Back Up Into Thin Air

The excitement has now completely worn off from all of the packing and goodbyes. Now all I’m left with is a nervous stomach and loads of anticipation (notice that I used the adjective “loads”, trying to get back into the Aussie lingo). It’s strange to think that I’m going to be living out of a backpack for possibly the next few years, which by the way weighs 45 pounds. I tried to reduce as much stuff from my pack, but there are certain things, bird books in particular, that I just can’t part with. So now I sit and wait at FAT (Fresno Air Terminal), hoping that I’ll have a place to sleep when I arrive in Brisbane in 2 days time. I have that feeling of doubt creeping in from the dark recesses of my brain, “what have I gotten myself into now?”.

I need to get back that excitement, that urge to travel. It really is true that I always want what I don’t have and have yet to do, and don’t realize how much I’ve enjoyed what I have had until I leave it. Deep I know. But at least that drive keeps me moving. It’s hard to leave your life behind, but you just never know where life is going to take you in the end.

Anyways enough of that, onto a new and less depressing topic. If this entry was posted on August 30th, it means that I have successfully wasted about 3 hours in LAX trying to figure out how to connect to the FREE public WiFi. Or I have given into paying 7.95 for 24 hours of T-Mobile internet access, which also at the moment doesn’t seem to be working. Being in an airport really makes me wish I was adrift on a small bamboo raft, 850 miles West of Peru, 3,500 miles East of the Hawaiian Archipelago, 15,000 miles above the bottom of the sea, and many fathoms from the moon (a quote from Barbara’s going away gift “Kon Tiki”). I get some consolation knowing that in 6 hours I will at least be flying over a vast unexplored ocean on a massive Quantas 757 flight, the modern way to explore the globe.

SO MANY PEOPLE HERE. I am currently sitting under a mobile charging station since my laptop is a PC and has terrible battery life: and they have altered all of the outlets in this airport so you can’t use them, and a man is standing over me on his phone (not sure why he can’t just step 0.5 over to the left…again switching back to Australian units of measure). I guess you’re supposed to give up your since of personal space when in a crowded airport, but come on dude, I really don’t want to be at face level with your bacon and bits for an extended period of time. Plug it in and move on….that’s what she said.