I feel like such an alien: 27 de diciembre de 2014

I feel like such an alien. I miss Raúl, but I’m mad at him for being so weirdly judgmental in a way. I don’t know where he is or what he’s doing. He has to be with Ximena, who I don’t feel like talking to so I’m just going to ignore the hurt and walk aimlessly around the city alone, like I’ve always done, and will continue to do, wherever I am in the world. It feels strange to be alone, but it’s also freeing. And I know that someone else will come along to help me when I need it.

Yesterday I walked along la cañada until I found a random concrete table with four concrete benches surrounding it, in a miniature plaza without grass. The perfect writing desk, my personal office facing the street, shade and a cool breeze my recipe for thinking deeply.  

I was there for maybe an hour when a group of young travelers arrived, the hippie-artisan type, tanned skin, dark hair and eyes, an occasional dreadlock here and there. The ones that sell jewelry so they can buy something to eat for the day. Tattoos, mohawks, piercings, malabares. The kids that work the semáforos, performers with a halo of energy that comes from the street, monedas clinking in their pockets, given to them by cars stopped at the stoplights for a well-performed stunt. I’ve thought about doing that, making a little pocket cash with giant bubbles and blonde hair. I wonder how much I’d make.

As I’m sitting here, on the other side of the giant iglesia in Plaza San Martín, at a table made to play chess, I look up and a young man with dirty clothes catches a pigeon in his hands, coos to it, sets it free. Another, another. He meets my eye, smiles, “¿Todo bien?” Two perros de la calle with wet fur from playing in the fountain to my right approach me, I give them both a few head pats as they smile and pant, and I continue writing.

I feel especially absorbent today, a sea sponge in human form, a scratchy loofah hanging in the shower, something used to change dirty into clean. I can feel them looking at me, breathing in my onda. A tie-dye dress and marijuana leaf earrings attract a lot of attention in a city full of revolutionaries.

Now I know this young man’s story, the catcher of pigeons. He approached me, “¡Hola, amiga!” Kissed my cheek, sat down opposite me. I won’t forget how effectively he used his initiative, something I’m trying to learn to do with more confidence and comfortability. He’s been living in the street in Córdoba for over a year. He told me everything, and I prompted him with my own curious questions.

He pointed out others that live in the street, viejos carrying bags of clothes that he saluted, other jóvenes with missing teeth, handing strangers cards with writings about Jesus and asking for money.

Jonatán, it would be Juan but he prefers it the other way. He had a kid at 16 and left high school to work to support him. His child is 5 years old now and lives with the mom in another part of Argentina. He has 13 siblings, including half-siblings, and he doesn’t know where any of them live. He has no contact with his family, and he has no desire to contact them.

He showed me a secret water tap when I asked him where to get water in the city without having to ask in restaurants to fill my water bottle.

And now all I can think about is why did I grow to become who I am now and not him? Why don’t I live in the street at 22, dreaming of a house and a family? Did he have bad luck at a young age? Make the wrong decisions, commit murder in a past life? Is his cosmic karma tainted? How can we know these things? Can we truly ask such questions?

Could I live a life like that and still generate positive energy? Why does my heart break when I kiss his cheek goodbye and hug him tightly, this new friend I’ve made, a baseball cap and all smiles. Why can’t I keep from weeping silently, alone, after I’ve left him, sitting on a bench watching the cars pass, thinking it’s so unfair the way life treats us?

The world is so heavy sometimes. He was very nice to me, when many people in South America have looked at my blonde hair and instantly placed me in the category of rich bitch from the United States, when I’ve never been that but I have been privileged.

Yesterday it was the same thing. One of the artisan kids engaged me in conversation, we talked about ayahuasca and he told me he took it in Peru with a shaman to guide him, he held his heart in one hand and his brain in the other, and his whole perspective changed forever. His left eye was covered in a milky glaze, the scar of a childhood wound. We walked to the plaza with the huge fountain next to the municipalidad, I put my feet in the water and he stripped to his boxers and jumped right in.

Everything’s crashing in on me, I can’t stop crying. I feel so alone and so inside everyone else, I can’t help but feel too much. I don’t want to end relationships badly, I feel Raúl abandoned me for not doing things perfectly, not acting according to his feelings, but to my own. Am I selfish, or am I free? Are these the same thing or opposites? I don’t know, I can’t figure it out.

I can’t change the fact that I grew up in a culture that praises individualism, or at least seems to praise it in my mind after I’ve experienced the culture here. I can’t help but act according to my own interests, does that mean I am unfair, unjust, as Raúl told me I am? How strange it is to lose oneself in another’s mind and desires, and then resurface on the verge of drowning, choking, trying to survive.

Fer, my artisan friend, short for Fernando. In the end he walked me halfway to the hostel and I gave him 10 pesos for the bus, he needed it more than me. Qué buena onda ese viajero. He said we should go to a three day fiesta electrónica in the sierras. I thought, “Yeah, if I wanted to get raped on LSD by other drugged fiends.” Instead I laughed and agreed, thinking I’d probably never see him again.