nomad nights: the final stop

i am here in seattle but still without a home of my own. housesitting one last time for an extended period. i have the month to apartment search. i have the month to return.

here's to hoping things will all come together sooner and i can be reunited with my home sometime between the 15th and 27th of this month. yes, that's specific. i have my reasons.

it's still bliss to be back in seattle, living out of a suitcase instead of just an oversized backpack. oh, {insert: jeans, t-shirt, hoodie, variety in general}, how i have missed you. i've also put down the burden of a rigorous running schedule to use these last few days of vacation to relax. after a month of being away, i am finally on vacation. reading for fun. hiding away from the world {mostly for good reasons and one quite painful one}. gathering deep for courage. preparing to reenter. work will force itself upon me on thursday at which point i'll have no choice.

in the meantime, nights 196 onward....until?

in roughly seven months, i will have changed location 39 times. mostly beds, thank god, though this number does include two air plane seats {hawaii and europe -- the latter un-pictured}, two air mattresses, and one couch. i only missed photographing said air plane seat and one other location that was a result of a late night airport run turned into an eeeeearly morning airport run and so a last minute change ensued.

here i am, finally: the last stop of my nomadic tour.

nomad nate, writing from madison park, seattle, washington. 

venice - part 2

at home. still not in the real world yet, nothing on my schedule at the moment except looking for apartments. hiding a little, but okay with it. in the meantime, here is the rest of my day-trip to venice.

touch down part two

never in my nomadic adventures have i felt so homeless: sitting at whole foods, jet lagged and expectant, waiting for a friend who i am crashing with tonight. even knowing there are two other places about the city i could call home tonight without even having to ask doesn't seem to help the feeling of being completely untied to a physical place in this city.

and i think the element that heightens this particular moment comes down to uncertainty. i am stepping into uncertainty in a new way, on several levels simultaneously. it is humbling how scary it is despite how hard i have been teaching myself to weather moments like these for the past six months.

but here i am, vulnerable and true, living and breathing exactly what is hardest but best.

touch down

here. seattle. finally, home is on its way.

the trip timeline {nights 166 to 195}

i still have so many photos and so many stories, but here is the rough timeline, given in the beds i have slept these 29 nights of my trip.

night 166 has no photo and it's one of only two places i failed to document during this time. night 166 was spent in an airplane traveling over the top of the world, down past greenland and through the northern lights. it was a hard night. there was sadness and weight laced with anticipation of the fresh start i would make for myself during my journey.

nights 167 to 172 i was in paris with my dear friend, karina. we met exactly ten years ago on a night bus from melbourne to sydney and have spent the past decade in very good touch {think novella length letters passing back and forth across the internet between the uk and the us}. as you know, we had a magical new year's eve together. paris was the perfect place to get my travel groove set. highlights: monet's waterlilies at the musee de l'orangerie, taking runs to the eiffel tower, nye with karina, and the hummus from israel.

nights 173 to 177 were spent in vienna. my sister lives here with her boyfriend of six {?} years who i met for the first time on this trip. despite the language barrier, he and i hit it off splendidly and i had a fantastic time being given the local's tour of the food and wine here {i had more alcohol in these five days that i usually have in five months}. they were both fantastic hosts and my german is just not-horrible enough to get by in the city that was in general, wonderful and easy to navigate. highlights: the food, getting a little drunk that last day, navigating such a friendly city, boot shopping, rene magritte exhibit with my sister {a linguistics phd candidate}, and klimt's the kiss.

nights 178 to 180 were spent tucked into a corner of my parent's living room having horrible nightmares, late night gchat conversations and radiohead ticket strategizing. it was..................hard seeing my parents age, seeing them with clear eyes, speaking and hearing the realities of the life they have chosen. this hardness came with lots of gifts. i have an incredible relationship with my mother. we had lots of good talks. highlights: running in the austrian countryside, eating home cooked meals, the chocolate factory near my parent's place, and resting for a few days.

nights 181 to 185 were in rome {by way of a day trip to venice}. this was the portion of the trip i set aside to travel by myself somewhere and i wish i had allotted more time. aside from the late night panic that first greeted me on the train platform {as i realized the directions i had printed off to the hostel were more than a bit vague and what the hell was i doing there anyway!?!?!} i had so much fun in rome. i could spend days just meandering the city, bumping into the pantheon and happening across the colosseum during my wanderings. strangely one of my other favorite things was the relationship between pedestrians and cars. so many unregulated crosswalks across massively busy streets and you just have to gather your confidence about you and boldly stop traffic. and it worked. and on the small back streets, i loved how they belonged to pedestrians who would casually give way to cars as they slowly squeezed past. i loved it. and the city was generous in return. i fell in love with two paintings here and four friends. more stories later. highlights: walking, running around the villa borghese, my new friends, being alone, michaelangelo's pieta & the sistine chapel, giulio gargellini's ressurection, and klimt's the three ages.

night 186 was a lone night in a hostel dorm in dublin while waiting for my two cousins to come join and we transferred to the guesthouse side of the building to a much nicer accommodation. i arrived late after a fun flight with two irish men and a woman from seattle now living in ireland.

nights 187 and 188 were spent in dublin, drinking with the girls, navigating a city that drives on the left and getting really good food recommendations. the two daves that worked at the guesthouse where we stayed were beyond fantastic. the city was a bit grey but was livened by the silliness of two younger cousins. highlights: caravaggio's the taking of christ, drinking whiskey with the girls, beef & guinness stew from the brazen head, strangely, the bog bodies from the archeology museum, and running around phoenix park.

{hannah is covering her mouth because she just got news she was 

not rejected from harvard law school. she's going to the 2nd round.}

nights 189 to 190 we traipsed down to killarney as i navigated {very safely!} driving on the left. car conversations are always the best and the countryside was beautiful. killarney national park was amazing and i got a bit of alone time hiking muckross lake on a beautifully grey day. exhaustion started to settle in as i kept mellow nights at the hostel chatting with a random drunk irish dude and the hostel's rather fantastic worker, pete. highlights: finding a ton of gluten free food in small town ireland, hanging with pete, the countryside, quiet nights & a short run through killarney park on the last morning.

nights 191 and 192 – galway by way of the cliffs of moher. more lovely countryside driving. more great conversations and amazingly sweet people. the irish are really truly friendly. i got a run in along salt hill staring out at the ocean and feeling the space stretch out around and above me. highlights: the cliffs of moher & help a little lost dog find its owner.

night 193 saw us safely back to dublin {same room, different bed} but i was exhausted beyond measure. almost went to sleep before 8pm. we were all feeling the weight of pending departures and a return to life facing the individual uncertainty and change we three had spent the last week hashing out amongst ourselves and our wonderfully tangential conversations. highlights: learning how to laugh with abandon with the girls.

nights 194 and 195 – back to vienna. a surprise welcome at the airport by ellie and emmerich. so wonderful to see a friendly face when i was expecting to navigate the transit system. we celebrated with a little whiskey i brought back from ireland. and now we are up to today. my last full day in europe. i'm going to get myself moving soon, collect some things i had left with my parents, see some more klimt, have a lovely dinner with my sister and emmerich and then get on an early morning flight to come home.

nomad nate, writing from vienna.

the beginning of the end

today was a bon iver day, zig zagging through back roads of ireland and getting a little bit turned around in the busy city streets of dublin.
today was a giddy laughter day punctuating the small cloud of sadness the three of us feel at our imminent departures.
today was a painkiller day, feeling my body betray me in an added insult to the injury of deep exhaustion.
today was my second to last day of my trip.

my plans changed while in rome and i have only been happy about the decision i made then to come home a few days early. i need a small bubble of time on the other side of travel, to arrive, to ground, to sleep the sleep of the travel-worn and jet-lagged. i am also impatient to begin apartment searching and begin my life on the other side of being a nomad. i also come home to intersect during a few precious days of overlap...

home, here i come. just a few days more.

self-portrait in rome

from the top of the vittorio emmanuele II monument in venezia square. taken on my last day in rome.

{photos of the monument itself as well as the rest of my charmed stay in rome to follow -- oh, and those are new earrings made by maximo, the craftsman who also made my new gryphon ring}

cliffs of moher

we arrived nearly at dusk which an early occurrence here at 52° 57' 47 N. darkness always ready to sneak up on you here in the north, adding a hazy moodiness to the overwhelming beauty of the waves throwing themselves at the cliffs' feet. from as far above as we were, everything seemed to move in slow motion: the smooth glide of the waves approaching, then oh so slowly crumbling at the base only to rise up again moments later, stretching themselves to the sky before falling once again to the ocean from which they came. a trapped beast trying to get out. chipping away slowly at the stone boundary, carving out hollows, dreaming of freedom.

and then there was the ocean. how i have missed the openness. how i've missed the massiveness. hello again, atlantic. it's been quite a while my friend.

 

the trio in ireland

traveling through ireland at the moment with my two younger cousins, anna & hannah {even they get their names mixed up}. it's been a lot of fun having people to navigate and explore a city with, buddies to confide in, girl talk on long drives and enthusiastic beer drinkers who might just help lead me to my 2nd beer i have ever consumed ever. i think it'll be a guinness.

it has also forced me to keep a clear sense of what i want and what i need. a bit of silence in the car as i navigate a roundabout, a quiet evening in front of a computer instead of a night out on the town, or a long hike alone. it's very different traveling with people versus even traveling alone but visiting people. i am enjoying it a lot as the final chapter of my month-long adventures.

here we all are our second day in dublin, romping through st. stephen's green.

{hannah on the left, anna on the right}

 

 

paris dressed in blue

from the top of sacre couer, paris done up in her finest gloaming attire.

team radiohead

it started with an early morning text from eden. walking on the streets of seattle she was creeped out by a man {and i won't even say what he was doing} and sent me a text at 2am central european time. for whatever reason, my usually silent phone had its ringer turned on and i woke up. as i read the text, i very clearly thought "that's unfortuante, eden, but it can wait until tomorrow when i am awake" but as i put my phone down to go back to sleep, i also very clearly thought "check your email" and without even pausing to wonder what could be so important, i did.

and there was the email from mike, radiohead friend #1. he was giving me the very important tidbit of info i would have otherwise missed during my travels: radiohead pit tickets were going on sale later that day, two days earlier than i thought. unfortunately this meant it would be while i was traveling through venice with my parents, or even worse: on the train to rome.

next there is scott, radiohead/music friend #10 {remember my bon iver friend from the concert?}. i called him straight away and gave him all the tips i know about scoring pit tickets. i also gave him my credit card info, waste log in info and instructions to purchase the maximum number of tickets possible: 4.

then there is the lottery. because you don't know what time the fan tickets will go on sale, just the date, and even then, it's a rat race to get in there fast enough to score tickets. last time i bought tickets it was 6am local time of the show {4am pst}, but 6...7....9! o'clock rolled by and no celebratory text from scott. the streets of venice were losing their appeal. i dreaded getting on the train to rome which would take me completely out of the reach of wireless and unable to do anything at all for our cause. but i said a prayer, got on the train and waited.

and beyond all luck, he got 4 tickets that sold out in less than a minute. and the crazy thing is i had seasoned fans lose out not only on this pre-sale day, but when the rest of the tickets went on sale two days later {and they had 3 people trying at once to no avail}.

but it wasn't until this morning that i realized the 4 people who all worked to make this bit of luck come together are the same 4 who will be getting these tickets and seeing the show come april 9th. without the text to wake me up, without the email giving me that crucial update, without cashing in on scott's luck karma {blended with a lovely bit of type-a focus that helps get a job done}, we wouldn't have these tickets.

so there you have it. team radiohead 2012*: eden, mike, scott & me.

*with several important sidekicks joining us for the show {including music friends numbers 7, 12 & 13}

entering venezia

{my posts will no longer be in chronological order. yes, i still owe photos and stories from paris, much less vienna & the austrian countryside. but all in good time.}

--------------

driving into venice was magical. the blue of the sky looked as though it had been washed too many times and now faded, was left to dry stretched taut across the horizons, the sun shining through the weakening fabric.

but once we entered the city proper, navigating the overpriced parking garage and orienting ourselves in relation to the train station i would need later, the thing that pressed up against my senses the most was the colors of the city. after the beige stones of paris and vienna, and even the white farmhouses of countryside austria, the colors were there for the taking. the wear and tear of centuries only adding a grace and patina to the saturated facades. 

 

paris dressed in beige

the buildings are {top to bottom}: arc d'triomphe, the courtyard at my friend's flat on rue simart, notre dame, a view of sacre couer from the streets of montmarte, sacre couer, again sacre couer from the streets, and then finally the view of sacre couer from the park peak we climbed up on new year's day. i'll have to get the name from my friend.

paris: city of lookers

i have never been so exhausted as that first day in paris. by the end of the day i was literally falling asleep mid-stride – my foot hitting the ground waking me up for a few paces and then i would surprise myself out of sleep again not ten paces down the road.

but despite that deep exhaustion only all nighters can bring, before i was even "home" from the airport that morning, i was aware of the fact that paris knows how to look back at you. everyone. they look you in the eye and don't shy away when you look back. nor are they afraid to let you know what they think of you. they don't hide the fact they think you're dressed different or it's odd you're jogging along the underground tunnel to the arc d'triomphe. they don't hide when they think you're curious or ignorant {aka english speaker} or sexy. it's all out there for you to see and connect with if you so chose to look back.

and of course i did.

and what i noticed in myself was the shift i had in those first few days to feeling beautiful. and not that on any level i felt more or less attractive – i use beauty here not to describe my looks, but a simple state of being-ness. yes, this feeling had a degree of awareness of my appeal to others, but mostly it rested in a place beyond my own self-criticism where i could just rest in the light of a momentary dialogue with whatever was happening behind this other person's eyes.

even at the time i was aware of the correlation between being engaged in that moment of connection {as opposed to evaded or completely ignored when i usually go looking for eyes} and my own sense of self confidence and worth. and i know that i don't like how much i still rely on the eyes and acknowledgement of others to help me find that space of calm, collected confidence. but that growth is obviously still for another day.

it was enough those six days in paris to celebrate the fact that all my life i have been looking out, literally since the day i was born and looked everyone in the delivery room in the eye, and never have i found a whole city where they look back quite so boldly in return.

view from the steps of sacre couer that first morning.

street self portrait

  

still flinching

i am a flinching animal
always waiting for the next hand to strike
and while i might look you square in the eye
while i might kiss with abandon and offer my spirit freely
my thoughts leave a trail betraying the fact i am always watching your hand
{unless it's holding me gently already}
to make sure i see the next blow coming.

i am a flinching animal
scrubbing my scars on cobbled streets and stone buildings
salving raw skin with time and more time and lonely anonymity
trying to pull the moment toward me
when i cross some invisible line
where i can look anyone in the eye
coming or going
and not be afraid.

suspended

i can't seem to get my head around what time it is. this is most obvious when i {hand} write an entry in my journal. miswritten dates since the new year include: 12.04.2012, 12.05.2011, and 01.02.2010 {really!? 2010?!}. i am not sure exactly where my mind has been these past few weeks, but it certainly has not been keeping track of the linear progression of time.

i am on vacation time where i don't rush myself, take a long morning runs and then later enjoy the process of getting dressed, applying lotion, earrings, whatever else i feel like doing or drinking or eating to simply savor the time passing. and in a rare space of grace, not account for and qualify it, merely observe and interact with it.

or not. often times i just spend an evening completely ignoring time, eating another piece of freshly grilled meat, having that other glass of wine, turning down that curious alley way in some strange city's streets to find something unexpected, something beautiful or merely nothing at all.






....................................................................................................................................................................

it has been a good few weeks so far and i owe you several posts, but in the meantime, here is a piece from the modern art museum in center pompidou, paris. it fits in quite nicely with this idea of being suspended in time.

things i love about this piece: 1. everyone stopped in wonder when they saw it. arrested, often for several minutes. 2. it filled me both with awe and delight walking both the realm of play and intellectual genius simultaneously. 3. i could get right up to it, feel the air blowing on my face, almost get brushed by the digital tape as it would dance about. 4. there was danger involved: those moments the two loops would almost slip beyond the grasp of the air. so close so many times, but always caught and returned. 5. the metaphor of interpersonal relationships that is implied in the image. the way the two are looped about each other permanently, but still have the places they are separate. the moments they are so tightly intertwined you think they will knot up, and then moments later, they are free and dancing separately again. just beautiful. 6. that the invisible becomes visible.





flux 2009
zilvinas kempinas

les nymphéas

i have had some pretty incredible experiences with paintings, including the time i “fell” into a picasso, had a vision, then spent the next five minutes wondering if i had somehow accidentally taken drugs. it was that vivid. i’m not joking. tangents aside, i have never experienced paintings like i experienced monet’s water lilies at museé d’orangerie.

in the same way the announcer prepared me for the experience i had nearly 7 years ago listening to samuel barber’s adadio for strings in minneapolis, the white room you enter first before the two rooms of water lilies, in their own understated way, heralded the importance of what lay just beyond.

i remember thinking ah, a palette cleanser as i entered the entirely white vestibule and paused long enough to read as much on my brochure. but as i stood there sloughing off the world outside, drawing myself in and preparing my spirit to be immersed, i also took in the fact that every other museum go-er, quite a few in a several minute span, blew right through the room to get to the other side. i hate to admit a certain superiority that swept over me, but it was tied to a sadness that no one else seemed to be paying attention. how could they miss something so obvious? 

pause.

and then i entered the first room.

what can i say?

it was beautiful. it was quiet. even with all the people, most respected the posted signs for silence by at least maintaining a whisper. and really, it was just surprisingly overwhelming to be surrounded by mural-sized monets. his depth, color, and tone something you could swim through for hours seeing something different each circuit of the room. paintings of that size offering so much space for variation. color. texture. details. darkness & light. a whole panel of dark on dark. eggplant. staccato of lilies throughout.

but the thing that surprised me the most, the thing that i could sit and absorb for hours was the calm of the space. the peace. peace in a way my always-going-a-million-miles-an-hour-brain often finds so elusive. even the pressure to observe, to articulate, to understand and gain something intellectual from the work {my art student training probably won’t ever leave me} was completely derailed by the quiet demand the rooms made to just sit and be. breathe in the colors. breathe in the space. just breathe.

so i did. for hours. and when i had my fill and tried to look at the work downstairs {a spanish exhibition} i felt such a strong pull back upstairs that i had an impatient disregard for the {high caliber} work in front of me. eventually i obeyed and returned, strolled through the two rooms of water lilies. sat some more. meditated.

monet understood the sanctuary of art and here i am a century later, benefiting from his genius. 

paris in photos

too tired for many words tonight, so here are a few photos.

fresh from the plane. enroute to my friend. 

the morning light hitting my 16kg rucksack while 

i try to convince my body it's not bedtime.

2nd morning. pausing at monmartre cemetery on my run to the foot 

of the eiffel tower. a 2 hour running tour of the city.

my breath was taken away as i jogged around a corner and spotted st. augustine's cathedral.

a detour around it's perimeter was in order.

the first suns of the new year:

 

in between a rainstorm and the louvre.

overwhelmed merely by the sight of it, this is the 

closest i got to the louvre this trip. next time, darling.

from the top of the centre pompidou.

changing over

new year's eve night was perfect. an exquisite dinner made in my friend, karina's flat, an incredible dessert i had found at a local confectionary in monmartre, and a simple, but beautiful activity to bring forward our gratitude for 2011 and tie it to our intentions for 2012.

i found an old book at a local thrift store and we tore out pages, cut them down into squares, and wrote an intention for the year on one sheet and on another, something we are grateful for from 2011 that will help us achieve this intention. for example, i will find and create a beautiful home is paired with i am grateful for 423 terry ave as well as my nomadic period for all they taught me of home. these two squares were then twisted together to create a paper flower and the series of them was threaded onto cord. the final project is this lovely flower chain. mine will find a perfect spot in my home-to-be.

afterwards we ventured out to the streets, hiked up to sacre coeur and was amongst the crowds as the city raised its lights and sounds to the new year.

bon année my friends. bon année.

dinner including a bouquet of ranunculus. my favorite.

that's dessert in the middle there.

the project.

sacre coeur.