When I’m away I don’t take my laptop with me and I only post on the facebook page. I collected the “hot” thoughts posted by me during the June trip to Mangalia.
Let me tell you what happened to me on my first evening in Mangalia. I was returning intoxicated by the colors of the sunset that I had admired between the sea and Pond of Mangalia, after 17 km of walking, loaded with food I bought, in short, I was broken. Approaching the hotel going in a blind way, because in Mangalia also the street lighting is under renovation, like the whole seaward part of the city, I see stuck to the door of the hotel entrance, on the inside, 2 women and 2 little girls, as if they wanting to go out, but not really. And as I approached like I was a dandelion fluff flattened by fatigue, I see their eyes widen. Before I know it, a big dog comes out of the dark and, barking, rushes to me and puts its front paws on my shoulders (I told you it was big, and I’m cut with economy of material). I strained the few muscles I still had functional at that time so that he wouldn’t throw me on the asphalt and served him the brilliant reply: “what do you want, puppy?”. I’m not afraid of dogs. I was bitten 2 times in my youth and for a while I was afraid. But it passed. Let’s get back to the story. After the dog convinced himself that I wasn’t afraid and I wasn’t too smart at that time, he got off my shoulders and started hopping madly around me. He didn’t have all the tiles on the house either. So we became best friends.
When I go on trips alone my biggest fear is not that someone will attack me or that I will get lost. But that I could have a flare: spondylitis, asthma, kidneys, stomach, enterocolitis or what other illnesses I have or have had. But you know what? I never had the slightest discomfort, apart from muscle fever from walking so much. Nothing. Nada. When you are not in a familiar environment, you are more present, more alert, your senses are not lazy and do not allow yourself to be taken over by “garbage”. Your spirit is all there, and your body is just its instrument. Spirit does not mess with fears and victimization. He is there to feel and learn and looks to the future anchored in the present, and the past exists only to learn from, not to fear.
The spirit has no age, and when you travel the body has the age you give it. No regrets, no resentment, no pain. Away from home and your daily routine you reset yourself. You do things that you didn’t think you had the ability and strength to do. This is how you learn about yourself. When you are in the comfortable energy of your home and loved ones there is a sweet laziness, a sweet comfort, a sweet familiarity, regardless of whether you consider yourself to have a “good life” or a “bad life”. It’s comfortable. You know all those habits, that infernal traffic, those never-ending dirty dishes and laundry, that unbearable boss. You know them. But when you leave you have to be alert to all those new things and places, to manage among them with the few familiar objects you have with you. You get creative. And you also learn something about yourself.
When I go alone across the country, everything I have is in a backpack. Don’t think it’s a mountaineer’s backpack, if you put 10 kg on my back you’ve broke me. I have a nice little backpack. So I think carefully about what I populate it with: the bare necessities of clothes and cosmetics, a pair of spare shoes, a few millet buns and a pocketknife. Yes, I have seen the McGyver series. With that knife I prepared my breakfast today on a plate improvised from a package of ham. It’s a new day… but a late start. Yesterday I walked 17 km.
When I travel with my husband or a group of friends I find it hard to keep up with them, my energy level has to match theirs, and my energy level does what it’s muscles want, which is to slack off. If I’m alone, I dose my energy as I want, I rest when I feel the need. I carried this backpack all day and didn’t feel tired at all in the evening. Because I walked at my je m’en fiche snail’s pace.