This week Pandabear came for a visit. It provided that provocative ‘escape’ that only appears when you are in the company of someone who does not fold when you whiff them off (‘Trust issues’ much?). For hours he pushed for emotional responses, not intellectual… he settled for something in the middle out of mercy for my emotionally handicapped vocabulary after I punched him in the face and literally exclaimed something along the line of “bleuahprrruueuu!”

 

Trying to straighten out the struggles of life and how to untie their knots, neither of us came to a conclusion of either emotional release nor intellectual satisfaction. Disappointingly the conclusion of my psychoanalysis ended in: 1. I am no longer allowed to think, 2. Nor should I ever again move to a small town. The first I could not agree with more, albeit the complexity of it renders me sour. As for the second… what if I don’t really ‘move’ anywhere again?

 

I am sitting in a setting sun by the riverside, listening to Buena Vista Social Club. It is spectacular. Making me move with that latino rhythm that is not purely musical but rather an existence physically, spiritually inside you. Listening, the music said one thing and one thing only: “A place where no one knows your name.” The tune and melody familiar enough for taste, but strangers for digestion. Starving, it leaves my mouth watering at the glorified promises that the unknown offers. A place where no one knows your name… Its appeal majestic and frightening.

 

The initial emotional response of freedom is countered by the intellectual brutal realism: There will always be one who knows your name, no matter where you go. In truth the only one who cares for your name in the first place.

 

The sun has fallen behind the mountains. Time to move on.