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Oct 31 • 4 min read
Keep Walking
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Hey friends! I'm back from a business trip from San Francisco. Well, I've been back for a week but spent the past week recovering from a cold. My immune system shot down after a very long and arduous hike. I did two sections of the Roundabout Trail! Section 1 was a personally important hike for me. And who can explain better why it's important than... Old me? Around July/August of 2015, Caltrain experienced another one of its frequent failures. I don’t recall the specific reason for the stoppage that day.
At the time I was still getting used to the whole commuting from San Jose to San Francisco thing. You know, the whole spending a large chunk of your day in a train that had spotty network connections and uncomfortable seats. Wanting to just get home to your wife and dogs. Only to end up in a station that was a few miles away from home. It fucking sucked, but it got me home around the time I want to be home and I could forget about the commute until next morning.
But when the train stops working, that system fails. The part where I forget that this fucking commute is temporary and I can spend the better part of the day at home. Some people just hit up a bar and get some drinks while they’re waiting for the train to get back to normal, but I wasn’t one of those people. I was just so antsy and so fucking… desperate to get back home. I couldn’t stand one more minute in San Francisco.
As much as I value the enjoyment of my own life I also value my wife’s. Coincidentally me being at home for dinnertime is a necessity for the enjoyment of both of our lives. But I didn’t want her to drive all the way to San Francisco; so I suggested that we meet somewhere in the reasonable middle. I would bike to 22nd St. or Bayshore. We got off the phone and I started biking.
When you bike from the 4th & King station to either one of those stations, you go through these neighborhoods that you would never go to on an ordinary day. Mission Bay, Dogpatch. Portola Place and Vistacion Valley. Biking through that neighborhood when the sun sets is a very surreal experience. All these warehouses with broken windows, construction sites that hasn’t been touched for months, people passed out in muni stops. Juxtaposed to one of the most beautiful sunsets I’ve ever seen, what’s left of the sun casting over the ocean. I’m sweating through this neighborhood, trying to navigate through this neighborhood that I’ve never been through before. At the end my wife is waiting for me at the station, and we end our day together. But this experience of biking through that neighborhood is exclusively mine, as we have no reason to bike that path together.
I occasionally thought I would try that path again with my wife. It gave me this intangible feeling that I’ve never experienced before. Desperation mixed with this hint of adrenalin and awe. Equal portion of greed and guilt. It left a big mark in my heart but I’ve never had a dream about this experience, it must not be something traumatic. That’s nice I guess. We never got to try this bike ride, and I rode through the same path about two or three times and never after that.
At the time I thought my agony was something that I couldn’t leave. I loved living in the South Bay and so did my wife. I didn’t want to move to San Francisco and so did my wife. Other neighborhoods, I’ve heard a lot of bad things about them; there are a lot of complaints about San Jose but hey, we’ve lived here for a while and it’s not fucking intolerable, right? Well, after a year and half, there came a point where I simply could not bear the burden of this commute anymore.
So I tried this thing called disregarding what other people say and experiencing things for myself. We went to all these neighborhoods and places that other people complained about and judged for ourselves. In the end we ended up in a place that was much more easier to commute to but was also not far from where we wanted to be. Later on, where we moved to became a place where we wanted to be. It all worked out well.
And now I think about this experience and it tells me something. Life isn’t really fair, that’s a fact; but that doesn’t mean you should always take things without asking for better. You always have to ask or fight for what you want. You might not get everything that you want, but you might; and it’s better than getting nothing that you want. Go places and ask for things you want. If you’re feeling miserable try everything to escape from that hellhole. When a suboptimal yet appealing offer comes to you be confident enough to say no to get something optimal. Make life something that’s worth living for yourself.
It’s June 2017, almost two years passed since that day. A lot of new things came into my life and I’ve left a lot of things behind. Some things you don’t even realize they’re there, but you can’t separate them from you. I wish the me of today was there next to the me that day. Now that I think about it, I’d say it’s a great fortune that I’ve found a me who can be of help to the past me. Here’s to me. The one person who can completely understand me and completely love me.
I love how you can kinda tell it's written by the same person 9 years later, but at the same time it's different. I'm also surprised at how I remember the event a bit differently after 9 years. But I guess the 9 years ago me is probably more accurate? Then it all leads to a wonderful destination you wanted to go to. |
Free from your scars, pain, and hurt, who are you? Experience it with me and create it yourself. Make your life make sense.