Too Late To Turn Back Now

Too late to turn back now. I have bought my tickets, except for my return.

A thousand small, cautious voices voices tell me to stay, don't go. I can hear them: What you are doing is dangerous, extravagant, foolish. Money will be lost. You will be lonely away from home. A thousand things could go wrong and you won't even speak the language. You will go missing, be taken advantage of by strangers. People will hate you because you are American. You might get killed in unknown parts of the planet.

The voices of the crowd that have seeped through my unconscious aren't my own voice. At times I have heard the words spoken from someone's lips. 

My authentic inner voice says to go back to Venice, Italy, a place I love. Go when the tourists have disappeared and the fog comes. Take photographs and paint. Re-unite with friends there. On the way, stop and see brother Wade and family in Washington DC, where I grew up. Mingle and rejoice with him, his wife and two children. Go to Paris and kick around on the cobbled streets of the left bank that I know. Roll around in the subway . . . take the train and discover Versailles. Be entranced. Let the creative juices flow. Take a cheap flight on Air France and arrive in Venice. Stay a month.

Let yourself be silently drawn by the deeper pull of what you truly love. -Rumi

Montmartre street, Paris, France

Egypt is poor and has been convulsed by the Arab uprising that has roiled the middle east. Yet, whenever I go I am welcomed and feel at home. Sure, I don't speak Arabic, look different, don't know my way around . . . but that is part of the fun. After two visits, now when I arrive in Luxor, there are two families waiting with open arms to see me. Each family has five children and is extremely poor by western standards. But I love being in the earthen homes with the animals all around, the children sitting next to me, relaxed, drinking tea . . . all the while the Nile River flows just steps away. I am drawn by this; it is what I truly love. 

Karnak Temple, Luxor, Egypt

 

I can stay a couple weeks, a month, who knows? It is cheap to live there. My home in Santa Fe will be rented. Hopefully, my gallery will have sales enough during the slow season. 

I will dream, be absorbed in the ancient land of the Pharaohs' near the Temple of Karnak, photograph, paint and write.

Masai young men and boys, Serengeti

I want to go back to the land of the Masai people in Kenya and Tanzania. I believe I will go to Arusha, in Kenya. I can find the Masai . . . and maybe hike to the top of Mt. Kilimanjaro. Sure, I might get mugged or have something stolen. But the local newspaper here in Santa Fe has a daily police report, and those things and worse happen regularly.

So, with a full heart I will go forth.

What you seek is seeking you. -Rumi

Stop acting so small. You are the universe in ecstatic motion. -Rumi

Thinking Of Lions

I fell asleep thinking of lions. They prowled the area of Ngorongoro Crater in Tanzania, Africa where my tent was pitched near the rim. In the dead of the night I woke to the sound of something massively heavy crushing and pulling the grass just steps away. On my cot listening, I briefly fantasized being pulverized into the earth, and then fell back asleep.

A water buffalo had come into camp.

In the morning chill and fog, as we made our way down to the flat crater plain, I encountered a couple young Masai men. The others in the small group of safari travelers shied away from the native africans, but I always was drawn to engage with them. This morning we met as they were stepping from the mysterious  shrouded bush and I was just waking from my dreams—and the water buffalo and lions.

I took some photos and now treasure the images as reminders of wildness, Africa, and the wonderful Masai who I chanced to meet.

You Smell Good

Today, I got in trouble with someone and I had to apologize for overstepping boundaries. I often allow my personality and temperament to flow unconstrained and exuberantly, like a journey on a free-spirited river that is sometimes placid and other times dashing against rocks and swirling in turbulence. For the most part I am along for the ride and call it THE DREAM. In this state I feel boundless and excited, and need to touch the world to unite with it and know where I am. For example, one evening last October, while sharing dinner with my fellow safari travelers in Tanzania, a man from South Africa stared at me from across the table and abruptly asked, “Why did you kiss that Masai woman today?” His direct query took me by surprise. Earlier, our vehicle had broken down on the bumpy dirt route out of the Serengeti, and we were stranded while one of the crew worked to fix the problem. I had gone out of the bus to stretch and met a Masai couple by the side of the road. I immediately felt attracted and so walked over to them. The man sized me up as I stood smiling, and I asked to take their picture. He nodded okay, and I took photos of them together, then each one alone, and finally just of their hands touching together. Afterwards, spontaneously and without thinking, I leaned over and kissed the woman’s cheek. She was highly amused and giggled. “But didn’t you see that the man was holding a club when you kissed his wife?” the South African asked. To be honest, I did not think that any of the interchange could end badly. That is my way. But today THE DREAM took a different twist.
Outside of Santa Fe there is an Indian tribe that controls an outdoor marketplace that is famous and where I have just begun selling my items from world travel. This morning, as I stood talking with my assistant, a young, very chubby, Indian woman who worked at the market came to speak with me. She was wearing nice perfume and in a moment, I was riding in the stream and going with the flow. “You smell good!” I beamed at her as I put my arm around her shoulder and sniffed her hair. A half hour later, I was summoned to the tribal office and severely reprimanded. Feeling a bit humiliated, I apologized profusely, but nonetheless received a warning. I felt like a school kid that had been scolded in the principles office.
For a while afterward, I questioned myself and even incriminated a little. But really, the stream that carries me is big and beautiful and my heart is full, so I imagine that someday again, I will stop in my tracks when I come to a fragrant rose and simply from exuberance, reach out and touch it.

Everything Is In Motion

We are all travelers. All is in motion, even when appearing to be at rest. Time is always moving and everything is related to time, so everything moves, becoming “older” with each moment. Furthermore, our world and all its parts are in constant rotation: the earth is rotating on its axis, and orbiting the sun, which is in a galaxy revolving in the universe, which is in revolution of another universe; and so on.
These thoughts arrived last night when I was at a party and people asked me about how it feels now that I have stopped traveling. Really, we are always traveling, and my trip around the world is but a small step in the grander scheme of motion. Moreover, I am comfortable knowing that the flux of my travel never ends, and that my perception of the moment is most important. Quality moments depend on awareness, and the love found when one's being is commingled with the surroundings; not resisting, but surrendering and engaged.

Another question I am often asked is, “What was the best place?” That is another matter for analysis, because it depends on what I have just discussed, which is quality moments. If I am always engaged and having good quality moments, why should I deconstruct the whole experience and break it apart so that I then label segments in a sliding scale of bad to good? No, I prefer to keep my experience intact as a living whole that is entirely inter-related and inter-dependant. Of course, some memories are stronger, like when I first saw an elephant roam into my view at the Serengeti in Africa. That is a bigger impression than waiting to board an airplane in Bangkok, because boarding airplanes is something I have done many times and includes long waits in a static environment. But somehow, the two experiences do not exclude each other. If I were a Masai tribesman who had grown up among elephants, then the airport experience might be more memorable.

The Dark Continent

Note: This post is late because I was on safari.

Before leaving the United States, my mother pleaded with me, “please don’t go to Africa, they will kill you for your shoes there.” But how could I go around the world and not visit the Dark Continent? It is true that crime and corruption is rampant, along with unrest and inequality, and Africa is dangerous. But it is also vibrant, colorful and soulful.
When I arrived, I was met at the airport by Charity, an African woman who runs Kikuyu Lodge in Nairobi. Her partner, Trevor, is British and built the lodge himself on the outskirts of the city. After living in Rome, I am shocked how disheveled and ramshackle are the surroundings. Streets are crowded and roads are in poor condition. Along the highways are tiny shops pieced together from scraps of wood and tin. People are sometimes dressed in little more than rags. There is a lack of aesthetics . . . Kenya is practically barren of high culture, and my first day in Nairobi, my eyes hurt, starved for fine art in the surroundings.
I search for beauty and find it in people and some of the landscape. Everyday, I swim in a black ocean of humanity. The shades of black go from chocolate brown to ebony, and it is a wonderful experience for my eyes, accustomed to white everywhere. The skin is smooth and soft to the touch and I notice how light reflects differently across dark features. Generally, people seem quick to smile and wave hello, and at least look curiously at me, a white stranger in their midst. The main language is Kikuyu, the largest tribe in Kenya. English is universal, but sometimes among less educated people, vocabulary is severely limited and communication in English difficult.
Baha’u’llah in His Writings, "compared the colored people to the black pupil of the eye," through which "the light of the spirit shineth forth." — Just like the black pupil of the eye absorbs the utmost light to feed the brain information for cognition, it seems the dark race is the principal transmitter of earthiness and primary experience.
I am biding my time, waiting to go on safari. I go out with Charity everyday, mostly to use the Internet while she does errands, but also, we visit a tea plantation, a flower farm, and a Masai crafts market and a self-help co-op for single women with children where jewelry is manufactured. We have conversations and laugh together as our personalities mingle. I hoped to do some street photography, but noticed that people are more wary of cameras pointed toward them. One day, Charity takes me downtown and we walk while I snap pictures. She explains that some areas, especially around government buildings, are strictly taboo for photography and if caught, police can make an arrest. While we walk, she keeps close watch on me, warning me to keep aware of my personal space because of robbers on the street. At one point, she entirely forbids me to go into an area. “Do you know what can happen?” she asks. “A thief will attack you from behind and lift you off the ground while another one will take your shoes!”