raising old bones only digs a deeper hole.

• The perfect host treats you like a friend, not a visitor

• Following your intuition is your best tool

• The world is waiting for my story

• Sleeping in the car is not that bad as long as you have a big, fluffy pillow.

• Money comes and goes, not worth holding onto desperately

• We’re all the same in the end, everyone has a story and everyone’s trying to make it in this big, wide world.

• Don’t be afraid of other people, be afraid of how you treat them

• It’s ok to let people mean something to you even if they hurt you, everyone fucks up sometime along the line

• There is a difference between appreciating something and being passionate about it. Defining that difference makes it easier to sort yourself out

• It’s stupid to think about where/how you want your kids to grow when you don’t have kids and are still growing up yourself. Think about it when that time comes

• Life is not set in stone, you can change it at any moment

• People hold a lot of helpful information despite their background

• How to pick up and travel with a hitchhiker

• It’s mind over matter in everything, if you think negatively you will feel bad, if you think in a positive and fresh way you will endure.

• Finally found where I want to take my life in a new adventure altogether as the next step

• The reality is much different from the way you imagine it to be

• The people of your past have nothing in common with you now, that’s why they’re in the past

• When you travel, you’re an observer. You never carry the burden of the place like the residents, therefore, you never really see it for what it truly is unless you live there.

Roadtrip Dynamics

A roadtrip is about giving in to the unknown, following that stretch of pavement, and doing the spontaneous. Like when I stopped at the Henry Miller library in the middle of nowhere in Big Sur and met Dave and Tamika. The night resulted of our discussing an apparent culture(rather skeptical on my end, mind) of America over a couple of Heinekens and some(really good) live music. All in the middle of a beautiful forest on a windy, misty road high in the mountains overlooking a death drop to the sea.

It’s also about self reflection and decompressing. Driving for extended periods of time can become hypnotic and tedious. You need to keep yourself attentive by taking your mind off the present circumstance, and with no one to talk to, you start thinking about your life, your reality, your future, your past, and your present. A lot can surface in those solitary moments. Like how I tend to have a need to plan out my future, hang on to the past, and am rarely present in the present. I found out that there is no right or wrong way to life. Life just is. It will go on despite what you do and it will end despite what you’ve achieved. It should not be worshiped, it should be used. It really is like a book. And the best books are the ones with tatty pages, ripped corners, old paper smells, and infinitely rebound spines. Because those were the ones well loved.

Traveling makes you understand what you have, what you don’t have, and the value of each. It makes you realise what you can do without and what you need to survive. It makes you think on a day to day basis rather than a yearly overture in progress. Picking up a homeless hitchhiker, Rachel, I learned what real trials consist of and that people are stronger than they seem. How someone can go through so many issues and still look 28 at 38 is miraculous. Not to mention she’s an activist on a mission, already piecing together her first expose on the real homeless situation of the US.

Going from city to city, America is one city duplicated over and over in hundreds of repetitive clones. The same design, the same layout, the same buildings. If not for the CouchSurfing hosts I had, these would have been lonely and quite honestly, boring, times. There’s not too much to see unless you become part of the city from the inside. Bonding with locals can be difficult without a connection and parking your car an absolute nightmare. Needless to say, I’m quite done with the cities.

As my mood on city life dwindles, I am startled by a call from my family saying there has been an emergency and I’m their only hope. My sister’s car has finally given it’s last and dying exhaust fume out into the smog-filled air of LA and needs my help. Family tops the chart of any list so it’s no hesitation as Lelu and I race down from Portland to LA. Amazing myself at the fact that I am able to drive for so long in a single day, I get to SoCal in two days quick, snap. As our efforts prove futile in the resurrection of my sister’s Honda, Lelu is the ultimate sacrifice given up to the alter of the car gods in hopes that she serves her for a long time onward.

And so concludes a life on the roads of the west coast. Lelu and I have braved all the twists and turns. All the ups and downs. All the smog and fog. We’ve crossed HWYs 1 and 5 in a complete circle(I’d finally given up on my long standing rule of never turning around). I’ve gotten lumpy(not a healthy lifestyle, folks), she’s gotten dirtier(killed a lot of flies in the process). All in all, I think we can part ways on happy grounds. Until next time, same brown hair, same need for more, goodnight everyone. Oh.

Some hella tight people in NorCal

NorCal

Leaving San Francisco, I had not tried any of the touristy things on the menu.  I had not seen the Golden Gate bridge, I had not taken a stroll through the park with the famous townhouses.  What I did taste was the real flavor of the city.  I worked a Super Hero Street Fair dressed as a would-be famous female version of Jack Sparrow, I rode all the public transportation lines up and down the rolling hills, I attended the Free Theatre Festival and witnessed amazing performances, sat in on the famous Poetry Reading Festival with Taslima Nasrin, and as the cherry on top got a $53 parking ticket for being parked in an area that had street cleaning on Mondays only.  Needless to say, I got the real San Francisco treat.

As I map out my route to Portland, I realise it’s gonna be a long drive(at least 9 hours) and that’s just a little too much for little ol me.  So I decide I’m going to make two more stops between here and there, one in Napa and another in Arcata.  I message CouchSurfers in the area in hopes of them being sympathetic on my situation and taking me in last minute.  I get a reply from Bob in Arcata first.  He tells me he will be away on the days that I want to come up but that I’m more than welcome to stay at his house regardless.  He asks me where I’ll be coming from and I explain my predicament of having no where to stay in Napa.  He immediately gets on the phone and rings up one of his buddies, tells him I’ll be there the next day, and tells him to host me. 

Not only did I get a quick response from Bob, not only is he letting me stay in house without him being there, but he also saved my ass in Napa.  His friend was just as welcoming, helping me to the famous Napa Valley wine(three bottles too many, in fact) and giving me one for the road.  Because of the immense amount of alcohol consumed that night, my drive to Arcata was a bit of a challenge. 

I stopped along the way at this redwood grove with fresh water pools, thinking the cool water would help me out.  There, I meet this little hippy dude who’s chilling by the water with his dog.  As soon as he sees that I am sick and unable to function, he comes right up and nurses me back to health.  Gives me his food, gatorade, and even a head massage.  Not to mention, he gaurds my things when I try to take a nap in his shady spot on the shore. 

And not a single “Hella” or “tight” was ever heard.  Just genuinely kind people coming to my rescue.  Just gets me thinking, what extraordinary things have I done to deserve this kind of care?  Truly amazing.

The Reality of Imagination

Going about your day to day activities, you expect things to be the way you envision them in your mind but you find that it almost never turns out that way.  You think that the places that you read about will be the way they are presented in books and stories but in reality, they are just like every other place.  Perhaps then, it is our view of the place and the magic from within that transforms it into something special; something worthy of the stories. 

And it’s all about the stories really.  Life revolves around them.  We see them in the movies, in books, in newspapers, in magazines, around campfires, around a couple of beers, and on television.  If you think about it, people have been entertaining each other with stories for years and years.  In fact, historically, storytellers were specifically hired by the royals to portray twisting and interesting tales of heroic acts.  Some of the best works of liturature were created from the need for stories by those unable to make them on their own(Shakespeare for one).  Even cavemen told stories  according to the cave drawings we find today. 

Perhaps then, we make our on reality based on the feelings we get from stories.  If you believe Romania to be chock full of vampires, you will go there expecting to find the bloodsuckers around every corner even when reality tells you otherwise.  In that sense, when you enter a new place and it has no meaning to you because you have never encountered it in a story, you feel a sort of disconnect.  It’s as if the buildings mean nothing if life had not been breathed into them to make them seem special by some strange and exciting event of incredible people ages ago.  It is then up to you to make a new story of that place to inspire countless others to follow in your thoughts. 

Traveling for many seems like such a romantic notion as they try to follow others’ footsteps in hopes of encountering their experiences, not realizing that it can never be duplicated.  What one person experiences will never be the same for another unless there is a story made from an event or place during travel.  That story can then be shared and retold to many others so that they too are able to see that what the traveler has been through with the eyes of the adventurer himself.  Stories are what make this human race and life bareable and worthwhile.  Sometimes, it is the stories of others that make your day feel whole and sometimes it is those that you create yourself and share with others that make it magical. 

I suppose, in that sense, we must all strive to become brilliant storytellers in order to share our views of this world with others.  Create stories in any way you know how.  Sing them, draw them, write them, photograph them, document through video.  Anything that transports your audience to another time and place and they get the feeling that you felt in that moment.  At that moment, all the work that went into your efforts is worth it.  In that moment, you have created a new reality.  A reality that anyone can revisit for as long as they feel the magic. 

Magic is everywhere but most importantly, it is inside you.