Thought #3: Saying Goodbye.

(view from my favorite cobble stone alley in Oaxaca City, Mexico)

I am just starting to piece together how central goodbyes are to life. I don’t mean “see you laters,” I mean real “I will never see you again” goodbyes—or at least if I do see you again, everything will be different. So far I have experienced this sort of goodbye with people, places, and art.

I become completely fascinated by each place I visit around the world, constantly attempting to make sense of the beauty that surrounds me. Every time I leave a city, I go through a sort of breakup. Not the sort of breakup where I resent or hate them, but rather the kind where I reminisce on all our good times and want it all back. However, I know could never commit to picking them over all the other places in the world I have yet to see, so I say my goodbye.

Moving from one work of art to the next in a museum/gallery/street is a microscopic version of this. I become completely infatuated with it, trying to learn all there is to know about the art, artist, context it was created in, etc…but I do move over to the next piece, because I know there is so much more to experience.

Forming connections with people does not come as easily to me as it does with places and art. It is rare for me to enjoy spending more than a few hours in another person’s company. Meeting someone who passes my 3-hours-of-talking-test is in its own way an art form for me. There is an indescribable energy about effortlessly being in someone else’s presence that is both beautiful and terrifying. However, one of us always breaks this energy eventually…

These goodbyes are by far the worst.

x Gem.

#travel #art #people #love