Flirting with Toronto

      There has to be something said for the feeling of being home. You know that sensation... understanding how things work, how people will react to you, and being one of the people that can actually claim to be from a place. The last ten years, I have made a life of being the foreign guy; being the guy that learns about a new place and molds myself to it. With that said there is a certain comfort in being back in Toronto. I know things. I know the faux pas and how to get a smile; I know what everything costs in the stores and in social relations; I know the people...  If I say Stephen Harper or Rob Ford is a twat everyone will know what I mean. We all have a shared narrative in common.

      I took my chances travel wise: I went for it, and then I went for it again, then again... I had to see what it was like away from where I’m from and I have. Now the time is for me to take the accumulated wealth of my travels and forge it into something tangible here. The more I think about it Toronto is an ideal base of operations. It’s BIG, but you can get around; it’s cosmopolitan, but not so much that you feel like a stranger in your own city; people are aloof, but hey if you have your own doses of sarcasm and self defacing ironic candour to peddle what else would you want; people are competitive, but they always are in big cities where cool stuff is happening. All in all Toronto has a lot more positives than negatives, with the most overwhelming positive being that I can actually stay. They aren’t going to kick me out in 12 months and there’s comfort in that.

    Does that mean my travel days are over? Not by a long shot, however the days of just having a backpack and being able to leave with 20 minutes prep time might be. People might see it as insane, but I had that flexibility for the last ten years. I got more in me then being defined by my one dominant moniker: “traveler”. The time has come, now that I like the place I am, that I’m going to nest a bit. Maybe I’ll even do what a few years ago I would have been blasphemous to the travelers’ pathos and buy an actual bed, a couch, and a few amenities – maybe a plant... why not, right?  

    Truth is I’m still not a Canadian with a capital C. My life style choices have made me a touch incognito in my own country. There have been nights out back here in Toronto where girls thought I was from Europe. Milk it right...??? Probably should, but I don’t lie to them, I just say that I’m an Alberta guy (though I wish I could lie about that... :P )  that has been around a lot and that a mixed accent is what happens when you REALLY travel a lot. They like it... and it’s just the truth. I guess, it allows me to be slightly foreign even though I know this place well, which is kind of cool in its way.

     I figure the greatest challenge of all is re-definition of oneself.  I won’t give up my lust for difference and the unknown. However, I need to apply its vigour towards a different medium now - building my life here. Having a holistic life of good friends, having a comfortable place international friends can stay when they visit, a job - or better yet a career - I like, and hopefully at some point a relationship are where my new challenges lie.  Adventure can be where you are, if you allow it.  I’ll go as far as my ingenuity will allow. The hope is that after being a dark horse for such a long time that I can finally grasp my "poetential" and be the phoenix that rises from the ashes. I will build a quality life for myself one brick at a time. 

Castle's in the Sky

    I’ve been in London an extra week. In a scuzzy library right now with no Wifi... waiting for my mate to finish work. I have a collection of bags with me; an amount of luggage that a friend pointed out with gleeful sarcasm: “was surprisingly little.” Honestly though, just like when I started travelling 11 years back, I hold what I need with me. Most of what I have is stored in my heart and my mind. So many experiences have accumulated; so much more than my little backpack could hope to hold.

  

    Many people say the reason they don’t travel is fear of the unknown. For me it was always the opposite. My greatest fear is the known – the routine. When other people see stability and comfort I see prison like bars staring back at me. I’m terrified of being subjugated to the same required daily action. The idea of relationships formed over time that could actually chain me into one single, expected way of presenting myself makes me tremble. I was never good with expectations or conforming myself. I've had an issue with committing myself to a definite plan, or person - maybe that's why at this point I still don't have a career and I'm single. Maybe it’s time I start seeing the best of the other side? I have to admit that the fool is the one that hold their ideas to tight to their chest without challenge. The ultimate sin for someone “claiming” to be open minded is making the abstract dogmatic and real. Even this present trip was in large part to get beyond something that happened in Edmonton. For as long as I can remember I have avoided the uncertainties in my life by itching my travel addiction.

    I have yet to meet a person that didn’t on occasion need to be jarred out of their own thinking. On this, the eve before I fly to Toronto, I'm holding a wrestling match with my own flock of golden geese... those limiting ideas that I’ve made real. Whereas before maybe I felt fear and an uncertainty of whether I could stand firm against the competition and the uncertainties of life – now I feel defiant. I had tricked myself out of trying by being contemptuous of those that strived for success. I pretended that not trying was evidence of a courageous, artistic spirit that turned its back on the capitalist mantra of competition instead of what it was - a buffoonish, self fulfilling prophecy of failure. I will not be held away from my own destiny based on the residue of thoughts that were non adaptive; thoughts that were built from the seedlings of personal neurosis. I will try, and if I fail, I will try again...

    I need to employ that Danish/Dutch honed openness I profess to have. I need to stretch myself and be open to different ways of life and know intrinsically that though I may accept stability in position, I still will not stop being open and seeking others like me. My friends are the ones that have allowed me to grow. They were the ones that nodded in approval when I was my best, most open self, and gently, but yet firmly enough, let me know I was descending into the murk of selfishness and ego. No amount of money, status, or power will ever come close to the love I feel for those people who have, and will, stand by me. All they ask in return is what I give easily - that I do the same for them.

    Previously, I felt that the only path to success in life was the singular one. A path that would open up like Moses parting the seas; a path not so much found but just followed without issue or obstruction. Maybe that’s what saw me hold on to my own biases so tightly. The detours and discomforts are where the growth takes place. I want to grow still, I want to learn....  Sometimes life and the expectations we put on it will trick us, those expectations become our own castles in the sky, they pervert what we see till everything is just a reflection of those perversions. Above that though, the pure spirit; the idealistic spirit; the resolute spirit will always stand its ground and push back. For those us willing to fight it, life will never hold us down it will make us stronger and more resilient... not to do such however is to cower away from the splendor of what could be.