With Facebook’s Map feature in Timeline, I was originally hesitant to map out places in the world that I’ve been to for the public to see. Not to mention the work involved with trying to remember all of those places. But on one uneventful night, I decided to go ahead and do it because, I figure, I should be proud to have had the opportunity to travel and experience the world in such a way. It’s been an adventure, to say the least. What’s weird is that I never aspired to travel. It kinda just happened. When I joined the U.S. Air Force in 2002, only a couple weeks after I graduated from high school, I had originally wanted to get stationed either at my home state of Hawaii or somewhere along the west coast of the continental U.S. Somehow, I ended up in Aviano Air Base, Italy as my first base right after boot camp and tech school. From there, I traveled all over the place for the military. After I got out of the military, I wanted to move back to the states and just get a regular 9 to 5 job to maintain some sort of stability & normalcy. Yet, the job I ended up getting also required me to travel often, even though it was mainly just within the U.S.
When I think about those times–the many drunken nights, the close calls from getting arrested and even possibly killed, and the dumbest & ballsiest things that I’ve done–I think that even though life has been utter chaos, I would’ve never truly learned or experienced anything if it were otherwise. It makes me think about this guy I knew who was an awesome guitar player. Sure, he was several years younger than me, but I was always the one in awe of his Jimi Hendrix-style guitar skills. But then, he had the hardest time writing songs, which was a big problem for him, since he really wanted to write deep & meaningful music. He was also the designated songwriter for his band. Fortunately, he knew exactly why he had trouble with it. It wasn’t because he wasn’t good with words; it was because he didn’t have much life or worldly experiences to talk about.
Towards the end of last year 2011, I never really traveled much or did much, other than staying indoors producing music. I was pretty much a hermit. But it’s made me realize that apart of me has always yearned for adventure. You see, I had never really considered myself the adventurous type or a risk-taker. A lot of what I had done was usually preceded with reluctance or what I call “a drunken necessity”. For example, when a buddy of mine wanted me to go bungee-jumping at a System of a Down/Nine Inch Nails concert in Oberhausen, Germany, I only went with him because he did it. I probably would’ve never initiated it myself. Or when I went outside of a bar (to be unnamed) to go piss on the street and they locked me out since it was after last-call (although my friends were still inside), I shut off power to their part of the building because I knew that it would make them open their front door–which it did. Therefore, having lacked much adventure in recent times, I became unsettled; and I never really knew why till now.
Basically, I’m overdue for some adventure. And although I’ve had a lot of crazy experiences and stories to tell from years past, I plan to keep gaining more. I also want to begin sharing them more often through this blog and through my music–which are now available to download for free via my website.
It makes me think of these shot glasses I used to collect. Every time I’d visit a city, especially a major one, I’d make a point to stop by the gift shop and buy a shot glass as my souvenir. Stories, experiences, and music are very much like these shot glasses, in that, it’s rewarding to collect a lot of them, but worthless if you don’t share them with anyone.