The Journey Back

 

 Pitsburg: Poetic Sadness

Our universe possesses within it the potential for tremendous warmth and light. But in between these places of happiness and safety lie vast stretches of cold, lonely, dark, empty space. In truth the amount of space that contains warmth and light, that allows for life such as us to exist, is relatively minuscule in comparison with the amount of space that is dark and unwelcoming. And yet we exist within warmth and light, and the cold and dark mostly never enters our thoughts.

But as it is said, the microcosm imitates the macrocosm, and our own world, as well as our own lives, are too a mix of light and dark. Some moments are filled with warmth, and safety, and a sense of belonging. But in between these moments of light there are often vast stretches of coldness and loneliness. These times of darkness must be endured, but even a brief time of warmth and belonging can make the months of cold worthwhile. That is the power of light.

Some fleeting sensations of light and warmth from my trip to Pennsic:
-Walking down the terminal after arriving, my name is called out, I turn to see an old friend waiting for me with a smile.
-Arriving at camp, my best friends younger sister, now a beautiful young woman, running and jumping into my arms to welcome me.
-My best friend sees me, and embraces me hard and strong, a rare expression of emotion from him.
-flickering fire light, drums, the spinning and weaving of dancers
-bare feet on dirt and mud and grass
-wandering around, scattered conversations, joking, laughing, drinking
-the taste of soft lips, sounds of pleasure, breathing close, fingers and toes, stroking, quivering
-sitting in camp, family, safety, companionship

 

Toronto

It's a fascinating phenomena that the more distance you put between yourself and a place, the more distance you feel between yourself and your connections to that place. For my emotions regarding leaving Pennsic have not stabilized so much with the time since I left as much as with the distance that I have traveled.

Now in Toronto I have reached a point in which I still feel Pennsic, I still feel the fictional yet real place that I almost just got lost in, yet I no longer feel attached to it. I no longer feel in danger of losing myself.

Getting lost in pennsic....that's an interesting topic. It's how the rest of the world melts away to allow the existence of a truly separate reality. When you're there it feels like the whole world, and that, for me at least, is maybe the most appealing aspect of it. I could see myself beginning to get lost in it, and yet, mostly because I knew I was coming back so soon, I never completely fell in. And that almost but not quite falling in aspect, as apposed to previous years where I dove in as quickly as I could, gave me a new perspective on it. I saw the getting lost aspect of pennsic with new eyes, observed the building of energy, and understood the climax of it all in a way I never had before. And standing on the brink like that, looking in on this thing we do, but not completely committing myself to participating in it, was very bitter sweet. It gave me a new appreciation for this thing, but I had to refrain from completely embracing it. In the end, having to go back to what Korea is for me, that's probably a good thing. It makes it easier. I still got to see the most important people in my life, but I don't have to fully endure the wrenching pain that can accompany leaving a temporary yet completely accepted and embraced reality.

Addendum: sitting at the gate for my next flight are two Koreans. I heard them speaking Korean and recognized it, so I asked them in Korean if they were Korean, and they said yes. We had a nice little conversation, much of it in Korean. I've only been out of Korea for 7 days, but it had a fresh feel to it. It was comforting in a strange way. It helped remind me that I do have connections there. I am established in Korea and have a life in progress there, and as much as I complain about it being lonely, a year into it it's really not so bad anymore. I don't have people there like I do back home, but I do have people, and they are good people. I feel comfortable with Koreans and have a good connection with them. Actually I have a much stronger connection with Koreans than with most of the expats living in Korea. The two Koreans at the gate reminded me of that. It helps a little bit with the sadness of going back.

 

Vancouver

And now I am at a truly wonderful place in my journey back. I had an 11 hour layover in Vancouver. Luckily, I have a friend who used to teach in Seoul who now lives in Vancouver, and he picked me up at the airport. He took me around the city, bought me dinner, and gave me a little tour. It was a good time.

And somewhere in the midst of all this, I gained a new appreciation for Korea and life there. While at Pennsic I didn't really experience normal American life, and so the differences that I'd forgotten about never really presented themselves. In Vancouver however, I was reminded about some of the things I like so much about korea that I'd stopped appreciating.

He took me to the night life area of the city, but by then it was 2 AM and the bars were closing and people were going home. And I'd sorta forgotten that that happened, you know, bars closing and people going home and stuff. Seoul never sleeps and I love it. Also, the parking situation in Vancouver is pretty terrible, and I realized that that's because they don't have an epically amazing subway system, because compared to Seoul almost no one does. Additionally, most people live in houses rather than apartments, so there's a lot of urban sprawl, and not a lot of population density. (Population density, btw, I've decided is a good thing in terms of it's ability to help build a city into an easily accessible and energy efficient living environment. I like density, not sprawl, but that's a rant for a different post.)

So I'm a little bit reenergized about going back to Korea and I'm looking forward to reestablishing my appreciation for some of the best aspects of the city. I also have found a few aspects about my social life that I appreciate out there. Perhaps because they spend so much of their lives studying and working, I think that in a lot of ways Korea has a very grown up culture compared to the states. Or perhaps that's just because I'm at a part of my life where I'm interacting more with people in their later 20's rather than their early 20's. Either way, my life out there is relatively grown up. I go on grown up kinds of dates, and have a very mature sort of day to day life. I like that. One thing that struck me about being back in the states was that I felt more grown up, more tempered, more aware of my actions and their consequences. I'm looking forward to going back because of that as well.

So at this point I feel pretty positive about things.

But I still have a strong tinge about missing everyone.

 

Seoul: The First Day

So now I'm back in Korea and I have survived my first day of work. I find myself happier to be here then ever. There's a lot of little interesting things going on.

I came back with a list of reasons I've been unhappy here and a list of things I can do to change that. That's a big thing. Of course one of the biggest things that makes me unhappy is my job. Teaching kids is great, but not for 11 hours a day with no breaks. So I'm going to find a new job ASAP, and not extend this one. This  means that I'm looking at getting out of this job 3 months earlier than I had planned, which is exciting. That makes me optimistic, and gives me something to look forward to. My next job will be a dream compared to this one, and I might even luck out and snatch one of the 4 hours a day (for more than I'm making now) positions. Thinking about that really helps me get excited about this next year.

Also, I need to stop hanging out with the expats that I only kind of like just because it's easy and they are there. I need to be willing to spend more time on my own investing in things I like to do and meeting more people with shared interests. Just gotta do it.

I also need to not be afraid to veg out and not do anything on a Saturday. As long as I'm working the hours I'm working, my health and physical rest are priorities. I'll have more time to be socially busy in a couple of months.

That, coupled with the realizations I had in Vancouver, put me in a positive and energetic mood today. I woke up refreshed, full of energy, and ready to tackle the day.

One more thing. For the first time since coming here, I have enough space between me and the early times here that I am beginning to remember them nostalgically. You know that feeling, when enough time has passed from something, that when you think about it you remember faint wisps of feelings, certain subtle sensations, long forgotten but never discarded. It's one of my favorite sensations, and intensely difficult to describe. I suppose it's similar to nostalgia, or perhaps more simply it is the underlying sensation that triggers the feeling of nostalgia. In any case, for the first time since coming to Korea, I'm having that sensation regarding times in Korea. Suddenly I'm remembering little sensations and feelings from when I first got here. Not as intensely as I felt them then of course, but just in that faint wispy sort of way. And I don't know if that's more a result of going to the states and coming back or more a product of the fact that I am back at the start of the annual cycle from when I came here. Probably a combination of the two. In any case, it's cool, and it makes me feel very positive.

Lastly, a very interesting thing about my life here and in the states. As soon as I got home it felt like I had never left. Like a movie had been unpaused from right where I left off. In fact, the strangest thing about being home was how not strange it was. And then I left, and while still close to it it was unbearably painful. But then, almost immediately upon landing in Seoul, it felt like I had never been home. All the memories of my vacation felt far away, like they had never really happened. I felt detached from them, they seemed like nothing more than a dream.

This is very interesting to me. It's like I have two completely separate lives, and while I play around in one, the other one waits for me, completely in stasis. Like parallel universes, but in this case parallel lives. They move in the same direction, but they never touch, and only one of them can actually seem real at a time. It's quite bizarre. But it's also comforting. It makes it easier to be here for one more year knowing that when I come back it will once again feel as if I never left.

Thanks so much to all of you whom I love so dearly. Turtle and Bri. Mamma Rowe and Hannah. My parents. Heather/Kyra, Dom, and too many other swampies to mention. Callie and Uaal, neither of whom I saw this time. Marc the piper, Kelee, Alchamar, and everyone at Bloodjack. You are all in my heart every day, and your love and support has helped give me the courage to find my own strength. I love you all so much. I look forward to the permanent reunion. And on the scale of things, that's really not so far away.

    - Mongoose