I curiously continue to lose weight. This despite a diet that has variously consisted of the following: potatoes (in many forms) and pints (Dublin), room service, more pints, and tequila (London), vodka, cheese, and a bit of chocolate (Zurich), mashed potatoes made with entire sticks of butter, topped with gravy (again London), and McDonald’s cheeseburgers (throughout the months of January and February. Possibly a bit in December.). It’s true I’ve been going to my trainer when I have not been in London, Dublin, or Zurich, which is to say, I haven’t been going to him much. Gym access has otherwise been spotty, and honestly, with the gym weights in kilograms, I have no idea how much working out I’m actually doing. I have, however, mastered measurements in stones. I’m quickly closing in on nine.

It’s possible that what you always hear about walking being good for you is true after all. I figured walking was like marijuana — the health pushers just started you out on it in an attempt to get you hooked on stronger stuff, but the walking itself was harmless. But maybe there’s something to this walking thing. I love walking — seeing new places, old places — soaking it all in. Although walking through a densely wooded park at 3am in Zurich may not have been my brightest moment.

They say that travel is educational and it’s true. Here’s what I have learned.

• As illustrated, you can have as much cheese and beer as you want as long as you occasionally walk rather than take a taxi.
• If your suitcase weighs 70 pounds, it’s likely there will be no elevator to the sixth floor. Think of hefting that bag up all those stairs as creative exercise. It just means you can have more cheese.
• Pack more socks. No, more than that. Maybe a few more.
• The number of reusable articles of clothing (jeans, sweaters, etc.) that you should pack is directly proportional to the number of very smoky places you plan to frequent. And if you plan to contribute to their smokiness. Not that I would. I’m just offering you helpful hints, is all. Not speaking from experience. Nope.
• A wicker stool is not as comfortable as one might imagine as a desk chair. A pillow works in a pinch, but is not really a substitute for an actual chair. If the wireless were reliable, you could work from bed. But the wireless won’t be reliable. So, you may as well start considering the trade offs of a comfortable position vs. the frustration of a dropped connection now.
• Your room won’t have a coffeemaker. If you’re in Europe, at least you’re likely to have some form of tea kettle. If you’re in Vegas or the crappiest hotel in Silicon Valley, you’ll get nothing. The more you pay, the less likely you are to have access to actual coffee. The diet coke in the mini bar is $5, but well worth the cost.
• Why don’t you bring shoes that are appropriate for the actual clothes you pack? Why? Because you will not, it’s best not even to try for anything other than jeans and t-shirts. You’ll just end up taking up space in the suitcase.
• Don’t let the cleaning people in. They say they’ll only be a minute. They lie.
• Sure, the mini bar isn’t cheap, but don’t knock the mini bar. There may come a time when it’s exactly what you need.
• Go to Dublin.
• Always book hotel rooms with robes.
• Did I mention how nice it is to walk around?
• Taxi drivers are like bartenders and hair dressers. They dispense life advice at no extra charge. And you’ll never see them again, so why not take advantage of the opportunity. Just be prepared for brutal honesty. After all, they’ll never see you again, so they have no need to sugar coat.

Obviously, traveling is the path to profound wisdom. And to cheese.

When I was very little, I would go to Laguna Beach with my family. My uncle (my stepdad’s brother) lived there, and all the relatives would congregate, bringing a full spread of Lebanese food: stuffed grape leaves, tabbouleh, kibbeh. We kids would play in the waves, dig for little crabs, build sand castles. One time, I was playing in the water and must have gone in just a little too far. The undertow grabbed me and pulled me under, sucked me into the wave. I couldn’t see, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t hear. I was at the mercy of the wave, tumbling me around with sand and seaweed and water. Just water. No up or down or air. And I was alone. Helpless, tossed, underwater. No way to get control. I still remember that feeling.

I have this recurring dream where I’m in a dark house and I wander from room to room, flipping light switches, but none of them work. And I keep trying, but the lights won’t come on. So, I blindly grope my way to another room, and feel for another switch and no matter what I try, there’s no light. Sometimes, it’s not entirely dark. Maybe the moon is out and not all the curtains are closed and I can see my way around enough to find the light switches. But they won’t turn the lights on.

Life isn’t like the game, with the plastic car and the little people and the neat boxes that lead to milestones and a finish line. Life is unpredictable. And every time you think you have it figured out, you realize that life isn’t something that even can be figured out. And every time you reach a place, you think, now I get it. Now I know where I’m going, with this confidence that only comes from an inability to see the future. You get through the moment of darkness. You find light. You find clarity. And at least then, when that moment of darkness comes again, you know that there will be light again.

The wave pulled me under and under until it gave me up and I was in the light and the air again. And I still remember that feeling.

I got to Dublin on Friday. I had heard a rumor about the potatoes, but you generally don’t expect rumors to be so true. I love to travel and see new things and try new foods, especially if they’re potatoes and/or gravy — preferably both. If not for the whole deal where you generally have to speed through the sky with no visible means of support in order to get to most places, travel would have practically no entries in the cons column.

I do like being home too. I love having a quiet place that’s mine, where I can find peace and refuge and storm-induced shelter and all of that. Sometimes my heart just craves it. It’s more a feeling than a place. Of rightness. Of knowing this is where I belong.

Yes, my idealized world is a Billy Joel song — “home is just another word for you” and all that. And sure, Billy sort of phoned it in there towards the end with the “instant pleasure dome” stuff, but, you know, I never did have a place that I could call my very own. He’s right about that.

Oh, like you don’t hear a song and realize your exact feeling has been put into rhyme and is neatly summarized to pop music. It happens to all of us, so don’t pretend you’re above it.

Billy Joel is often the soundtrack for my life. Vienna has been the resounding chorus for years.

But back to potatoes. In Ireland, I finally know that I am not alone in this world. There are others just like me, who feel that a meal just isn’t complete without potatoes. And maybe a meal needs two or three different kinds.

I was walking down the street the other night and heard singing from a bar. John Denver. “Country roads, take me home, to the place I belong…” I am often mocked for my John Denver love, but some things you just keep from your childhood. And some of my earliest memories are from when we were living at my grandparents’ house, listening to John Denver and the Carpenters on eight track with my mom.

The point (obviously) is that I’ve decided to stay in Ireland a few more days. Maybe I won’t find the truths of life as only Billy Joel can write, but at least I can have a few more potatoes. And sing the songs of my lost childhood, mocking-free.

When I was little, Disneyland sold tickets for rides and Casey’s train still went around the park. The Indiana Jones ride didn’t exist, and the Haunted Mansion was scary. I remember getting a mug from one of my early trips to Disneyland, commemorating the bicentennial. Mickey and Goofy and Pluto are in the 1776 band, with the flute and the drum and the marching along. I still have that mug. I keep my pens in it in my home office and it makes me happy to see it. I even still have one of those hats with the mouse ears with my name stitched in the back. Although it’s a bit small, so I don’t wear it all that much anymore.

In junior high school, I was the drum major in our school’s marching band. I played the flute but somehow ended up with the mace as tall as I was and the whistle and the standing in front telling everyone to parade rest. Our band’s crowning achievement was marching in the parade at Disneyland. We got to assemble in a part of the park that regular visitors don’t get to see and then marched all through the streets. With all the Disney characters. Fantastic. Well, and also really hot, since it was summer and we were in those band uniforms. But totally worth it. And after we were done marching, we got to spend the rest of the day on the rides.

In seventh grade, I held hands with a boy for the first time on the Pirates of the Caribbean. I know it’s really hokey, but that ride is still one of the most romantic places I’ve been, with the water and the little boats and the fake fireflies and the dark and the dog with the key in his mouth. I was there on a church trip, and the boy (Bobby) was a year older than me. It was all very exciting until we went on the skyway and he and a friend rocked the car and threw things from it, despite my fear of heights and conviction we would plummet to our deaths, and when we got to the end, the park employees threatened to kick us out. I lost all faith that he cared about my feelings and fears, and well, dumped him before the first kiss. I still have fond, romantic memories of Pirates of the Caribbean though.

When I graduated from high school, we did Grad Nite at Disneyland. Grad Nite is when a all the seniors spend the night at Disneyland after they graduate. Er, kind of like the name might imply. It’s pretty cool though, to have the park to yourself all night long, even though as a high school senior you spend too much time being bummed that they search all the bags for alcohol.

Not all my Disneyland memories are warm and fuzzy. My biological father took us once, when I was fairly little and still really afraid of roller coasters. I cried during the entire wait to get on Space Mountain as he refused to let me out of line and kept telling me I would like it. I didn’t. It’s one of my scariest childhood memories, beaten out only by the time our car was totaled and I was afraid to ever get into another car. I did eventually get over the Space Mountain fear. And the car fear, now that I think of it.

I think I have taken every boyfriend I’ve ever had to Disneyland. None of them have gotten it. At all. I guess it makes sense. Why would you want to ride in a slow little boat and listen to robot dolls sing about the smallness of the world in many languages, if not for the nostalgia? Of course it’s annoying to hear me whisper the Haunted Mansion soundtrack as we pass by the hitchhiking ghosts. And fake singing birds in a bar with no drinks, alcoholic or not? Crazy.

I always go back to the old rides, even though the newer ones are ostensibly better. And I miss the ones that are gone. Bring back the Country Bear Jamboree, dammit! What did you do with Abe Lincoln? But old rides gone, new ones added, and current ones changed, I just love being there. I don’t even like Mickey Mouse and the rest all that much; it’s the park that I like.

It’s probably one of those “what have I known the longest” things. What is it that I know now that I’ve always known? My grandparents’ house. And Disneyland.

There’s this message board I’ve been going to for years, and they’ve got this obituaries thread. People post when an author or actor or some other celebrity has died. Of course, I have this whole death avoidance problem where I try to pretend that death doesn’t exist and we all just live forever, yet I can’t stay away from the thread. I’m always sneaking in there, freaking myself out. It doesn’t matter if the person who has died is 30 or 90. It hits me either way. I’m going to die! Fuck!

Really, every time I see a new post in that thread, I should click over to the Literature and Language thread instead and distract myself with books. But I don’t. I think about my own mortality and have a tiny anxiety attack and wonder about my life. Every single time.

What am I doing with my life? What should I be doing with my life? Should I be devoting my life to the betterment of the world for those who come after? Should I be saying fuck all that, this is the only life I have, and going where my heart tells me? What? I don’t know.

When I was younger, I was told, every day, that our lives were for the glory of God and every choice we make should be based on that. Makes life choices easy, really. But it didn’t give me much useful experience that I can use now. It also didn’t give me much experience getting comfortable with the idea that death was looming for me, since I was always told the rapture was any day now and we all would be whisked away. I was always looking ahead to the next milestone and hoping I would get there. I’d like to graduate from high school before the rapture comes. I’d like to start college before the rapture comes. Hey, maybe I could even graduate from college before the rapture comes! I think I started to stray a bit from the living my life for the glory of God party line when I started thinking, I really hope I have sex before the rapture comes.

I was much more selfless when I was younger. I seriously considered joining the Peace Corps. Later, I was convinced I would be a journalist, reporting on wars and turmoil around the world. And years before all that, I thought I might be a missionary, spreading the message of God’s love. In every case, I was ready for the dirt and the bugs and the sleeping in tents and eating inrecognizable food.

And now? I want to be happy, I guess. Do all the living I can. Whatever happened to just wanting to make everyone else happy? What happened to my desire to make the world better? When did I decide I didn’t want to sleep in dirt after all?

I was just invited to a gathering to remember someone who recently died. I never met him, but even so, it’s probably best I can’t attend. I don’t think I could take that much thinking about life cut short.

I no longer have this clear sense of where life is heading that I had when I was young. I’m not looking ahead to milestones that I hope I get to before life is taken away from me. I have no idea what’s next. I’ve learned that even with careful planning and clear goals, life is a journey with unexpected turns you have no way to predict. And some of them surprise you in the most joyous of ways. And some days are hard. And I wouldn’t miss any of it. And I guess since the time we have is finite, I don’t want to waste any of it. And maybe all my mini panic attacks are because I worry that sometimes I do.