On The Road (not the overrated book though)

I realize I carry pieces of a past life hanging on my set of keys . A bottle opener key chain from a previous job. A souvenir keychain from a friend far away. A 4gb hard drive disk. "Just in case you need to transfer data" some guy said , and laughed. "Why do you have that?" I don't know . It was on my key chain before. I shrugged. Only now there's no set of keys.

Those three items, the bottle opener, the hard drive, the souvenir piece, rest next to two tiny keys on a wooden table. The keys do open locks, but no doors .

When I'm asked where I live, I say no where. The response is curious, surprised, or amused. Sometimes it's met with a sarcastic "oh you're such a citizen of the world", but always followed up with a question. What do I mean that I live nowhere. And then I repeat a statement that, as often as I've said it, still doesn't seem real. I left everything, sold or donated all of my belongings save two suitcases worth of material. My net worth in liquidable assets is about 2000$ and that's only if you value my laptop as practically new, which it's not.

I live nowhere. Then they nod. They're either impressed or drawing conclusions in their mind. One the most common ones, that only some are brave enough to say out loud, is that I'm financially cozy. I must have a trust fund, or wealthy parents, or have saved up a large pot of money somewhere.

Maybe I bought Bitcoin in 1984.

The truth is none of the above. I don't even have a savings account. It never made sense to open one. Anything I could save always went to paying student loans. What I'm doing would be, under normal circumstances, highly financially irresponsible.

But I'm not normal, I don't envision my future to be normative. So it's only a little irresponsible. Along the way I came to realize something a little beyond my years that terrified me much more than not having money: not having energy and health, or time. Because there's a lot of money out there to be had, if you really want it, you can always get more. The more experienced and knowledgeable you are, the more you can acquire in a shorter time. But proper energy and health, or time, those are not within your control. When they begin dwindle, there's only so much you can do to prevent it. The truth is I lied when I said it all started with the car accident on the bridge the day I took my law school entrance exam. It started long before, this need to be totally unimpeded. When I was an adolescent, I used to try to kill myself. It started when I was roughly 11, and my method of choice involved a dull Swiss Army pocket knife given to me as a gift by my uncle, a Holocaust survivor. Even then, the irony wasn't lost on me. It didn't stop me though. I practiced this and similar forms of self harm until I was about 15, with one final relapse at the age of 18. To say I wanted to die, however, would be inaccurate. To say I was looking for attention was still more inaccurate. My parents didn't understand, they didn't think I needed help. They didn't think of it much at all, I suppose.

The truth is I simply wanted to escape. I wanted to be anywhere but where I was.

The problem was, no matter how much money I saved -from babysitting, and in later years from minimum wage jobs- I would always count it and realize I would have to come back. Whether it was 300$ or 3000$ I wouldn't be able to stay away indefinitely. I wouldn't be able to fend for myself. So I chose death. It's pretty grim, I know. But eventually I got out of it. I remember waking up one and looked out the window, the sun was shining, and I had this thought, kind of like : Screw everyone else, theworld is beautiful, and I won't let anyone take it away from me. My life is mine, and I won't let others push me in any direction that doesn't suit me.

I had always wanted to live, I just didn't know how.

It was probably also around then that I realized that I would definitely be able to fend for myself. And that money would be the last thing to keep me from happiness. In the years following it became all the more true as I got jobs at odds and ends just to make quick cash in order to buy a plane ticket or a car or whatever it was that I desperately wanted. Fear, fear is much more complicated than money. Unlike the latter, you always have more of it than you need.

So I cut ties with my possessions, and not to mention a whole lot of people who were important to me , and did what I never imagined doing.

But in all of this, there are those who think that life on the road is what it looks like Instagram would have you believe- nonstop smiles, wind in your hair, flower-headband fun. Parties and vantage points. Throwing money at everything and doing whatever you want.

Riding down highways in topless cars with topless people or otherwise a vintage VW minivan with your feet hanging out the window while your new best friends jam on ukeleles. Sure. Whatever. Maybe. Hasn't happened to me yet though.

In reality there are moments of breathless happiness and those where you wonder why you're doing this.

You sit around planning and calculating how to stretch your dollar and when you're not planning youre writing, learning, reading, anything to stay sharp, or looking for ways to make side cash. There are times when you're constantly in the company of fun people and those where you put your headphones on and eat your failed attempt at dinner cooked with the same spices you've been carrying for weeks, or alternatively- cheap take out, just hoping no one tries to talk to you so that you can finally have peace.

There are times you are thrilled that you were brave enough to take on this challenge, to make the move, to leave it all, to travel with a set of keys that open no doors, and then there are those where you feel so lonely it hurts.

There's a lot of sewing up holes of worn out clothing items and doing laundry in hostel bathroom sinks. There's sleeping on taco shaped mattresses, hammocks, by the side of the road, in someone's backyard, livingroom, in bus terminals, airports, and on cement floors. A lot of over night buses, 20+hour rides, weird situations, life threatening moments, and time to think. Tons of time to think.

There are new friends, sure, you meet amazing people, but you miss your old ones just the same if not more, and wonder when and to what degree you will be less remembered if not forgotten.

There are the what ifs. Like in any other life you'd be living , there are always what ifs. They're simply easier to ignore, as you're faced with the next place, the next site, the next new friend, the next challenge. And after all, you chose this. For the most part, you're glad for it. But life is never a floaty bareback ride on your own My Little Pony sailing off to wherever the hell the Lucky Charms guy lives to have crumpets and tea with the blue Carebear. There are always difficulties, no matter what you choose. At the end of the day it's about appreciating Your brand of difficulties. If you think someone else is constantly happy, they're not. If you think they have it figured out, they don't. If you think you're behind on the race, there isn't one. We're all in the same boat, only with time we get better at riding out storm. It's important to remember; The more violent the sea, the better the sailor.

#travel #backpacking #wanderlust #solotravel #girlsthattravel #solofemaletraveller