More Bruges:
This is the kind of architecture that'd make Freud, adolescent adults as myself and young boys (who haven't been traumatized by a priest) giggle.
There was a small Greek restaurant around the corner from me. For the second time in a few days I had another incredible meal. After all the canned tuna I've been eating you think the last thing I'd want is fish, but holy hell it was good:
I confess a desire to stay longer, but it was an expensive few days. Checked out of my hotel and set off. My SIM card wasn't working in Belgium, so I relied on Garmin's wisdom to get me around. It was here in Bruges that my frustration with Garmin's idiocy boiled over into hilarity. The first day in Bruges I just rode around aimlessly. It's a small place, so it was easy to map it out internally. The second day is when I turned the POS on. I knew exactly where I was going, so using the schizophrenic device was more to help me understand its logic. 50 minutes into what should have been a 10 minute ride I gave up. It had me going in circles, including routing me onto a bicycle and pedestrian path through the park (an instruction I didn't follow). So when it came time to leave Bruges I stopped into a gas station to get directions from the attendant. This is how it went:
Spreekt u Engels?
Yes.
Can you point to France?
What?
France. What direction is it? [Me pointing as he inquisitively laughs]
Well, where in France are you going?
Don't know.
What do you mean? What city?
I don't know...I don't know where. Just need to get to France.
Still not understanding why someone would just be going somewhere without a particular destination in mind--he nonetheless gives in and points.
Thank you!
"Would you like to look at a map?"
Nope, I'm good. Thanks!
As I got on my bike, I looked back through the gas-station-convenience-store-window to find him staring at me, as if trying to glean an additional piece of information that would help make sense of the conversation he just had. Like the Garmin, he was trapped up in some sort of thought loop. He knew where I was. He knew where I was going. But he couldn't get his head around the middle part: the how (and perphaps the why). I gave him a nod, started 'er up and aimed towards France.
"I don't know" is an amusing reply to the question, "Where are you going." Most think of "I don't know" as just a synonymous phrase for "I can't remember." So it's a surprise when someone means it literally.
The 'where are you going' conversation happens quite frequently. It's the motorcycling equivalent of who's on first. Either sensing I'm lost or just out of curiosity, people tend to ask it a lot. The reply always catches them off-guard. Curiosity piqued, 'help-a-stranger' desire in overdrive, more questions follow.
"Well do you know what hotel you're staying at?....No? Do you know what part of the city it's in?"
"No, kind lady, it's not that I
don't know where I'm going, it's that I don't
know where I'm going. I'm just riding."
"But I thought you said you were from Los Angeles?"
"That's correct."
"And you got all the way here like that?"
[At this point I just have to grin slightly to trigger the part of their own brain that answers the question for them.]
It's kind of glorious, watching the realization. For the first time in their life it clicks--that you'll always arrive
somewhere, as if they'd lived under the shadow of thinking without a destination you'd end up NOWHERE. Over and over I've enjoyed the responses as they slowly come to the literal conclusion of my answers. For some it's an epiphany. Others....well....not sure if they ever get it.
The irony is that aimless wandering delivers me to the exact spot on the earth, at the exact time, that the careful planning led them to. And then they go back to the life they know and I go back to discovering a life I don't.
Irony and modestly and amusing conversations aside, the reality is that, despite even the most careful planning, none of us do know where we're going. Life is merely a Garmin-like illusion. You know you input the proper destination, but then you end up on a bike path, at a hair salon, a warehouse behind an airport or behind a counter at a gas station wondering, 'is this where I'm supposed to be'?
