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A song came to me as I was writing this post, and I thought it would be neato-o to post it at the beginning. If you can, hit play and enjoy it while you read through my ramblings. The feeling and of this song just seemed to fit (if you’ve never seen it, it also has a cool music video). Enjoy, suckahs.
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travel.
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There is a different air that consumes everything in it’s natural place. The density of the air feels different depending on the location of your body. I mean, physically FELT. Air molecules in the lungs respond differently to your physiology depending on geography. It’s a distinct and strange feeling. I find it cathartic, a reminder that the purpose of life is to be lived and experienced, noticed.. and repeat, rinse and wash.
Having left northern Florida in early December I arrived to my destination- the Atlantic coast of Andalusia, Spain- just 15 hours later. The air seemed crisp, fresh and easy compared to the dense and dank humidity of my departure location. And with the air came towed closely behind the thoughts and feelings and memories of time passed, and the necks kissed and warm embraces, wide smiles and hearts beating in elevated cycles.
Flying all over the world you have to be able to mold and change with your current surroundings. When my wife and I would fly back to Italy after having been gone for many months, or sometimes (for me) longer than a year, we would arrive in Rome Fiumicino terminal and the smells sounds and vibrations would signal something to arise from within us, the inner selves, the selves which emerge when they want to like a cat out of a garbage can or an elk bounding in majesty from some frost-covered evergreen at sunrise. Our selves always appear without our exclusive permission, ever-present, and under the radar like a skin-covered submarine. We would begin to act accordingly. It was primordial, the old instincts which came about, like carved from the inside of a rock. Suddenly we wanted a smoke. Tobacco went from smelling like the ash-burned asshole of a backwoods Trojan horse, to a sweet and delectable elixir made of magic and smoke. We'd light a cigarette as soon as we inhaled the brisk air from outside the terminal. The urge to smoke wasn't a fiendish impulse but a delicate suggestion, a nudge. We hadn't smoked our entire time in the states.. but the air here was different. It beckoned us. So we did, and it didn't disappoint. It was the air’s fault.
This time having arrived in Spain, the same phenomenon occurred. Things I never felt like doing in the states came all of a sudden back. Spending many nights staying up late playing cards and talking- no FALLING INTO- conversations about politics and life and love and music and games and war and shitheads and children and whatever. And night after night of drinking wine and beer and digestivi, no dense hangover ever appeared. Was it the ingredients? Less preservatives, more actual carbon-based elements? Was it the happiness which warded away the dark spirits when immersed in the lives of the people whom you most love? Maybe it was all of these things. But I am convinced that the air had something to do with it.
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When you travel point to point, locations and intermediary stops in cities which you've lived or visited you have a whole cardboard box of memories inside of your head, closed with tape (now barely adhesive from moving a few times and opening and closing looking for old rubbish), these memories come back to you in a rush. Landing in an airport, thoughts come to you: I used to live here and drive around the airport, spend an afternoon with friends in the Atlanta atrium eating lunch and watching people and talking teenage trash to each other. This other city I slept on the floor in Madrid, Terminal 3 overnight after a concert ended late but had to catch an early flight to Sicily. In Boston I had a drink in a hotel bar, landing late, after saying goodbye to my family for deployment. Or sprinting with a baby stroller in the snow encrusted sidewalks at JFK, darting and skipping over terminals, with my kiddo laughing basking in the cold air and the equally cold rush of excitement.
We live micro-lives in airports. An ant's lifetime. Sometimes hungover, sometimes heartbroken, other times hopeful and full of radiant joy.. in airports you witness blinks in the lives of completely random strangers. And yet the truth is we're all connected by our DNA, our humanity. You could have brushed past someone you used to know in high school, or stood in line to get a coffee in front of a famous musician or athlete or CEO of a billion-dollar company. Most you will never meet or see again. But they are just like you, going to meet family or friends, attend a work-thing, vacation. They’re traveling from one mass of air to a different one, and they too will feel the change, whether they are aware of it or not.
Thanks for reading. Till next time.
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PS: I spent time editing this in the Madrid airport (it snowed, a rare occurrence) coming back from seeing my family for the holidays. There weren’t many places to sit due to social distancing so I had to use my guerilla instincts to find a place to post up for a few hours before my flight. Grabbed a few beers, a couple of sandwiches, I did some of my initial editing of this newsletter standing up. Here was my spot:
byeeeeeeeeeeee
“It was the air’s fault,” got me. Thoroughly enjoying your posts!
Been waiting for this bro! Keep them coming.