----- Original Message -----
From: david j rodriguez
hi, justin & co.-
sorry about th installments- but that is precisely how i see myself working: th confessional poet influenced by th serial saturday matinee!
here is some background on my main focus- walking th camino de santiago pilgrimage route, hopefully along its burgundy route starting in th town of vezelay all th way to th cathedral city of compostella where i was briefly a student in '71- '72 (supposedly classical philology & letters- for a while preparing for th entrance exam toth fine arts academy of san fernando in madrid...hugs, d=(8{>)
To: Thy Tran
Sent: Sun.25 November, 2001 20:50
Tell me, why have you become such a hermit?
-oof. in 25 words or less?
...from earliest recollection, rules for going out of th house to play were so strict (i had a bicycle for less than a year when i was twelve before it was stolen- w/ heart in mouth i wd sneak out of out gorgeous little subdivision development behind th university of puerto rico to a nearby shopping center where i bought comics & mad magazine...)
-& then there were my two kid brothers...i learned to escape inwards- was an avid reader from an early age...
i'll send you a pretty wild rant i wrote fueled by my first cup of coffee after three-four weeks off caffeine during
my illness last summer- goes into more of this 'backstory'...
there's a few immediate factors fueling my current bout of reclusiveness-
i spent my budget for two years in 2000, mostly from buying th snazzy little vaio laptop i'm working from & treating myself to a sampling of seasonal game at some of th best restaurants in nyc-
(sorry to say, though, i never made it to 'daniel's' or 'acquavit'
...my personal favorite for impeccable cuisine w/ zero attitude being 'gramercy tavern'-
oh, i also kept postponing a more formal dinner visit to 'union pacific' after casually walking in for lunch once)
...while waiting in vain for sony to exchange th machine or fix some vague quirks which would haphazardly
cross th line into malfunction-
sitting in my little room at th carlton arms for th better part of three months i had ample time to indulge my habits of self-questioning, self-criticism & second-guessing all of my purposes & priorities.
in hindsight, i mighta coulda shoulda just gotten on that plane. but i decided i did not want to take a single step for distraction or escape, i wanted to stare this one down to whatever nitty-gritty existential void i might need to face...
still, i kept & still keep coming back to a quote bruce chatwin relays- 'life is a journey to be made on foot'.
i returned to puerto rico hoping to make th best of my circumstances-wait for th market to rebound(hah)& rebalance my finances while seeing if there was any progress on unresolved family issues.
i had plans to rededicate myself to hiking th camino de santiago by th end of th summer, but i wanted to put
my little toyota rav 4x4 on th ferry to th dominican republic & drive around for a couple of weeks in july
when th lymph nodes close to my groin on my left thigh swelled up...
www.wanderlustmedia.com : a virtual ground for homeless desire