a week's worth of beautiful living, and the hydrogen of leg one

I´ll catch up from last Monday, little over a week ago...

We made it to Alacante Tuesday morning after probably the worst bus ride ever. My feet swelled to sausages and every time we stopped they squelched the destination name through the bus microphone. But we fell into the arms of a friend we met on the road in Morocco, sweet Melissa from up north-Canada way. She's going to university in Spain and offered a place to sleep, so with moon pie smiles we dropped our packs at her home.

Simply, the week was spectacular. I swam in the cool clear blue ocean every single day since we left Morocco. Chilly, but damn better than any Oregon beach water temprature. We played, danced and had quite a grand old time. Went to Melissa´s university and labeled things with chalk. We made a Mexican meal for them on Friday, then we danced wildly throughout her apartment and carried her around the city singing "She sleeps like a girl but wakes like a woman!" Wild. Relaxed for the last week Jeff and I were spending together in Spain. On Sunday we decided to skip town, and head to Madrid early to catch some Museo´s and such. We caught a bus to Elda, a town not too far north, then made our way to the local gas station and put up a sign saying "¿Madrid?," by our packs. We had a ride for the whole way within an hour! We were supified not only at the efficiency of the hitch, but also by the blasting Columbian Ranchero music for the duration of about three hours.

We spent the last three days in Madrid, staying the first night in a hip hostel downtown and then with a great English fellow I found on couch surfers for the next two. We caught the Reina Sofia, Prado and walked with ease and delight throughout the whole city. Madrid this time around was much more to our taste, for reasons I feel relate to being abroad for more than a month already. We could handle anything in the post-Morocco journey. The art was beyond anything I can put into words. Such truth. Hundreds of Picasso´s, the greatest Velasquez and Goya´s in collection, Brugel and Bosch´s "In the Garden of Delite," Miro and Dali. I discovered a Spanish sculptor whom I adore called Eduardo Chillida. It all has gotten me really excited to further my studies in art history, I crave more. Madrid was inspiring, a city I could easily find myself living in down the line if a city is where I´m going to live.

Right now as I write this, in the town of Vitoria, I just got done at a Modern Art museum which had really exciting work, full of Spanish and American photographers and scupltors. In a progressive and funny way you get to decide what you want to pay for admission on Wednesdays (lucky for my wallet). Similarly, there´s chalk and paper all over the walls asking for viewers to contribute, and one installation is comprised of objects left by the viewer. One can leave and object then take one at their own will, constantly changing the dynamic of the peice. I love it. Hog heaven. Something I really needed to hit me out of nowhere because I now travel the road alone.

Jeff split today. He´s heading back to America to get the good work done and hopefully figure out what the next chess move of life will be. I´m in such a weird place. Right now, 5:52 pm, Paris-time, we are in the same continent, but as far away as you all are to my eyes and hands. A partner in crime, someone to be accountable for and to, my fellow debater in life, my contrast and my reference to life back in Oregon, gone now. There are great elements to traveling alone, which are confusing now but are making the transition easy. "Do I want to walk here?" Well, no one to ask, so "Yes." But this month and a half was so incredible, meaningful, changing, and the greatest element I attribute that to is Jeff. The hydrogen of leg one.

The biggest contrast to now and before, or, traveling alone and traveling dutch, is silence. It´s presence, it´s use, it´s burden, all tools that can be powerful in the right use. I found myself in many moments in cafe chairs, stoops of buildings, cliff edge´s and balconies just in awe of creation and what life I have been dealt. To share that was amazing, but not in the commentary, but in the silence of the moment. Never needing to look over at Jeff, but just knowing that something similar was going on in his brain. I mean, one of us would cut a fart at this point, but all the same.

Who knows who reads this thing, I am going to get better with the updates, but most of you probably know or have heard of Jeff. He´s a different cup of coffee. Genuine in its definition. His humor along with his honesty sneaks up on you. Jeff makes people want to be better people by being real and sharing himself like most only dream. He can´t take care of his feet for crap, he´s a bit clumsy and shaggy only begins to describe how he carries himself. Jeff´s a Texan from the Northwest. Though he rarely comes to a conclusion or a statisfiable answer about life´s big-fish-questions, he´s always going to be a fisherman. He smokes a pipe and fills the walls of his room with his own art. Jeff plays guitar like the best of em´. I´d take a bat in the head for him any day of the week.

So that could put you where I´m at right now not even a day´s apart.

Folks, friends, family, Geographers, I gotta catch a train to somewhere (Is France is a good start?) and hopefully take the train from there to La Rochelle to rock the socks with a great friend and brief Tango partner of mind named Matilde. I´ll keep y´all posted and see you down the line.