This is the online version of my travel journal. It isn't as complete as my paper one, but still worth reading (I hope!) The title of the paper version is "The View From The Train Top", but I wanted something a little different for online. "Wanderlust In Motion" is a little more technical, perfect for a more digital view. Most recent entries are on top. ~Eryn At camp. Sunday, August 27th, 2000. 4:03 PM /Eugene, Oregon/ I saw the first and both-session campers off today! Walked over to the hotel with a group of unschoolers, and then off to Monroe park. After that I caught a ride with Nick and Justin and we trailed the unschool bus to the train station. Then I got sick of it all and walked back to the library. And that's where I am now. Ho hum. More later, when I feel like it. I think I should eat something before I forget. Friday, August 25th, 2000. 3:14 PM /Eugene, Oregon/ I have a lot of entries in my paper journal, but it doesn't look like they're going to go up anytime soon. First, because I'm on a computer in a public library and Second, because I only can use the computer for an hour at a time. So from now on it's short "checking in" entries. I am in Eugene, Oregon now, staying at the Hostel by night, and the library by day. This is my down-time, my own time. I'm looking forward to spending hours and days holed up in the library reading writing and surfing the net. Also, of course, exploring the city and getting together with campers before camp. I found this awesome vegetarian restaurant nearby the library today. Lunch was "all you can eat" for about seven dollars. I stuffed myself full, so full I forgot dessert until the cook urged me to try these blueberry cupcake things. Being on my own is wonderful, and very easy. I feel quite uplifted and not lonely at all! Oooh, and today is my birthday! I'm seventeen!! Friday, August 11th, 2000. 9:58 AM /Edmonton, Alberta/ I haven't updated this for a while, so Update!: I am staying with Dawn and Shippy now, and it's been pretty good... if a little chaotic. Shippy left to visit Noam early early this morning. We're all leaving for the west coast at different times. I got up at 5:30 in the morning to see her off. I only got about four or five hours of sleep last night but I feel pretty awake. I remember in the train station in Winnipeg, I was so tired that I kept hearing voices in my head and tipping over... that's probably the most tired I have ever been in my life. On and off sleep is what does that to you. At least I got a few complete hours of sleep last night. What have I been doing? Well, last night I attended a pagan circle dance with Dawn! It was quite interesting, although too long... my feet hurt at the end of it. The music was absolutly beautiful, all of it! We also browsed in some stores, and I sent off some postcards and got a present for Noam. We visited Christy and her family in Smoky Lake. I attended a derby there and got to see beat up cars crash into each other. Hmm. Ooh, and I develope some of my film today!! Pictures! Whoo. Saturday, August 5th, 2000. 3:55 PM /Eastern Alberta, Canada/ I could see the storm clouds we were driving into from the windows of the van. I never knew that rain could be seen from far away, that it looked like a grey curtain waving in the wind, hanging down from the sky. At first I thought there were tornado twisters, the rain was that thick. Now we are in Alberta and the sun is shining. My arms are tanned a lovely golden-brown, and I like to look at them. I like browned skin. I am too tired to write now. I think I should sleep. Wednesday, August 2nd, 2000. 11:57 AM /Middle of Saskatchewan/ The day before yesterday, Daniell and I took bikes and rode along the country roads into town. The skies were huge and blue, and the praries stretch for miles. We stopped at a pure blue pond and saw ducks swimming around. Except for the occasional motor vehicle, the only noises are those of insects and animals. There are many dragonflies around here, I love to watch them. I wish they would land on me. My friend Meg says many butterflies at a time will land on her. Lucky girl. I have henna tatoos on me, we made them yesterday. I have a tin yang on my hand, a vine on my upper arm, and a winding spiral design on my foot. I like the one on my foot best. Maybe I should ask for henna as a birthday present. Wow. I will be seventeen years old. Monday, July 31st, 2000. 11:19 AM /Middle of Saskatchewan, Canada/ Insight. Discovery. Some people meditate, some study, some find religion. But I am too distracted to meditate or study, too free to work, too unsure to tied myself down to one belief. So I go. When I seek personal evolution, answers, questions I move I go. Go! I am at Danielle's now. She lives in the country and the place has no name. She lives two miles from a place that can barely be called a town. People say Sakatchewan is boring, with it's endless praries and farm silos, but I love the nature here. It is green, very green! There are fewer trees, and the skies are overpowering. They call this "the land of the living skies". I feel mellow and rested. Thursday, July 27th, 2000. 11:53 PM /Minneapolis, Minnesota Fifteen minutes after leaving St. Paul, there is a 45 minute layover in Minneapolis. I'm killing time here. Hehe. I'm a time killer. Yeah well. The bus station is bigger than the one in St. Paul. It has lockers to store your luggage, a snack bar, grey cement floors and harsh florescent lighting. I put a quarter into a candy machine and it swallowed it up, giving me nothing. Quite annoying, but not as annoying as my cell phone, which wouldn't turn on at all when I tried to call Mom. But that was my fault, I forgot to charge it when I had the chance. Oops. Bus stations at midnight are different than stations in the daytime. People seem more awake, for some reason. I can't believe I have to transfer at five-thirty in the morning!! There will be a two hour layover in Fargo, North Dakota, then.. I expect I'll be writing again. We had an unschooler get-together at Jessica's yesterday. We went to a lake beach, and forgot to bring sun lotion. I have gotton badly sunburned for the second time in a month this summer. I will never learn. Ho him. 5:42 AM /Fargo, North Dakota/ North Dakota sunrises are beautiful. I remember one from the train last year. Now I am watching from a bus station in Fargo, a town that looks like the middle of nowhere with it's cement and wires and factory sillouhettes. I guess the town must have some importance, though; I heard there was a movie made about it. I hope they filmed the sunrises. I got literally now sleep at all last night. It is just impossible to actually sleep on a Greyhound bus , even if you have two seats to yourself, which I did not. Towards the end of the ride This bus station is friendlier than the one I was in last, the one in Minneapolis. The floors are not cement, they're made of some plastic I guess, the material of most kitchen floors. The walls are brick, and there is only one small lobby, so I can see what's going on around me. And the vending machine actually gave me a Milky Way bar, yay! I was thinking of sleeping on the floor here, but it would be quite uncomfortable, although maybe not as uncomfortable as the bus itself. I might or might not try, probably not. I leave in forty minutes for Grand Forks, wish my bus would get here. I will board it and selfishly keep two seats to myself... or not. Not if another old lady is in need of a seat. I'm too polite. Ha. Yeah. I have a lump in my lip that I keep biting, my stomach hurts, my hand is getting cramped. Ho hum. All a part of travelling. I'm waiting. I wonder if I'd like anyone who lives here. I wonder if I know anyone who lives here, and just don't know it. Well, with all my Internet friends it's certainly possible. My fingers are cramped and my hand is shaking; I better stop writing. Good morning, more later. 9:15 AM /Grand Forks, North Dakota/ Actually you can sleep on Greyhound. I did it, a miracle! But I had two seats to myself, so I could lay down. Laying down is the only way to sleep, believe me! I skim through a u.s. news issue on the seat beside me. A couple interesting articles. A few people are sitting out in the sun, but I am inside, looking through the window every once in a while. I hate the sun, at least for now. There's a cute guy hanging around, I like to look at him. He's dark, Hispanic maybe, with short brown-black hair, straight and cropped close to his neck. He is wearing a shimmery shirt and a black, also shimmery, jacket. He is smoking a cigarette outside. I hate to say it, but it adds to his cool look. Oh well, I can't be politically correct all the time, can I? I like his face. It is thin and searching. I didn't drink my tea this morning. 3:50 PM /Winnipeg, Manitoba. Canada/ Well I survived customs, the glaring sun over me, hazy, as I slept half-consciously on the bus. I lay down on the two seats I had and let my feet dangle in to the aisle. I just let the day carry me, dazedly. Then I ended up here, in the train station. Soft hues, marble floors, and high ceilings. A wide wide round dome room, and echoes. THis staiton is so quiet, there aren't many people here. The signs are printed in both English and French, proof that I am in the middle of Canada. Canada feels safe. It really does. Sunday, July 23rd, 2000. Around 7:15 PM /St. Paul, Minnesota/ I updated this with a few entries I wrote on the bus from Michigan to Wisconsin... you'll have to scroll down a bit to see it. Nothing much has happened here, I've just been hanging around eating sleeping and talking to Jessica of course *smile* Everyone visit Jessica, she's really cool! ;-) Whoo. I think it's on Thursday or something that we're having a get-together of campers and campers-to-be... we're all going to the beach! There will be me, Jessica, Elsbeth, Ryland, Lotus, Lotus's sister (I think her name is Ali), and a girl named Darci who I've talked to on ICQ a couple times. I think that's all, hopefully I didn't miss anyone. It'll be a lot of fun! Yay :) Is that Ani playing? I think so! Ani! Yay! Little things like that make me so happy :)) Saturday, July 22nd, 2000. 12:51 PM /St. Paul, Minnesota/ Eryn is at Jessica's right now! Yes I am, and it's very nice :) I have time to catch up on online stuff! :) Hey, here's an idea. If anyone actually reads this, put your name on the bottom. [0] I want to know who's actually interested in where I am ;-) I may copy stuff from my paper notebook in later, but that's later. So, for now, I'm off to do other things. Thursday, July 20th, 2000. 7:57 PM /Menomonie, Wisconsin/ I'm considering just stopping the thing with typing in my paper journal0 to here. For one thing it's getting too personal, and another thing is I'm just too lazy or busy. I'm at Ryland's home right now, which is a beautiful and very unique place. Jenny G. is visiting as well, and Lotus is over. I'm afraid I don't feel too social, though. Not right now, anyway. I hope that mood will change, so I wont' be holing up in Rylands room writing on his computer. Yeah anyway. i was at a campout in northern wisconsin with some other unschoolers... none campers except for Jenny and Ryland. It was very interesting... though not exactly a calm, mellow experience. Heh. yeah. Spirits wandering around, weird energy, fucking group dynamics Wednesday, July 12th, 2000. 7:33 AM /On a Greyhound bus bound for Wisconsin/ I just called Mom. It was good to hear her voice. I don't really miss home, though. It's not right here right now. I just realized I am doing a lousy job of writing, though the bus bumping around and shaking my pen doesn't help much. It's early in the morning yet. The sky still has that blue-grey look to it. I think most of the other people on the bus are resting; I'm sure they had to get up as early as I did. So far I don't mind the bus - it's not much more uncomfortable than the train. And I love the windows, which are quite big, and clear. Maybe I will change my mind, though. Right now the bus isn't that full, it's quiet, and I have two seats to myself so I can sleep. I think I should do that sooner rather than later. 11:54 AM The Chicago bus station is a confusing place. Not because it's big it's not like the train station but becau<SE of the way the system works. It seems a little more scrambled than the Amtrak system. RIght now I"m on the bus bound for Milwaukee, Wisconsin: my first transfer. It leaves in about three minutes. I feel rather guilty. A kind old woman asked if I was alone, and then offered me her window seat. I asked her to move to another seat for a minute, so I could get my bags in order, but she didn't understand me, and stayed in the aisle, causing a person to yell at her for blocking the way. I told the person it was my fault, and that she shouldn't yell at the old lady. THat's my good deed for the day - I hope it makes up for me putting her in that situation in the first place. I still feel guilty, because small things like that always do that to me, but it will go away. On the other bus there was a guy who kissed his love goodbye and boarded the bus in Michigan. I watched through the window. He had dark, curly hair and a kind of determined face. He wrote in a notebook while I watched him; I felt kinship towards him. He seemed a lot like myself, and we are both on journeys. Yes. I am wearing my khaki pants, a black tank top, a magnetic bead bracelet, and the silver dolphin necklace that Dawn gave to me, sneakers, and a big straw hat - the same one I wore to camp last year. I feel like a traveller in these clothes. But... maybe I would feel like that mo matter what I was wearing, as long as I was moving. 4:55 PM Greyhound Bus Station /Green Bay, Wisconsin/ LIttle did I know I would run into a dear friend in this bus station in the middle of nowhere. But I saw her elfin face, with the closely cropped hair and pointed nose, I knew she could be no one else. After a few hesitations, I walked over and started to say "I know this might sound silly, but are you Already I have written more than I did last year, and, dare I say, better as well. I just want to get everything down, I want a record. Even the things that are not particuarly amazing, like right now. Like how lonely and muted it is out in the middle of nowhere, with the endless fields and farmhouses. The small towns with starkly quiet bus stations, and nothing around to enclose and protect it. Not the woods, not the mountains, not the buildings. The only soubd I hear now is the hum of the bus going down the long, long road stretch. It's a little mournful, it's a lot beautiful. I want to remember that. Sunday, July 9th, 2000. 10:38 PM /Middleville, Michigan/ Currently I'm visiting Amberlee, Lareina, Minetta, and Heather Simon in Michigan and having a good time! Yesterday I met up with Adam Dicarlo in Chicago and it was cool; he's fun irl just like online! :) Anyway, I wrote a lot of stuff in my travel journal, so here's some goodies, whatever I felt like typing in here and letting the whole world read Anyway! I'm happy, and everything's good, and the trip really isn't as scary as I thought it would be. Yay :) Saturday, July 8th. 5:43 PM. /On the train from Chicago to Michigan./ Oh, I see I'm in Indiana now. We just stopped at the station in Hammond/Whiting. And now we are turning to Michigan. Yay. I love traveling, but it will be nice to rest somewhere that is not moving. It will be nice to see Amberlee and the rest of the Van Striens, and Heather. Lake Michigan is lovely. It looks like the ocean; unfortunately, I can't see it now, because there are some factories in the way. I'd like to see the sailboats again. Oh well. Teatime. I'll write more later. 6:43 PM. /The very beginning of Michigan./ I like writing in the snack car. There are nice, flat tables and the windows are bigger. I have to write each letter slowly and carefully, because the train is moving fast and it's bumpy. We are passing through woods and fields, and they are so green I can't believe it. Very lush, like Oregon. Green all around. I love looking out the train window at the end of the day. I could write poetry about it. Maybe. You know, I thought I would feel...wiser... when I was traveling, but I feel normal, same as ever. I feel still and calm now, but not in the way that comes from things resolved. But maybe I don't want to feel resolved...yet. God knows I procrastinate too much. Was it a blessing that my walkman broke? If it was working, I wouldn't be writing now. Who needs to write when you can listen to music? Both are relaxing for me, but different. Music is a confirmation of what I think and feel inside, and writing is an explaination. I wonder why I need to explain so much, especially to myself. I just realized I am freezing cold, but I don't think about these things when I write. We just passed a cemetary. Cemetaries are still, but everything is still in the late evening. Well. Timeless. Now there is sand being dug up. I wonder why. I am curious about everything when I am moving. Three more hours until arrival; I wonder if I should sleep. However, I like sitting here and writing. I wonder if anyone else hears voices inside their head when they write. Mine dictates my pen like it's writing a speech for an audience, or an essay, an explaination Ever heard a train toot before? It's not a short and high sound, but long and far off, like a foghorn. Friday, July 7th. 9:13 PM. /Somewhere in New York or Pennsylvania, on the Amtrak Lakeshore Limited./ Well. I can't sleep, so here I am writing again. I'm wrapped up in a nice, very comfortable, Amtrak blanket. The Amtrak conductor gave it to me because I looked so young and vulnerable, and I asked them to turn down the air conditioning. I guess there are some advantages to being small. I feel partly happy now, somewhat apathetic. This trip doesn't feel real to me yet; there is no mad creative inspiration seeping through my fingers onto the paper. I'm just passing the time until I am able to sleep. Though who knows if I'll be able to sleep here? But that is a part of travel. There is a creepy drunk man, or maybe he's hung over, opporsite me. He keeps staring at me, and it is a little annoying! He's wearing a loose tank top, hasn't shaved for a few days at least, and keeps coughing and grunting. The woman next to me fills out crossword puzzles and leaves me alone. I like that. Stupid walkman won't work. It messed up two of my times and contributed to most of my travel frustration so far. That's another reason I'm writing; I can't listen to my music. Damn. I"m wondering if I should send it and my tapes back home Okay, enough writing. Time to attempt sleep. [0] Reanna, Ari, Lotus, Erin, Courtney, Amar, Rosie, Carrie, Katelet, Jessica, Summer, Danielle Levesque, Marina NBTSWikiWiki | Recent ChangesEdited 34 times, last edited on September 5, 2000 by 207.98.52.108. © 2000 NBTSC Webmasters |
it was about four in the morning
