No sleep came to me the last night at home. In my head all I could hear was the songs from Rachael William's album "Elysium" repeating over and over. Its one of only three CD's I've ever bought or owned and stands in a league of its own in my opinion. Its a real heart opener. But it was something of a torture as all I wanted to do was sleep.
I was also sweating through my sheets, probably because I had a Chipotle burrito yesterday, that was a bad choice, all that hot sauce and sloppy soyrizo... they cost $16 now... They were six dollars 20 years ago... That should make me feel old, but it just reminds me how weak our money has become, and all by design in order to collapse the middle class and consolidate business into the hands of a few power brokers.
Once I pulled myself out of my wet and sticky bed I rinsed off and decided to totally reformat my luggage, opting to transfer it from my small Hurley pack I just bought at Ross for $30 into my 33 L Osprey, while also packing the Hurley as a day trip bag.
I went upstairs and shared a tense 15 minutes with my sister Michelle, neither of us are morning people, to say the least, and it being 4am without sleep and the stresses mounting? Well... I tried to just keep it together.
I'm usually so cool under fire, but this trip is my first truly solo adventure since 2011. That and the trauma I have from traveling with my mom in 2020 during the plannedemic, I thought I knew fear before then, having faced death and dismemberment in various ways, I was wrong.
My own fear I can handle, but when I'm absorbing a whole planets fear at once... Well, I'm sure anyone with any sensitivity knows what I mean. Especially since I only wore a mask a total of 5 times during those three years. People were ready to kill me themselves just to alleviate their own fears.
"The only thing to fear is fear itself" the saying goes, and the plannedemic proved just how true that statement is. 9/11 did too, though not as thoroughly. But because of both these monsters of fear, we have permanent bastions of authoritarianism in our everyday lives. As I went through security in Monterey airport I opted out of the full body radiation scanner, a total invasion of privacy and attack on the body at a cellular level. And had to be groped by the TSA, another invasion. They've stopped a total of Zero terrorists thus far by the way and caused more pain and suffering than you can imagine, not to mention the cost to support them.
A large white guy with a "Meatery" hat on was being groped next to me, a large smile on his face as he said, "this is the best part." While a frail Hispanic man in a wheelchair was being man handled and prodded too. Its all so dehumanizing, and that's the point. The powers that should not be need us to keep small, to remain afraid, in order to rule over us.
There's many things that help me push past the fear and uncertainty though, but one man I love dearly has helped me more than anything else recently, his names Scott and he's lost everything dearest to him, even his own life, several times in fact. All that tragedy and not only is he still standing strong but he's getting stronger, kinder, and more giving than he ever was as far as I know.
Perseverance like that makes me want to weep,
And it does, for literally at this moment on the plane halfway to Japan, as I'm writing these words I'm wiping the tears from my face as everyone around me is gorging on their balsamic chicken and cheese hot pockets fresh from the microwaves. I would be eating something too but every time I asked if they had fruit the flight attendants just shook their heads, with one finally saying flat out.
"No. We're on an airplane." As if that should settle the matter and I had to accept the futility of desiring the improbable. How hard can it be to have an apple, orange or banana for 300 people on a 12 hour flight? Apparently its only possible if one of the flight attendants finally realizes I refused every meal offer and has a heart.
"You must eat something." He said.
"I'm vegan, I cant eat anything on this plane."
"Ohh." He says, and comes back a minute later with two rectangular pods filled with chilled fruit.
'Where the fuck were you hiding this my guy?' I wanted to say as he walked away. But when he came back around I stopped him and said "thank you." Instead.
Luckily I had visited the Tomokazu restaurant in G wing of San Francisco airport, eating sushi (cucumber and avocado) plus potato curry, which was basically a shit tone of rice.
I also bought, one large coconut water, then another, then finally another three. The server stopped short and repeated the count as if to make sure I knew what I had just spend all the rest of my small change dollars on.
"That makes five coconut waters..." He said.
"Yeah... I'm addicted. You guys have all my money now." I smiled, so did the entire crew working there, and I left with my bag of goodies which included a Kale salad and a vegan wrap from another store in G wing. I've done this before you see, a little preparation is a life saver. Especially when your vegan.
And so the flight passed, uneventfully, with me just trying to sleep, I even spent $40 on a fancy, organic neck pillow, but it was too bulky and I didn't like it at all. Unable to sleep I decided to watch a movie, for whatever reason I chose "we were soldiers" a Mel Gibson Vietnam war movie about the first use of Helicopter gun ships used in battle. Like all Gibsons movies they glorify God as a tool for slaughter and survival, but it also brought important insights into the Vietnamese's thinking which many war movies exclude, showing the enemy as heartless heathens.
Finally we landed in Tokyo, and the weight of having no plan at all was finally hitting home. Where will I go? What will I do? The first thing I had to decide was which hotel Id be going to, The Japanese would not just let me get off the plan without a plan... So I got on the wifi and chose the coolest sounding hostel. UnPlan Hostel its called, how perfect!