Often times I wonder how events in my life happen. Do my actions really lead to reactions? Are there pushes for every pull, or pulls for every push? Is output really correlative to input? Or is all this balance talk just a part of the formula that is trying to explain my experiences?
I guess what I am trying to say is that I am finding less connection between events in my life than I used to. My life is turning into a series of moments that are drawn free hand, disconnected from the last. Often these moments seem incomplete, the color is out of the lines. Right now my life is full of spontaneity. Yet only when I am existing freely can I appreciate this concept of sudden moments flashing in and out of my life, independent of me, yet I am a part of it. All this philosophical rambling is only to express this unique fixation of mine on why my life is becoming so random and exciting. Allow me to explain.
Last Saturday I went on a tour of the wine country of Stellenbosch, probably one of the most lush and extravagantly beautiful areas in all of South Africa. I came upon this opportunity from a friendly Zulu man who I met through a friend of mine, a friend which I met through a closer friend of mine at a furniture shop a week earlier. At this wine tour I visited 5 different venues across the South African countryside, tasting some of the best wine in all of the Southern Hemisphere, viewing the mountains of the coastal lands from terraced locations, speaking with wonderful people, flirting with beautiful girls. Later that day I had a "skaakle", a Afrikaans social, in a 6' x 3' blowup pool with 15 other South Africans and much more booze.
Several days later I attended a house-warming party for a local, where I wore my blue pants (it was an 80s party) and was asked to a "saakie" a South African dance, by a random girl named Cara. I of course went and danced the night away, and I pretended like I had never danced in my life so they would be more impressed by my smooth inhibition on the dance floor. I came back to the local bar at 2 o'clock in the morning and ended up at McDonald's at 3 o'clock in the morning, a place where the finest social experiments could be done, with drunkards being the constant and sober Americans the variable.
Just a few days ago I asked this Cara girl to drive me to a music festival that was 150 miles away, with only 12 hours notice. I didn't know any of the bands, didn't speak the language of half the bands (they spoke the local language-Afrikaans, a Dutch-English hybrid) and I hadn't known the girl who I was spending the next 36 hours with for more than 3 hours in my life. Needless to say I drank Brandy and Coke all weekend, danced by myself in the middle of jaw-dropped locals, and went swimming in my boxer briefs in a river (all of these things sober mind you).
These are only the highlights of a week defined by just being in the right place at the right time, being open to taking chances and facing the consequences, being free to experience anything and everything, and most importantly expecting nothing. I have become a man who doesn't know how to say "no" (disclaimer to the D.A.R.E lion- "I do have my limits, namely crack cocaine").
Saying yes is so liberating, life becomes unpredictable, indescribable, and beyond definition. It makes so much sense when it makes no sense at all. When you lose your rationale and response, and just act on your instincts, the purer part of yourself.
Spontaneity. I like it strong with a little bit of sugar please.
I guess what I am trying to say is that I am finding less connection between events in my life than I used to. My life is turning into a series of moments that are drawn free hand, disconnected from the last. Often these moments seem incomplete, the color is out of the lines. Right now my life is full of spontaneity. Yet only when I am existing freely can I appreciate this concept of sudden moments flashing in and out of my life, independent of me, yet I am a part of it. All this philosophical rambling is only to express this unique fixation of mine on why my life is becoming so random and exciting. Allow me to explain.
Last Saturday I went on a tour of the wine country of Stellenbosch, probably one of the most lush and extravagantly beautiful areas in all of South Africa. I came upon this opportunity from a friendly Zulu man who I met through a friend of mine, a friend which I met through a closer friend of mine at a furniture shop a week earlier. At this wine tour I visited 5 different venues across the South African countryside, tasting some of the best wine in all of the Southern Hemisphere, viewing the mountains of the coastal lands from terraced locations, speaking with wonderful people, flirting with beautiful girls. Later that day I had a "skaakle", a Afrikaans social, in a 6' x 3' blowup pool with 15 other South Africans and much more booze.
Several days later I attended a house-warming party for a local, where I wore my blue pants (it was an 80s party) and was asked to a "saakie" a South African dance, by a random girl named Cara. I of course went and danced the night away, and I pretended like I had never danced in my life so they would be more impressed by my smooth inhibition on the dance floor. I came back to the local bar at 2 o'clock in the morning and ended up at McDonald's at 3 o'clock in the morning, a place where the finest social experiments could be done, with drunkards being the constant and sober Americans the variable.
Just a few days ago I asked this Cara girl to drive me to a music festival that was 150 miles away, with only 12 hours notice. I didn't know any of the bands, didn't speak the language of half the bands (they spoke the local language-Afrikaans, a Dutch-English hybrid) and I hadn't known the girl who I was spending the next 36 hours with for more than 3 hours in my life. Needless to say I drank Brandy and Coke all weekend, danced by myself in the middle of jaw-dropped locals, and went swimming in my boxer briefs in a river (all of these things sober mind you).
These are only the highlights of a week defined by just being in the right place at the right time, being open to taking chances and facing the consequences, being free to experience anything and everything, and most importantly expecting nothing. I have become a man who doesn't know how to say "no" (disclaimer to the D.A.R.E lion- "I do have my limits, namely crack cocaine").
Saying yes is so liberating, life becomes unpredictable, indescribable, and beyond definition. It makes so much sense when it makes no sense at all. When you lose your rationale and response, and just act on your instincts, the purer part of yourself.
Spontaneity. I like it strong with a little bit of sugar please.
