TRAVELMAN SRI LANKA: Travelman’s Search for Meaning, or a Donut.

Traveling the world is, indeed, all it’s cracked up to be and more, but not all the time. Some days -some weeks, like this week and last, I just want a normal life, and I’m tired of the new. It’s a crazy revelation, but I really feel done at this moment. Backpack Europe instead of working? Probably just some more mountains, and paintings, and a thousand years of culture, and stuff. ...Meh.

I feel challenged to keep going, I feel lonely. This post is my sequel to Viktor Frankl’s masterwork, Man’s Search For Meaning. I should call it, Travelman’s Search For A Good Time. (I thought I’d found it, but I called the number on the bathroom wall and it only went to a pre-recorded operator telling me the number was out of order- and that I’m not funny and need an editor.)

Yesterday was my dad’s birthday. I video chatted with him. It was my first ever video chat. I love and miss him. Happy Birthday Dad!

I guess I’m just a cowboy, on steel horses I ride. It’s always the same, only the names’ll change. Everyday, it seems I’m wasting away. ...Sometimes I sleep. ...Sometimes, it’s not for days. The people I meet? Well, they go their separate ways.

And I’m wanted Dead or Alive do-do-do-do do-do binka-binka-binka-binka (That’s me playing a guitar lick using my onomatopoeias . People say my writing is like music- that’s best listened to with the volume turned down.)

Okay, maybe that’s not quite me. I’m not wanted dead or alive, I can sleep for days, and I don’t ride steel horses- I ride aluminum mules.

In the last two weeks, I feel like the Bon Jovi in the Wanted Dead or Alive video- You know? That Bon Jovi! The one when they show him collapse onstage, and then he’s all tired and lonely on the bus- and they conveniently fail to show the gaggle of hot women just off camera waiting to jump his bones- I feel like that Bon Jovi, without the off-camera bone jumping.

I feel the conversations are repetitive and lacking. I’m in an area of Sri Lanka that has a crazy amount of German tourists. The people I meet in hostels are young Germans on extended holiday. ...No offense to Germans, but like most young Americans, they think they are interesting, or at least want you to think that.

Doesn’t everybody want to be thought of as interesting though? I’m probably guilty of it. I most definitely am guilty of it. The only difference is that I don’t have a meaningful and unique tattoo to tell you about- ”Yeah, that one. I got it from a one-eyed paraplegic monk in Thailand. It’s the ancient Atlantean sacred symbol for pretentious douche.” (Says, a guy currently wearing a bracelet bearing a broken anchor given to him by a young Nepalese man on New Years Day just outside the Annapurna mountain range. The broken anchor is the symbol for shoddy craftsmanship.)

I’ve also met a lot of people here who have been traveling for 6 months to a year (still a lot of Germans). Sri Lanka Seems to be a place that either seasoned travelers or Germans, seasoned or bland, visit.

I’m also being unfair for the sake of making my point. I’ve met some truly interesting people and I’ve failed to take the time to discover what’s interesting about the others.

I’ve been following my friend’s adventures on Facebook. She was climbing a Himalayan mountain in Nepal and raising money for a local village there.... I’m hanging at the beach and feeling empty even though I’m traveling the world. I feel like I’m moving into a new stage of this trip. I need it to be more than the tourist scene, much more. I want to help build hospitals in villages like my mountain climber friend! That’s going to take some effort and decision making on my part.

...Hmm. ..Maybe I’ll just investigate hotel buffets around the world instead.

I wonder about my future, what to focus my thoughts upon regarding my future, am I going to recommit myself to being a nurse? Am i going to commit myself to writing a novel? To both? To developing an online business?- God, I’m jealous of those fuckers that have online businesses and travel the world! I hate them! I hate ‘em! I hate ‘em! I hate ‘em!

Because I want to be them! AAGHH!

Then I tell myself, “that could be you!” It’s like Lenny Kravitz says, “If you want it you just got to believe. Believe in yourself. ...Yeah.”

Then I say, “Really? ...Really, Lenny? Is that all?”

Lenny hasn’t answered yet. Whatever, he can go his way and I’ll go mine.

And is that even what I really want? This trip has only opened new questions in my life of what my real desires, hopes, and dreams are.

What is happiness? It’s something that has to come and go, but how do we maximize it? What do we do to be able to look back and not feel empty? To feel full?

I want to work around people who love being there and doing whatever they do there as much as I love doing whatever I do there. Maybe I need to try to get into filmmaking again? Maybe I need to teach kids, I’m good at that. Maybe I need to practice ukulele and develop my sound and become a rock star... Hmm, Rock Star sounds good. I’ll have to look on monster.com for openings.

I think I’m still feeling the ups and downs of life, but I’m having trouble remembering that the downs are much less down than they used to be... You know what I mean? Maybe I’m learning how relative happiness is.... How fleeting it is.... Sure, I’ve got a lot of all I’ve ever wanted, but- it’s not that great. I want the parts that I haven’t got, then when I get those, I want other parts. I want all the parts. You can never have enough Legos.

Maybe I should become a zen monk and write zen koans. “How many Legos does a man need to build the perfect LEGO thingy.” Or to build the perfect man?

What will make me not sad most of the time? And really happy now and then? Is that true happiness? Am I not truly happy because I dont’ have a wife? Or if not a wife, just the love of my life beside me? Am I not happy because I’m not building something? Working toward something? Not helphing enough people?

...Maybe I should buy a Maserati. Or maybe just a chocolate donut. The donut wouldn’t require me going into soul crushing debt.

Yeah, chocolate donut.

!steemitworldmap 5.9737 lat 80.4403 long Travelman’s Search for Meaning, Sri Lanka, d3scr

P.S.
The answer is 42. ...42 legos.