I’m easily realizing – I can’t necessarily say quickly realizing – that it’s too easy to get lost in one’s thoughts, to get trapped per se. It can feel like I am running on a treadmill without an end and it can also feel like I am opening a door to escape some mental reality I am constructing (only to find myself back in the same room in which I started but with walls painted a slightly different color – maybe a shade darker or lighter but a change imperceivable unless your mind thinks that you have nothing else to do but try to decipher the color). Sometimes, I find that my sentences are too like my thoughts. They too can be never ending but always grammatically correct – I’d be lying if I said I didn’t pride myself on that.
But, alas, this post isn’t to stay lost and muddled in my head. It’s to provide an update for those curious viewers at home who are anxiously scrolling through Facebook searching for my newest blog post or more accurately being inundated by the pressures of college exams that, as you all know I have the pleasure of not worrying over for at least several more months, or counting down the days until Christmas holidays finally start, or sitting and watching tv (maybe even all three!). So, where am I now that I wasn’t before?
Well, it is kind of hard to say where I am that I wasn’t before – at least in the physical sense. I am sitting, well lounging really, in my bed typing this post. I like to think I am at least a little tanner, a little older, a little more confused, and maybe, just maybe, a little wiser. I am honestly not sure about that last part – the wise part. Wisdom is something to gleaned with experience and time. Not to say that I am not having experience or spending time here in Brazil (obviously, I am) but I feel like I still make mistakes that I shouldn’t be making or at least that I don’t want myself to make. I let myself get caught up in my thoughts and sometimes forget to breathe in the gracious air around me. My head becomes so clogged with minutiae and worry that I struggle to find the purpose or the motivation to want to continue doing things. I know the teachings that I am supposed to learn; I am aware of the pieces of wisdom that are there for the picking; I am there; I am here.
Sometimes though, being here is more akin to being there, in my head. My mind palace is sometimes a mind prison. As I am reflecting now and have been over the few days, I ask myself why do I let myself get trapped up in my thoughts? Well, I have always been a private person – the one who bottles up his feelings because he is afraid of letting them spill because I don’t want other people to have to dirty the soles of their feet with the problems that I have felt like I was drowning under. Too, my feelings have been bottled up, along with my tongue sometimes. I have totally learned a lot of Portuguese but it can be difficult to jump into the middle of a conversation if you don’t really have anything to offer or you are not one hundred percent sure of the last thing that was said. But, the thing to remember is that I can jump into a conversation and I can ask questions or be curious. That’s because it’s who I am: I ask questions; I am curious.
I guess because some days I have found myself locked in my head, I have forgotten to be the Steven that is the Steven that I know and that you know. It is interesting to think though how people gain different personalities while speaking in different languages because no two languages are completely the same. Different languages have different but equally beautiful ways of expressing things. Sometimes, I find myself telling myself not to translate something that was said just because it will lose meaning and just sounds so much better in Portuguese.
So, I didn’t mean for this post too to get lost in my head. But, I feel like I said things that I really needed to say. Things that have been on my mind are now on the page. There is something cathartic about just opening your head and letting things out. It’s a pressure reliever, truly.
So, to actually accomplish a little more of the update side of this post, here it goes:
-I’ve made at least a billion self realizations ranging from the mundane to the sexual to the pensive
-I’ve discovered that no matter how much I listen to Christmas music here while the sun is beating down on me, I’m wearing shorts and sometimes sweating, it doesn’t feel like Christmas here
-I could start every day of the rest of my life with a bowl of granola, fruit, and milk
-Sorry, Pop, but you know that GIANT jar of peanut butter you sent me, it’s pretty much gone. You’d think it was me, right? NOPE! My host brother absolutely adores peanut butter and just about ate the entire thing!
-Acai is literally one of the best things in the world
-I should definitely read and write more often
Now, I don’t really know what else to say now because I’m getting to the point where I am no longer typing seamlessly but am staring blankly at my computer screen as if it is supposed to do some fancy trick but I think that just means that I am tired. I promise that I will do more of these – I really want to and I really need to!
