Stranger in a Strange Land

Well I am back.

I have actually been back for over a week now but have been somewhat surreptitious in announcing my presence. Just took a look at the blog and realized how long it has been since an update. Once I made the decision to leave Colombia, I pretty much put my head down and headed for the states. Strange that as one of the reasons I wanted to ride home was to visit places I had missed on the way down and revisit places I had liked. As it was, I certainly enjoyed the ride back but didn’t take the time to do much tourism. Only two rest days between Panama and Colorado.

I crossed the border in El Paso, Texas spent some time in Colorado and then crossed over through Southern Utah, Arizona and Nevada on my way home. It was really nice to enter the US through Texas and New Mexico. The southern hospitality was welcoming and very comfortable after a year of Latin American hospitality. On my way across to California I visited Moab, Bryce, Zion and the Grand Canyon. Hard to believe I have lived so close to those places for so long without visiting them.

So now I am back in San Francisco. Coming back at the time I have, when people are so focused on politics and the economy, has exacerbated the foreignness I feel. The first thing I noticed on arriving back in SF is how guarded people are. So many people seem to exist within a suit of urban armor to shield themselves from those around them. It makes it hard to get to know or even meet people as you have to work so hard to get to the person inside. I noticed this in Panama and it is similar here. Most people are friendly if you make the effort to get through to them, but are so wrapped up in their own concerns that they don’t make the effort to get through to you. I am glad to have friends here where that is not an issue.

I am finally becoming accustomed to the ebb and flow of normal conversation and sharing my trip with others. Sometimes it is difficult as people I don’t know hear of and ask me about the trip. It is hard to know exactly how much to share as often times, just as I start to re-live the trip and remember cool things to share, people get tired of hearing me talk. At first it would be quite disappointing but I am now comfortable with the fact that most people just can’t relate to my trip experience.

A funny thing happened upon my arrival here in SF. I stopped in San Jose and had lunch with my mom on the way home. Bike was running fine but started to run a little warm as I passed Daly City. I exited the freeway at 7th street and was going to do a little tour of the city on my way back to the outer richmond. My bike had other ideas. At the first stoplight in the city it died. Smoke from burnt oil curled around the tank and it made a horrible metallic racket as it quit running. It has not run since. After 50,000 miles of solid work this year, it gave up the ghost the moment we got home.

I can’t be too disappointed. There are so many places it could have died that would have been so much worse. My mom tells me that she has been praying to St. Jude through my entire trip to get me and my bike home safely and this shows that he came through. Of course she didn’t say anything about after I got home.

I don’t relate well with the saints or a compassionate controlling god so perhaps it is good that my mom takes care of that for me. I do know, however, that when something like this happens it’s hard to believe in a universe ruled solely by chaos and probability. Magical realism anyone?