Finally I feel like we are pushing on with this trip again!
In truth, the past few days have been filled with lugubrious conversation of what to do next as the clouds in our soul came and went as frequently as the spring weather confuses the locals here.
But its time to stop beating myself up and give myself yet another break, otherwise what is the point in being here at all?
We have soaked up Melbourne and after a short week, have both decidedly spat it out. We thumped the pavements, and took with us every day a fresh pot of enthusiasm for seeing something exciting, strange and new from the city, only to see that pot emptied onto the sides of their beautiful tree-bracketed streets with loneliness, most of all loneliness. Despite our best efforts, it seems that optimism is sometimes an exercise in futility and that first impressions, in the end, win out over common sense.
For my part, the thought of returning to work is still playing on my mind, and even the excitement of working here, in a mad sprawl of metropolitan muscle, is something that appeals little right now.
It's not laziness that calls me in another direction, or at least if it is, its a sort of noble laziness where I truly believe that I am doing the right thing.
For some reason I feel I am being pushed on again, not allowed to rest and set up a new haven for myself here.
There is something of a need in me, the need of the impatient driver. I have to see everything, at 50mph in third gear, right fucking now, and to stop just feels like waiting in traffic!
I think it fed my depression a little too openly and the thought of pitching my tent here, asitwere, just sailed to the bottom of my hopes for this trip.
We tramped both sides of the Yarra from Carlton to Kew looking to uncover rocks of misadventure and all to no end. We kept the purse strings tight in expectation of moving on soon and for that I am grateful. The thought of staying here, accepting the working life in Melbourne and biding our time until friends lifted the veil of the city with us has become too dull, too tedious in comparison with all the travel and bustle around us, heading out into open Australia and romance, heat and desert.
And here's me, with money in my pocket and the smell of adventure in my nostrils. The realisation that we would have to make our own way and friends in the office world of the place is not one I could relish. So when we do return, I will be happy to greet Melbourne with open arms.
If ever there is a place to set up a life where you could be happy with humdrum office work, Melbourne is the place and you better believe that!
As soon as we decided to let the little studio in St. Kilda, that dank, lovable homely little apartment, I think the old rebellion in me started to rise with my blood level, and it suddenly became decision time rather than self-derision time.
In truth, the fact that I can't live in that lovely little hole, with its orange ceiling and blue walls, crazy neighbours and artsy landlord is the one thing that saddens me about our departure. I really loved the guy we rented it from, I was excited about meeting our crazy looking neighbours, and filled with wonderment and foreboding about what life in boho st. Kilda would unfold for us. But alas, it’s not to be, at least not yet, as the road is calling us again!
Hangovers abound here for want of a healthier activity, and without friends to share them with or work to struggle with it's often a lonely and quiet morning of hoping that the cloud of impatience will lift.
I am fed up of fighting my instincts to stay in relative mediocrity hoping for a shitty job so that I could fight boredom.
It seems that as soon as we rented the car with plans of a 4 day departure from Melbs, our mood of anxious foreboding lifted with the thought of moving on, of seeing more of the wonderful newness of travel, of feeling the dirt of the road on our skin and feeling the daring of travel again, complete with strange new bit-part characters, pitfalls, weariness and wonderful crazy. If it's all about existing on our own against the world, then I would rather do it with the crazies, the loons, the lost artists and stoic intellectuals of the road.
Discussions led to the futility of returning to strange urbania without friends, and we both realised that we didn't want to come back here, leastwise not until Cian and Sarah show up.
As it stands, they are loving their jaunt through the belly of god-knows-where and planning on extending their time trekking in Thailand and Laos and that whole trip. Well we can't just sit it out here ticking off the calendar and wasting money on self-indulgent spending, and we both decided that coming back to Melbourne alone would be an exercise in depression and a waste of hard-earned travellin' money.
We came here for a good time, not a long time, as the drunken philosopher muses on toilet walls, and its time to get back in the good and out of the hung-over rainy mornings and sunburnt afternoons of this broke backpacker haven.
A backpacker’s guide to Australia purchased in a chain-book-store has fed our dreams and whetted our appetite for the country I have had such trouble settling into. Pictures of the Great Ocean Road, thoughts of driving a new continent, and hopes of some new crazy friends in some beat-up hostels have led us to a new path, starting Sunday a.m. with the Melbourne Marathon, of all things, planned the same day. It will be a strange type of fun I am sure, trying to navigate our way out of the city with all the roads closed to those athletes, but worthwhile if it means some of real old Australia is one the menu. Captain Cook's Australia, before they built a Mc. Donald’s on every corner of this international sprawl.
In truth, and as you can see, my nerves were finally steeled to staying here, grinding it out for a few months to save money and for the greater good of prolonging the adventure, but after such a short time of adventure travelling, it seems unfair to ourselves to just lump in with more mundane office jobs. I think the time will come when its right for us to go back to work and save some cash for adventures, and that time may come quick, depending on how our adventure continues, but that time isn't now. And when we are ready to feed our bank accounts and not our hearts, I can think of no better place than Melbourne, with its thronging friendly streets, happy population and thousands of restaurant-cum-bars to settle and be happy in for a few months.
So I am sure of returning here for the greater good.
So it's suddenly up to me, to guide the little toy car we rented, a yaris, across 1700km of Australian terrain to Brisbane! In 4 days! What a trip and what a deadline!
The prospect is delighting me. At the least, it will make me feel a productive member of our travel party again, having sat back while Sarah powered through apartment rental, job hunting et al as I struggled with depression and called for more booze.
But optimism is in the air, and our destination is Nimbin. It's a tiny town, from what I read, close to Byron Bay, about two hours from Brisbane as the kookaburra flies, and therein lies a hippie haven, replete with the smell of weed and the thronging buzz of sixties music, idle backpackers and full bars.
1 comment:
When you face forward, and stare down the sun, the light bedazzles you. When you look back on what you've done, you're swathed in your own shadow.
Either way, you are blind.
Happiness depends on dignity, and the ability to look yourself in the eye. Keep on going, and you'll have that for life.
We're proud of you.
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