adamyntium

Of little sleep, many chances, big dreams

Tuesday I will be in Mountain View.  Tomorrow I will be in Frankfurt with good friends and many drunk loud Germans screaming at a big TV. Tonight beyond the witching hour I declined an adventure in Koeln, being the wise or stupid one.  Today I was rocking out with people from 10 to 79 and also teaching a tango dancer to waltz to a band playing surprisingly damn good cover songs.  Also today I unexpectedly toured Bonn for two hours with a charming new also-unexpected friend, played piano for an entire wedding in Sankt Augustin, and ate a breakfast of bread, sausage and cheese for the many-hundredth time.

Now I am not clubbing. I am not answering any work e-mail.  I am recharging my phone, my camera, and I am thinking.  And yes, writing.

Writing and thinking about how every new experience, every new friendship brings discovery, along with often joy, wistfulness, confusion… reminders of what was, what will not be, and choices.  Always choices.

Sometimes I envy those with simple lives.  They grow up and die in the same small land.  They marry their high school sweetheart.  They are neither worldly nor stupid.  They don’t have huge dreams to dream or to shatter or to just miss by a teeny tiny what if or an almost or a one-courage-short.  With small dreams come exponentially smaller risks, fewer disappointments, less uncertainty.  And certainly less angst.

I travel a lot.  I see a lot.  I have friends in more countries than I can count on my two hands doubled, and close distant friends in at least one hands-worth.  They’re so far away.  They’re having kids, they’re changing, they’re focusing.

And I… I am still exploring.  Sometimes regretting.  But—in those moments when I let my mind wander in the way that is not wandering to procrastinate or to forget—I am more wondering.  I cannot change what I’ve done and what I’ve become, but will I make better choices tomorrow?  Or, rather, will they be more important choosings of the things that matter, not which coupon site mint gum new web too oh site cool phone app sock alignment?

So here I sit, much loved and alone in yet another hotel room.  And I wonder if they are fast asleep or wondering, too.

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Adam Lasnik

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7 responses to “Of little sleep, many chances, big dreams”

  1. Johannes Avatar
    Johannes

    If you’re looking for a nice German song that might go well with this post:
    Hannes Wader, Heute hier, morgen dort. Ideally you’d need a guitar for this and sing it yourself, perhaps with a bunch of good old friends (who will, of course, need to part ways the next morning) around a camp fire.

    Reply
  2. Adam Avatar
    Adam

    Hey Johannes, thanks for the musical tip :-D.

    And Sasidhar, I hope to be in Hyderabad in December!

    Reply
  3. Jillian Avatar
    Jillian

    I know what you mean as a business traveler myself, i have more friends abroad then I do in my home town but at least i got to see the World.

    Reply
  4. Angelina Maben Avatar
    Angelina Maben

    See india not only Hyderabad but the whole india is very beautiful.

    Reply
  5. Meg Avatar
    Meg

    I hate hotel rooms.  They’re so impersonal.  Being alone in a hotel room is really the only place where I truly feel alone.  Jumping on the bed usually helps to dispel that :-).  Unfortunately I couldn’t when I went to Milwaukee for a conference a few weeks ago.  By the time I checked in, my hotel was out of bedrooms.  So they gave me a “parlour room” instead.  I guess traveling businessmen rent these things?  It had a desk, a couch, a bathroom, and … a Murphy bed!  It was pretty awesome!  But I decided against jumping on the bed for fear that it would snap me into the wall.

    Reply
  6. Gula Avatar
    Gula

    I know what you mean by simple people and thier simple dreams like what movie to watch on Saturday night out. Very nice guy asked me to marry him, but I was free spirited, I didn’t want to stay in one place, I new my future with him. Too simple.  Our souls crave more than just to exist- we want to live.
    BTW- I highly recomend you to watch movie “Best of Youth” italian but has English subtites.
    It will help to discover the purpose of travel and many other things.

    Reply
  7. Adam Avatar
    Adam

    Hey everyone, thanks for the ideas and the sympathy and the stories :-D.

    I’m actually traveling less for work… not “none”… just less, which is great :-D.

    And thankfully, on some of my recent travels, I found ways of being less lonely in the hotel… gtalking with friends online, going to swing dances, and so on.  So it’s all good 😀

    Reply

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