Resolve

When you decide things, you have to stick to them. Even if you hate your previous self- the self who made the decision- for it. When you don't jump out of the taxi, and declare that you're going to stay in the fictional rain, you have to stay in the cab, you have to get on the plane, and when people ask you if you're excited about the next months or years of your life, you have to say yes. Not because you want to lie or to keep up appearances, but because youre placing your hope on the notion that saying it out loud will make it real.

I landed in New York. it looked a lot like Kiev, which I had had a short stop over in before continuing for 10 hours. I was exhausted and the sight of grey skies and white terrain did nothing to comfort me. It was March, and under norm

al circumstances, it shouldnt have been snowing. New York went by quickly, and then all too slowly, as a "noreaster" blew by and rendered the entire region helpless for a number of days. All flights were cancelled, and thereafter overbooked for days- all flights including mine.

Argentina was waiting, as was my friend and prospective travel partner, Tal. I'll stick it out in Buenos Aires for a few more days, she said.

Ok. I'll let you know when my flight gets rescheduled.

I updated my friends regarding the delay. Everyone was asking how South America was, and I didn't yet have an answer.

Do you want to Skype tonight, he wrote to me on Whatsapp. I did. We talked for about an hour. It was strange. I was always aware how much of our communication was wordless, but when all you have is a camera and sounds, it becomes that much more pronounced. Eventually time zone differences prevailed, and it was late. I know how a day in the sun wears you out. I joked. He said something about wanting me to be waiting for him in bed. I agreed.

I didn't miss him. That is to say, it wasn't painful. I just had the feeling that he should be here, close by, and it felt strange that he was not.

The following night I flew out of JFK airport.

I arrived in Cordoba after 38 hours without sleep, Tal would be arriving the following morning. I was tired, hot, standing on the curb with my new snowboarding jacket in my hands and my hoodie tied around my waist. I was happy to be warm. After waiting for the local bus for twenty minutes, I realized I was overcharged for the fair.

Shit happens. I'd have to be more careful.

The hostel in the city center was nothing special. Located on a somewhat dodgy back street, walking there, I quickly got the feeling that Cordoba wasn't the location of my dreams. Fortunately my expectations had been low. I had the room to myself until around 2 am , by which point I was already in bed. My new roommate entered the room and proceeded to test the invention of electricity by turning the lights on and off until she was sufficiently convinced that Franklin was certainly onto something.

In the morning Tal checked into the hostel. I had already been up for two hours. My transatlantic jetlag hadn't entirely worn off. It was good to see her again after so many months and it felt like nothing had changed, which is always a good sign when it comes to friends. She looked tired after the long bus ride, but I imagined that I probably didn't look much better. Her eyes were smaller than usual, likely from crying. We had talked on the phone the night before , she told me about the guy she had met in Brazil. It had apparently been an intense but short stint and she didn't need to explain for me to know that some times the most unrealistic romances are the hardest to part with, if not only because they're unrealistic. The fairy tale beginning is a lot harder to let go of than the non-fairy tale ending that usually follows.

For my part, I hadn't heard a word from him since my plane landed. When I boarded the plane in New York he told me he was going to bed. Wish I could be there I said. No response. It had been nearly two days. It didn't worry me in the sense that I thought he'd forgotten me, or that he no longer cared. The beauty of our chemistry was that I never had to worry. It was easy, simple, it was clear to me that to him, I was like no one else. there was no anxiety, or games or power struggles. And it worried me that perhaps now there would be. Perhaps now he would be like every other guy, who had to drop the ball in order to have something to chase after and catch, only to drop it again. I wanted him, in as far as I knew him, to remain different , so that I could believe that there's someone like that out there. He couldn't possibly be the only one. I didn't care who he killed his time with, at the end of the day, some day, I thought, I might want him. And the only solid reason I could come up with to explain why, is that I had finally come to the conclusion that the best kind of relationship is the kind where you're smiling most of the time. Not because they're a stand up comedian, but because for whatever reason, you're actually pretty damn happy around them.

Maybe you have different taste in music, maybe you work or study different fields, maybe your friends are nothing alike, maybe his family is low income and you have a trust fund, maybe he likes egg yolks and you like whites, maybe his pet peeve is white kids with dreadlocks and yours is people who don't wash their hands after using the toilet. Whatever. If you're smiling more when you're together than not, that's the right thing. Maybe he's not the person you'd read your shitty poetry to, and you're not the one he'd vent to about his ex, but if you're happy, you have a less of a reason to write shitty poetry, and less of a reason to give a shit about exes.

But there it was. He was gone.

A few days later he wrote an anxiety-filled paragraph about how, after deliberating, he realized he didn't want a long distance relationship . Baffled, and unable to respond due to lack of internet connection, I stared at the screen and read it several times. He thought about it. He grappled with idea of having a relationship with me while I'm out traveling indefinitely. I didn't know what it said about me that I hadn't. It never occurred to me to be tied to someone in the next months or however long. I took for granted that it was impossible. Moreover, I was sure he wasn't taking it that seriously. I had joked that my leaving was convenient for him. It was a joke, but it carried some truth, at least on my part. I imagined the typical bachelor being given the chance at a so called "vacationship" without the vacation price tag. Definitely not, he had responded to my tasteless joke. But that was before.

Time does its work.

As do beaches full of bikini clad teens and 20-somethings. When all was said and done, I couldnt blame him. It's always easier to be the one leaving than the one left behind.

In a way, it felt good. Fresh. Clear. To have a life devoid of someone to be strung to. Like a kite tail in the wind that gets stuck in a tree.

I would later come to realize that when it's so cold that your bones vibrate and chills run through your body like a fever, you feel as though your insides are shrinking, slowly but surely your thoughts get jumbled up and your eyes begin to close. You know you're going to die if you let yourself sleep. You're head isnt even clear enough to think of the past, to imagine your life flashing before your eyes. But if it was, you'd know you no longer want to be a kite, the idea of wind hurts.

Maybe you won't wake up. And would that be so bad.

It would.

To be cont.

#travel #emletravel #patagonia #southamerica #argentina #cordoba