I remember being a kid and having these intense feelings of needing to run. Fast. I just wanted to fly through the trees, wind in my hair, to get to a place where I could scream at the top of my lungs and not have to explain myself to anyone.
I wanted to be wild.
That sentiment stayed with me as I searched for the feeling in every move I made. In every person I met. In every “yes” to a situation I wasn’t entirely sold on.
Being out here like this, completely free to come and go, able to leave when I’m ready, to stay when I want, to say no, to say yes, to learn, to be afraid… it’s the most wild I’ve ever felt and I feel wide open. I feel like the wind is rushing through my chest and I’m flying so fast.
That monotony of seeing the same faces, the same walls, riding the same routes, shopping in the same sections, it’s never present.
Last week I was drinking cheap beer from the bar at my hostel with a Slovenian girl, an Australian guy and his German girlfriend in Frankfurt, Germany. This week I’m drinking red wine and eating French pizza my friends from New York in Paris, France.
THIS. IS. LIVING. I feel alive. I’m learning more about myself than I’ve ever done, more about the world, more about what it means to be a good person, more about what it means to accept the proper love and care I deem necessary for myself. And it’s always changing. Maybe I’m addicted to change, in which case it’s not so healthy. Maybe I love freedom to come and go. Someday I’ll get tired of sharing rooms with strangers, tired of the snore-symphony, tired of the backpack or the lack of privacy, or the cigarette smoke.
But at this moment, this is what I’m supposed to be doing, and it feels insane. I’ve had these feelings of being in the right place at the right time before. I’ve felt the sense of belonging before, and maybe that’s what I’ve been searching for all this time. That same sensation of just feeling right. Feeling like I exist properly. It’s here in these coffee shops, in the freezing cold parks because I can’t afford museums, it’s here in the bookstores with foreign titles. I belong out here like this right now.
AND IT RULESSSSSS!!!!!!! I want always to be a boy and to have fun.
The strikes have been an issue, but we’re resilient. Fran and Sharon went to Luxembourg for a night and couldn’t get home for a whole day. It was scary but they survived and I got two nights alone. I cannot express to you what it means to be alone in a nice place, where I’m not sharing space with anyone. I’m rejuvenated.
On another note, I MADE IT. I finally made it. I’ve finished my last Christian album (at least of this journal). I couldn’t be more thrilled, and want to thank my mom for reading through each, painful experience. You’re a trooper and a good woman.
Kevin Max’s album Stereotype Be can best be described as that person in your required poetry class in college who takes it way too seriously and comments the worst shit about your poems when you’re just trying to get a passing grade so you can move onto the shit you actually care about (I loved poetry class in college. I also hated that girl who even corrected the way I pronounced my words).
He pulls influences from a lot of popular artists (U2, the Beatles, Peter Gabriel) but it all kinda feels like coffee shop bands, the guys who love music so much – too much – so they kinda just rip off what they’re hearing.
It has “world music” influences, as every review says, and also includes spoken word poetry. The last song on the album is the dreaded 2 minute song, then a 2 minute brick of silence, and then a whole other song.
Least favorite. His book was better than his album.
Next week I’ll be in Madrid, Spain having spent three nights with Sharon and Francisco at a friend’s house. By Monday I’ll have already checked into a hostel for five nights in Madrid. Excited to be back in Spain, excited to see how it differs from Barcelona. Excited for more and more and more new shit all the time.
The world doesn’t run out of new shit to see and do, right?!
Which leads me to my last project of Volume Two for now. I’ve got loads of other things to do from this volume, but they aren’t entirely accessible at this time. So, as a parting gift to myself, after weeks of bad music, I’ve left this for last. With no context whatsoever, I wanted to know who Miles Davis was. So I’m gonna get to know Miles Davis over the next couple months.
Next week we’ll be launching into the Twilight Zone Volume Three. The first quarter of it was written in 2004 as a 14 year old creep. Then it picks back up at the angsty, Danny-obsessed 16 year old we leave behind in Volume Two. Good bye weeks and weeks of sickness, good bye mostly Christian influence (don’t get too comfy, I practiced Christianity pretty much until I was 18).
It’s a whirlwind. I have some big goals for V3. Like, actually possibly unattainably big. That, or I’ll be going back to college, giving modeling another go, and learning Portuguese.
Wish me luck this week and see you in Spain ❤
JACLAND 