Roadtrip and Reality

I wish the title was more reflective of some exotic location like Egypt, Bora Bora, Australia...anywhere but Pennsylvania? 

Note: I started to write this blog a few weeks ago but since then, my emotions have been on a total roller coaster therefore I never got to finish it and honestly, my feelings towards this state is not so positive right now although I know that not all that live there are selfish ignoramuses who decided to vote for the horrendous Orange Ball of Shit. Sure, I believe that.

But I was there, and at that time, it was just turning from the vibrant colors of summer to the warmish tones of autumn. If you had no clue, I absolutely love this particular season. The very idea of sweaters, outerwear, scarves and fuzzy socks bring me to the edge of ecstasy...well it used to. Now, thanks to crossing over the threshold of a woman of reproductive age to, not so much, hot flashes have become my constant companion. I'm going to tell you men out there who may be reading this, if the females in your lives suffer the absolute chaos of peri-/menopause, please be kind to her. For real. Just support her. The first stages of this particular period (no pun intended) of life suck-eth and it's a true adjustment, physically as well as mentally.

Getting back to the point of this blog, I had a few days of PTO that needed to burned and instead of heading to the Blue Ridge Mountains, I decided to try something different. Pennsylvania seemed good enough with rolling land and absolutely scads of miles to drive without the annoyance of heavy traffic. Also armed with memories of a past where I had visited Lancaster to gawk at the Amish (who I'm sure appreciated it very much indeed), I hopped into the car after work on a random Wednesday evening. I should have known that nothing, and I mean nothing, is ever so smooth in this area.

For those who also may not know which geographic area I reside, I'm in the DMV (District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia) area. The trip should have been maybe 1.5 hours +/- here and there. But was it? That's the burning question. No. It took damn near 2.5+ hours. And them rolling land? It was pitch dark as soon as I hit the main road that would lead me to where I was going so those lands were lurking in the background somewhere. 

By the time I got into the small town of York to meet folks for dinner, I was at the point of saying, "why did I do this?" but after a few drinks, okay-ish food and music that was way too loud for the pub/restaurant that was chosen, my mood was swinging upwards.

The next morning, I woke up, got dressed and eager to hit the road to explore. But first, breakfast. I found what seemed like a pretty popular spot called "Round the Clock Diner". It wasn't too crowded which I admit I was thankful for as I'm not a huge fan of crowds. Here's where being a brown person in a place that is predominantly white comes is just...uncomfortable and NOT imagined.

As I was lead to the booth I would inhabit, I felt eyes on me. Was it imagined? You may think so but I saw far too many curious eyes on myself. I'd like to think it was because I'm so beautiful that I took everyone's collective breathes away but nay, that likely was not it. Sitting down, I decided to shake it off and just focus on enjoying myself. After all it wasn't often I got out to do things alone like this. The waitress was nice enough.

Ordering, I did what other "table for one" diners would do, stare at my phone. The food was indeed what I expected, tasty so as I dug into my single pancake with a side of eggs and turkey bacon, loud animated voices began to distract. It wasn't until the curious statement "I don't want them to..." pulled my attention into focus. 

What I heard was a whole ass conversation about conservatism, how it was the best way to live, how the liberals...blah blah blah...nothing new heard...and how the country needed to go back to traditional values. I finally snuck a look. It was my waitress. The one I said was nice enough, and she was...to me...in front of me. I didn't want to start to conspire that she was speaking just that loudly knowing I was within earshot, I refuse to give into that sort of paranoia, but it was hard not to wonder. 

Finishing up, this was the sort of place where you paid at the register and let me tell you, the biddy at the register gave me the same look one would give a cockroach that clearly deserved to be squashed. I left sad, as I often am in these situations, which I have encountered before many, many times, unfortunately. 

The rest of the day was spent avoiding people other then the Amish market that I stopped by. They were all lovely. 

Look, now it's approximately...like a lot of weeks since I went to PA. I tried to write but have been finding it more or less impossible since my bitterness towards that particular state stings my tongue. I shouldn't, I know, and I appreciate those who did try to swing the state blue but...yeah I can't write about that place anymore...or at least not now. 

This was a weird blog, I know. I was trying to find some normalcy in my writing, maybe post something once a week. No doubt I overestimated my stamina, moreover my sense of discipline, which I have zero. Where has the love of stories and words gone to? What happened to me? Where is my voice? 

Have a good one while I ponder these questions. 

 

I'm Super Duper Important Business Travel Person, Don't You Know?

Pic Cred: Greg Rosenke

The first time I boarded an airplane, I had an international passport and getting onto a jumbo jet. I was also 3-years-old, headed to my new forever life in the USA. Not that I understood any of it was happening at the time. I actually do have very hazy memories of being led up a metal staircase as I sobbed hysterically clinging onto my mother. For the longest time this was some dream only to find out years later as an adult, when relating this to mom she mused that it was likely I was indeed recalling the night we left family behind and the place of my birth behind. 

So when others speak about their first airplane ride, that's mine to share. From then on, and thanks very much to having family strewn about everywhere around the globe, particularly Bangladesh, I've been flying from a young age. We actually rarely ever flew domestic as the philosophy of my immigrant parents was that if it wasn't drivable, we weren't going because money was saved for those insanely expensive tickets back 'home' (weird that while Bdesh was where I was born, and the USA where I grew up, I still call Bangladesh home. Truth is Maryland is home and will always be no matter where I live.). We spent a lot of time in cars.

By the way, a body never really gets used to flying those long hauls, the 21+ hour flight time ones that seemed endless because they were. Sitting in a small confined seat with the only thing to look forward to was maybe a stale roll or a movie that you were too cheap to go see at the theater. As a child it was boring, as an adult? Maddening. I'm not the type of person who does well confined, not unless it's by choice. Add not a great sleeper on top of it. Good times. I don't think anyone enjoys this crap.

Wait, that's not true, likely I'm being a little extreme, allowing my own prejudice to color my opinion about this subject matter. I've heard, even know, of those unicorn individuals that love, love, love long flights but usually they're also the same who can afford 1st class, at least business and wouldn't be caught dead in steerage (like myself). Sister over here is most certainly not them. Hell, even if I could afford, would I? Yup, absolutely. I just don't have the funds.

Well anyhow, while I did hate those long trips back home due to the sheer hours they were also unbelievably stressful thanks to my mother who overpacked every single bloody time, even the handhelds were stupid heavy, and without missing a beat, we would always be asked to take something out of those stuffed to the gill suitcases otherwise pay extra weight. You know we were not about to do that. Right in the middle of the airport you would see us all huddled together (when I say 'us' I mean my mom and dad and whoever else adult were there, not my brother nor myself for we were 10 feet away pretending we weren't apart of that family) taking out all that we could to get the weight down to "you won't have to pay an arm and leg to check that thing in' level. I still see these brown families at the airport and my heart goes out to the kids.  

I do suspect that the reason I dislike the process of traveling is because of all that from childhood to youth to young adulthood. But the flip side, getting to the destinations? Exploring? Traveling overall? Oh heaven! If I had the funds, I would be in a different country every few months. 

The glorious part is that eventually I was at an age where I paid for my own ticket, which translated to trips, NOT Bangladesh. Those travels weren't nearly as stressful, including the two times I traveled back to the homeland due to the fact that I controlled those bags, packed them, weighed manically unwilling to make a spectacle of myself. 

All that being said, what I really wanted to do was make traveling into my career. I don't mean becoming a flight attendant, I didn't envy those folks and what they had to deal with on the reg with passengers. Their job always seemed so thankless to me although they looked damn good and were soooo poised. What I mean is to be able to travel for my job. 

I was the little kid at the airport watching well dressed people rush by seeming very busy, hurried, important. When I learned that they were going away for their jobs, well wasn't that cool? I wanted to do that! 

As if manifesting that ambition, eventually I did. The first ever business trip I took was to Minnesota. That was eye opening because I had no idea what real business travelers did such as all that went into organizing the trip itself, finding flights within budget, hotels, transportation, had no clue what a per diem was or that I had to track expenses. For sure there were occasionally fun moments but you just don't realize exactly how much times is spent in never seeing anything other than the confines of a conference room or at most, a nice restaurant for dinner with colleagues. During the Minnesota trip, I was accompanied by a gaggle of team members who showed me all the ropes, guiding me so I didn't end up somehow charging the firm for something I shouldn't, or me paying for something I didn't have to. 

I learned all this in one fell swoop but did I consider myself a legit business traveler, had I arrived? Nah, what I thought would make me bonified was solo travel. Don't ask me why, I actually have no reasonable thought behind it at all.

Long story short, throughout the moving and shifting of careers, I did end up business traveling quite a bit but here's the reality: I was never really busy when at the airport other than turning on the 'puter to check emails (even then, not really as I could do it through the phone). If anything I used the excuse of checking emails to keep myself occupied so that at least I looked busy and not a lonely loser. Oddly, I never found the need to run either (unless I didn't manage my time right or sprinting between gates due to airplane delays) as I thought that's what bidness folks do. Last, and humble alert, I was never that important. I guess in a way I was important to the company sending me on the trip because they just shelled out some cash to get my ass there but like...important important? Nope. 

Business trips still sorta get me hype (not always, depends on the destination, like if I were going to NJ, not really, no offense), I do look forward to them, but the youthful shine has long since rubbed off. I absolutely detest the prep before hand which hugely includes packing, something I cringe at, without a doubt the biggest reason I don't travel as much as I would like. As I wrote on FB just earlier this morning, why haven't they created a tele-porter that we could use to just, at minimum, get our suitcases from point A to B? Also, my mind balks at trying to figure out what is the best way to get to the airport, when is the right time to leave, what is the traffic situation, etc...gahhhh...low level stressful and likely the second big reason I don't travel by air unless I'm required. 

Currently as I write this I'm 10,000 feet up in the sky headed to the west coast. What a different world we live in that I am able to do so, right? My employer is taking the whole lot of us, all 300+ staff meeting for a few days. They've thought of everything including providing vouchers for ride shares as well as launching an app that is more or less a 1 stop shop for all the info. The organizers are beasts. And all of this is lovely. I'm excited because I haven't been back to CA in a while. I'm stoked to have time with colleagues and physically meeting those I had only connected with virtually. It's cool that we're going to be taking several hours in one day to volunteer to paint a middle school (or is it schools?) and I adore, adore, adore the companies mission statement. I work for an NGO that provides loan for underprivileged, BIPOC communities. We help make dreams happen and I'm 100% onboard with all of it, blessed to be apart of this place and yup, thrilled to be going to spend a few days across yonder but...just...truly...

...I REALLY HATE PACKING.

(Yeah, a whole blog simply to say those 4 words.)

(Also, the outlet at my seat doesn't work.) 

(I'm going to snooze out.)

(Did I mention I hate packing? Yeah? Okay.) 

 

I'm So Awesome, No I'm not, But Yes I am, But Not Quite...

(You gotta love the nonstop "..." that I use in my titles. They denote a certain mystery, unsaid words, etc...right?)

If you're wondering what this blog is going to be about, that little nugget of information that I provided in the prior blog about things that have happened in the last few years that contributed to me disappearing from this sphere, well this is one of the first sharing that I'll be doing. 

Let's talk about introspection, shall we.

What does true introspection look like to you? Particularly when it's real without smoke and mirrors or gaslighting yourself?

I'm here to tell you that it absolutely, without a doubt, completely and totally SUCKS, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. 

Regardless, I've been doing a lot of it for quite a while now, as in years and years. Who knew I would need allllll that time? Not me, and that was probably where I went wrong. The assumption that I was pretty okay and self-realized. Nope, not even a little.

(Side bar: As I'm drafting this, I think I may have even written about this same topic before but I have zero patience to go do my due diligence to make sure I'm not being redundant. Likely that I am, I own this and maybe I have something fresh and new to share in all this?)

Introspection seems like such a popular, trendy word in certain circles. These are the intellectual giants who appear to have their thumbs on the pulse of their own psyche, as well as others. They seem to know right vs wrong, correct vs what the actual fuck, zen vs frenetic...etc. In fact, most often these chosen people seem to glide around so composed with an aura of light that can often be blinding. They are...perfect, or at least seem. And when in the company of these 'whole' humans, the regular folk like myself strike a thoughtful pose, nod solemnly, and try to pretend like I not only get what they mean but also ascribe to the same higher consciousness. 

Even while I pretended, fearful of being less than...if I have to be honest, this shit used to annoy me, not because they had a grasp on things I didn't understand or reflected a behavior that I thought was impossible in the face of negativity of any sort but rather because I wasn't at their level, hell, I didn't even know there were ladders available to begin the climb.

Then one day way back in about 2015-ish or so...I was pretty down and out. Really, really. I had very little idea about the future, felt as if so many roads I thought has been 'safe' were anything but and more importantly, I was angry that because I was a good person that I didn't deserve such strife. I, of course, never said this out loud, never let my angst and outrage show but this is exactly what I thought. Or maybe I did and I had no awareness of it. I was clawing to understand why I seemed to be a target of God's and fate in general.

Do you know how devastating it is to think you're this completely awesome person only to realize one fine day, after turning a few things over in your head, how very wrong you were? It's a literal journey through your life up to that point where you're convinced that just because folks think you're 'helpful, nice, kind, good' should give you a free pass from sadness, disappointment, struggles, etc. It's bullshit of course.

Being all those things, the positive things, doesn't make life easier. Sure, it's a great way of being able to look at yourself in the mirror and not be horrified at the reflection. If you're not being truthful to yourself though and if you know that what you show to others is a better version of all those things in your head, or worse then well...what's the point? Who really are you?

That's the question I posed to myself. Who am I without the nonsense and fakery? What am I? Am I that good person that's so helpful, so nice, so good, so kind? And while I speak of no payback, that my good deeds speak for themselves, did I really mean it? Turns out folks, I didn't. Not at all.

I swear expectations, the type that demands like to like, is bonkers. A minimal amount is completely, at least to me, acceptable, but the ones that says things to you such as "I did that for X and they didn't do anything back for me...they suck" or "How could they have not done/reacted the way I did when they needed X for me, and now that I need them?" 

Yikes. I thought this ALL the time. Comparisons of my act of service, which is for sure my love language, versus the other persons was way beyond what could be considered healthy. I walked around in a perpetual state of emotions that were wholly negative. I reduced those around me to being insensitive and my outrage was as high as the furthest outreach of the galaxy. 

My mindset was toxic. Like a salivating dog looking for a bone, I was seeking reasons to feel superior.

And during all that time I was amazing at pretending to be enlightened, really above it all. This was not even slightly true. The need for people to like, respect, want me was all I could think about. That external approval and validation was far more important than the internal. 

What did I do as I started to realize what my mindset was really like? The first thing was...to avoid the hell out of it. Because the first look was so damn ugly that I sunk into binge watching every episode of the Star Wars series, even the terrible 3 middle ones. Better to torture myself with Jar Jar Binks then who I truly was.

Eventually I got back to it. Unpacking that first instance of an incident that I thought I had been in the right and the other person, wrong. The fact that I so quickly could find that example told the whole story that it still bothered me and I had to deal with it or lay it to rest somehow. 

The process I utilized:

1. Recalling every thing I could about it, down to the tiniest detail which is not easy.
2. Reviewing those feelings that had been generated within me.
3. Asking myself why I had those feelings.
4. Asking myself, if looking at the whole incident from the external, not the internal, as if I were a 3rd party observer, what would I have thought, not just about what happened but MY words and MY actions.
5. Did I at all try to defuse the situation?
6. Did I approach the situation with the willingness to listen and clarify?
7. Did I at all take into account the feelings of the other person?
8. Did I ask what was happening in that persons life or take that into account if I already knew? 
9. In all this, I did not at all focus on the other persons words/actions as it was in the past. I had to deal with the hear and now and most importantly, my part.
10. What did I want to do next? What was the remediation plan?

Again, this is what I did, this isn't some help advice column where I'm giving anyone some tips and tricks or psychological advice or therapy. I never went to school for a second regarding any of this, I don't have degrees, I have zero qualification. All this came from myself, from understanding and listening as well as over and over again putting myself into others shoes. The #1 question I asked in every instance as I faced the past:

How would I have felt if the tables were turned?

What

I'm Back...I Think!

You like the title? How self assured, yet indecisive I sound? 

Let me dive right in and say, if there is nothing more evident about time going by fast, it certainly became crystal clear when I logged into this long-forgotten blog. Today, randomly, I was thinking, "oh yeah, I have a blog, what happened to that?" (as if someone else had taken over because I'm a whole-ass publishing house or something with a staff that manages stuff) and then thought, "what the hell is my login?" This was followed by at least 30 minutes of trying to actually access it. It was touch and go, and I almost gave up. But I digress (did you really think anything would change, and I wouldn’t?). My last post was in December of 2019. It's now September of 2024. See, time elapsing, but seriously...

What in the world, Marty McFly?? When did I become a character in Back to the Future??

So why the great swath of time between that post and this?

Did I just start to lose interest in writing anymore, you may wonder? In a way, yes, but let me explain. I know why I've not been blogging—mostly the lack of words, but not a lack of things to say. I've just been processing as well as accepting so much change in my world since that last post (actually, even before). In rereading it, I was a little astounded by how trite it was when I was in the midst of so many things happening in the world, and my own life was actively altering at that point. My guess is that I simply wasn't prepared to put all those crazy facts and thoughts down in a way that would make sense to anyone.

One thing’s for sure, I've changed. A lot. And at the same time, I've remained the same. I've embraced a lot of truths about myself and had to rethink a lot of things, too—a journey I began well before 2019. That's okay. Getting to know your own self is no small challenge. Am I a better person due to all this? Yeah, I think I am. I've found a certain amount of peace, but do I have a long way to go yet? Definitely.

In writing this post, I'm also rediscovering my own voice. I haven't written anything substantial in ages. Not really. Even on FB, I've noticed a withdrawal of sorts from engaging too much. At one point, I used to write these impossibly long posts with ramblings and rantings, pithy anecdotes, or wisdom. The same 30 folks always liked them, and I was good, happy, content.

Then came the slow removal of myself from social media, which I contend was natural as life became full. But the bigger reason was that it seemed like the virtual world, which I once found succor in, became toxic with nothing but judgment, anger, and a sense of entitlement that I couldn't identify with. Hold on. Let me make this clear because some may think (well, those who don't know me) that I invite these things due to whatever sort of connections I have on FB.

If it wasn't evident before, let me be clear. I am a liberal. I am moderate as well.

During the nightmare years of The Orange Asshat's (Trump's) presidency, I cut ties with a lot of folks for whatever personal reasons I had, leaving behind a definite echo chamber of my own political spectrum. Well, at least I thought so. Come to find out, just because we're on the same side does not mean we are like-minded. After witnessing enough cancel culture, ego, and superiority that actually just made me angry, I made some effort to protect my own mental health by disengaging.

So here I am, living life, somewhat changed, and I think I'm back to the world of blogging? I say "I think" only because this is intimidating as hell due to the dustiness of my fingers, and I'm not disciplined enough to manage any sort of cadence to posting or anything really. I know this because I still have full bottles of vitamins that I promised I would take and did so regularly, for about a month.

I repeat, I've changed, but not that much.

The next few blogs will be about these aforementioned changes, some realizations, my thoughts about the world in general, my relationship with social media, and my own health journey (no, I'm totally fine, but there are some interesting things going on that I want to be transparent about so that maybe someone else on a similar journey can get some support). Oh also, food and photography. Lots to share about that. And trips...okay this is getting out of control. There's a lot to share, that's pretty much what I'm trying to get across.

I kinda hope this reaches some of my old readers. I'm not sure it will, but at this point, this blog is going back to being a little bit of a diary. If someone wants to read it in the meantime, that's cool, and I welcome you.

Now let me start writing the next one before I become disinterested because that's always a possibility.