June 9th 2014
I’m sitting in a café in Frankfurt, finally able to gain
some perspective on a long trip which is nearing its end. I breakfasted at my
hostel, and as I walked back into an empty dorm-room, a sense of absolute
stillness suffused the atmosphere. The air was thick, warm, and pungent with
the odors of a dozen people who had come and gone during the night. Beams of
sunlight streamed in through the window, and the sounds of the city below were
muffled. Only dust, and the jumbled memories inside my head, stirred within
that empty, disheveled room.
I took a seat on the lone chair situated in the corner. As I
sat down, twenty months’ worth of memories flooded my consciousness. I pondered
in the stillness for five minutes; then ten, and then I lost track of time.
Recollections of the trip played at random – each a wordless clip of the
various incidents of the past twenty five thousand kilometers.
I had already reviewed these memories several times, but in
that moment I noticed that their texture had changed. What had once been a mere
archive of historical information about my trip had become something dynamic; seemingly
separate from me, yet tangible. I felt as if I was watching scenes from someone
else’s life. It was there, in the stillness of that room, that I began to realize
that my trip was finally over, and that I had enjoyed it immensely.
But, how did I get to Frankfurt? The last time I wrote, I
was very much in India. That was nearly five months ago, and much has
transpired since then. For better or worse, most of my travel since then has
been inward. That story will have to wait. The bill for my cappuccino has arrived,
and I must for hunt down a good mechanic in Frankfurt. I’m still with the
motorbike, and she needs new tires.
I’m sitting in a beer-garden in Bruges. The bike is in
tip-top shape, and it rode the 500Km from Frankfurt quite smoothly. The weather
in Belgium is uncharacteristically perfect, with cool morning and evenings, and
moderate, sunny afternoons. I’m sipping down a tall wit-beer, enjoying the
shade of a tree, looking out over a gorgeous canal in the picturesque, tourist
laden town of Bruges. I shipped the bike from Kathmandu to Frankfurt only a few
days ago, and am only one day’s ride away from London. For the first time in
seven years of travel, my perception of the world seems altered in a way which
feels permanent. But, as travel has also taught me, so much can change in so
little time.
Poignant memories of the trip continue to roll in
sporadically throughout each day. My mind is changing so rapidly that it is
hard to put much faith in the thoughts it produces. Currently, I consider the
trip to have been a tremendous experience, and well worth the effort. However,
any assessment I made of the trip just a few short weeks ago was unambiguously
negative. Several times I had declared the trip to be the worst decision I have
ever made. I had become frustrated by all the time and resources I was wasting.
I was frustrated that none of my most important plans were coming to fruition.
I was frustrated that I was frustrated must of the time. Eventually, I fell
apart. I became numb, and apathetic. I didn’t care what was happening with the
trip, and I didn’t care that I didn’t care. Months ago, I lost the ability to
enjoy things which I normally find enjoyable. This, in turn, forced me to
retreat the only place I knew I could: inward.
Fortunately, I recognized my inability to enjoy things relatively
quickly, and this gave me a much clearer idea of what was happening. I was
becoming depressed again. About twelve years ago I was diagnosed with
Dysthymia, which I understood at the time as a persistent, low-grade form of depression.
I never put much stock in the diagnosis because it always felt like excuse
making. Additionally, any such diagnosis came loaded with stigma – both public,
and private. Was I really one of those weird, nutty individuals who has psychological
problems?
As the years have carried on, I noticed that most people
have psychological problems. Mild or moderate, clinical or anecdotal, named or
unnamed, I have noticed the rarely discussed fact that all problems are,
ultimately, psychological in nature. Even the supreme problem of death is a psychological
problem inasmuch as people’s psyches do not often feel like being dead. To be
upset, to feel discouraged, to be afraid, to be anxious, to be angry, to be
resentful; these not all psychological problems, regardless of their proximate
cause. However, some problems have pathologies and diagnoses, and some do not. While
it is normal to become sad, or angry, or distracted from time to time, it is
abnormal to be incapable of experiencing happiness, to be boiling with rage at
the slightest infraction, to experience anxiety over trifles, to be unable to
pay attention to even the most basic task, and so on.
I have observed myself over the years, and I have noticed
that I really do get unreasonably depressed from time to time; in a very
predictable manner. I’ve been through five major depressive episodes by my count,
including this most recent one. Fortunately, during at least two occasions I
felt as if my life was fine in an objective sense. Nevertheless, I was unable
to feel good about life, or about anything at all, during my depressive
episodes. Objectively, everything was fine, but my experience was anything but.
I should be clear that I’m not talking about feelings of sadness.
In my experience, the most defining feature of depression is the inability to
feel much of anything. Depression is continual apathy. Sadness, if it comes at
all, comes later in the process. For most people, depression is often preceded
by negative life events, and is experienced by most at some point in life. In
my case, severe depression has twice descended upon me for no reason
whatsoever. For this I am grateful because it removes the mystery of my
situation. In two instances, I could plainly see that I was not depressed about
anything in specific. I was doing things I wanted to do; doing positive, life
affirming things that had once brought me considerable joy. However, whenever a
bout of depression randomly descends upon me, nothing can bring me joy. Initially,
nothing can really make me sad either. It is only after weeks, or months, that the
gnawing inability to feel anything starts to resemble what might be called
sadness.
And this is how it went with this last episode, which lasted
about five months. Looking back at my journal I can see the general rise in
negativity leading up to depression. There was no singular cause that I can pin
down, but evidence of its progression is unmistakable. When I left Calcutta in
January, I was headed south towards Chennai, and a place called Auroville. I
had made plans to spend a month volunteering in Sadnah Forest - a sustainable
living community in India. At the time, I was suspicious that I might be
falling into a depression yet again – my first in almost four years. I figured
that a month of hard labor, early rising, healthy food, and community
involvement would be just the medicine I needed. There is strong evidence to
back up these claims, too. Involvement with other people, doing meaningful
work, eating a healthy diet, and engaging the body in copious amounts of physical
exercise all have very, very strong correlations to the experience of
well-being. I had numerous reasons to look forward to a month at Sadnah Forest.
From Calcutta I had to ride about 2200Km to reach Sadnah
Forest. The road was very good by Indian standards, but that still meant I’d
have to avoid a bevy of livestock, tuk-tuks, push carts, pot-holes, bicycles, motorbikes,
and the omnipresent transport trucks which belch diesel fumes, and drive as
whimsically as they please.
On the way down I spent a few days in the beach side town of
Puri, and later Gopalpur. I made some friends, and technically I had a good
time. But, due to the mounting depression I can’t say that I was able to enjoy
much of it, no matter how wonderful I thought it was in an objective sense. The
weather was good, the people were great, and India was as amazing as I could hope
for it to be. I could acknowledge all of the good things in an objective,
didactic, intellectual sense. But, I could not feel the goodness of the
surroundings. I could not experience the lesson.
Back in Calcutta, I had taken up regular consumption of
booze, and hashish. I can enjoy these substances in moderation, and will little
ill-effect, when I’m not depressed. However, I rarely feel like drinking when
I’m truly travelling; truly happy. Depression can be so numbing that it compels
the experiencer to try and feel something, anything. I tend to drink far more
when I’m depressed, and am also more inclined to smoke hash, or weed, as the
case may be. This time I added a new vice, totally out of line with my
character. I started regularly smoking cigarettes. This is not something I’ve done
before, and I am, in fact, against it. But there is the rub of depression: you
don’t feel much, and thus don’t care one way or the other about anything.
Better to feel a transient a nicotine rush, and the regret of having started smoking
at thirty, than to feel nothing at all.
Fortunately, I have started to care again. I quit my brief
experiment as a half-pack-a-day smoker about two months ago. I have slowly
sipped my delicious wit-beer here in Bruges, and have no desire to order another.
I’m off to stroll in the beautiful backstreets of Bruges; to sit on park
benches, and chat with anyone who is up for a chat. It may sounds cliché, but
its true: with the depression recently gone, I feel like my old self again –
the gregarious guy I know who loves to be travelling.
I’m sitting in my friends’ apartment in London having
arrived – smelly, but smiling – late
last night. The ride from Belgium was fantastic. The roads in Europe are as smooth
as silk, and the countryside this time of year is charming, and lush. Crossing
the English Channel was a cinch thanks to the Chunnel train. I was parked
behind an amicable English couple who were returning from a week in France. Using
the toolkit for the motorcycle, I was able to help them fix their malfunctioning
bike-rack while we were in transit. I considered it a successful day.
I left Kathmandu just over one week ago. I spent the last
three months of the trip in an apartment in Bhaktapur, Nepal. I retreated there
after my plans for southern India came undone. I had made it as far south as
Chennai, the capital of the state of Tamil Nadu, a major port city on India’s
east coast. The heat in Chennai was oppressive, even in early February. I was
two hours north of my intended destination of Sadnah Forest, where I was set to
volunteer for a month.
My plan was to stay in Chennai until I resolved a legal issue
which had been plaguing me for months. I was riding a foreign motorcycle in
India, and thus required special paperwork to temporarily exempt the bike from India’s
hefty vehicle import taxes. Initially, the bike was granted 180 days of tax
exemption, with the ability to apply for an additional 180 days of exemption at
a later date. I was told that the extension process would be simple, and quick.
But, knowing full well the depth, breadth, and incalculable inefficiency of the
Indian bureaucracy, I began making inquiries several months ahead of time. From
one office to the next, my inquires bounced. I was told to check with this
office, then that office. I was assured that I would find firm answers in
Calcutta, then the office in Mumbai, then Chennai, and then finally New Delhi.
In the end Girish – my faithful, hard-working, and exceedingly
generous Indian friend – did most of the legwork. In New Delhi, Girish ferried
my ever-expanding application from one office to the next, spending several
afternoons riding across town in New Delhi traffic after work. Unfortunately, there
was a slight problem with the time-table. If the motorcycle was not out of
India by the time the extension was granted, then I would be liable for the
import taxes. For two weeks I would wait in Chennai for a decision regarding
the extension.
A ceaseless chain of cigarettes, and coffee was my
breakfast. A liquid meal, followed by the second barrage of cigarettes was my
dinner. For lunch, I would a stroll just before sunset until something caught
my eye. During these two weeks, I stayed mostly in my room, and spoke to as few
people as possible. I slept at odd hours, and managed to keep busy doing a
whole lot of nothing. After breakfast I would plunge into my books. In the late
afternoon I would roam the streets for an hour or so. As I walked, unsullied
cynicism coursed through my veins, and informed every passing thought I had in
Chennai. In my notes I can see that I still found India exciting and intriguing,
but more for its frequent displays of extravagant depravity than anything else.
Negativity was all I could see.
Stuffed into the tiny tourist section of the tremendous city
of Chennai were all the greedy touts, nefarious beggars, faithless charmers,
and niggling importuners that travellers are bound to encounter everywhere in
the world. In India, such performers are colorful, and gritty. These
city-dwelling deceivers are found in their most concentrated form anywhere
tourists congregate.
Initially, they may be hard to distinguish from the
genuinely interested, and superbly trustworthy locals which outnumber them
ten-thousand to one. But, regardless of how well one can detect such people, a
traveller can never be free of them. All travellers in the developing world
wear the same sign around their neck, a blight of privilege. It reads: “I am a
walking wallet.”
On my daily lunch outing I kept my distance from people, and
brushed off any unwanted encounter as best I could. On the surface, I was my
normal convivial self, but inside I was hostile. I was still in love with India,
yet I wanted to brawl. I wanted to unleash my growing indignation with the
Indians who gave India a bad name. I walked the streets as a sentinel of rage.
Fuel by self-directed anger over my own decisions, I was eager to unleash pent
up feelings in display of tremendous violence. I recognized that my wavering
brain chemistry was beginning to get the best of me, and so I took advantage of
the one luxury I did have: the ability to insulate myself.
As the days passed it became increasingly clear that the
Indian government would not render a decision regarding potential import taxes
in time. Therefore, I would have to get the bike out of the country, which
meant driving back to Nepal. In a haze of apathy, I glibly accepted this new
fate and more-or-less appreciated it as it gave me a mission. The trip would
take at least a week. I backtracked over the East Coast Highway all the way to
the outskirts of Calcutta. From there I headed inland through Bihar, aiming to
arrive at the border of Birganj on the last day the bike was legally entitled
to stay in India.
The journey was exhausting, and dull. My mind was numb, and
listless by that point. I overnighted in a half-dozen strange India cities –
arriving at night, and departing in the morning without saying much more than
“Hello, how are you? How much for the room. Thanks. See you later.” Travelling
was terribly uninteresting to me at the time. In fact, travel was a burden
comprised of broken dreams, and tiresome hassles that I wished to be rid of at
the earliest possible convenience.
I fell ill just outside the city of Patna, Bihar. I spent
three nights enclosed in the first air-conditioning, hot showers, and clean linens
I had seen in months. I ordered bowl after bowl of overpriced chicken noodle
soup, recovered many hours of much needed sleep, and finally had a chance to
wrap my head around the situation. I was unraveling in a way I had seen many
times before. Things were going wrong, but they didn’t upset me in the slightest.
Or, did they? I had no clear idea. I did realize that I needed to take a
higher-level look at the situation. I needed to eat healthier, I needed to stop
being so damn angry all the time, and I needed get the bike to the border by
the end of the following day.
I departed before the Sun was up, and was on pace to make the
border by noon. In the fresh morning air, slicing through the empty streets of
Patna, I was enthusiastic. I knew was on my way out of India, and whatever
horrendous state I was in. I longed for Nepal because Nepal meant rest, and
repose. If I smiled at all during these times it would have been the morning
that I rode out of Patna. I seemed on the verge of something new. Some sort of
positive change seemed to be just on the horizon.
Hours later, at the border of Birganj, I would take my last
pictures of the entire trip. I have only just reviewed them. Without realizing
it, I didn’t take a single picture during my three additional months in Nepal.
I hardly went anywhere, took any notes, or did much of anything. I found a well-appointed
apartment in charming town of Bhaktapur, and there I stayed. I have never been
in such a neurotic funk before, but at least I was comfortable. Although I knew
something was wrong, I was grateful that I had the means, and wherewithal to
keep my head above water.
Each day I was stuck in a bizarre, and hopeless loop of
attempting to read the entire Internet – in order understand everything that
can be understood – before crossing off items on that days scant ‘To Do’ list:
get out of bed, shower, eat food, etc. By baby steps I was able to climb out of
depression, eventually employing all of the best known remedies. I have much,
much more to say on that subject, but it will have to wait. Today is July 1st,
and my friend Girish has just messaged me concerning my whereabouts. I managed
to land back in the Western world on a spectacularly high note almost one month
ago, and have been feeling great ever since. I am currently touring the Scottish
Highlands; the weather and riding are the spectacular.
I learned so much about myself during this trip; so much
about subjectivity versus objectivity, reality versus perception, determinism
versus free-will, acceptance and surrender, versus hard-headedness and ignore-ance.
I don’t think it is possible to understand everything that can be understood. I
am suspicious that the set of all things which can be understood is either
infinite, incomplete, or most probably both. Fortunately, therefore, I need not
fully understand what the previous sentence means, and thank goodness for that.
However our sense of awareness arises; wherever the boundary
line between the inanimate, unconscious mater which comprises us, and the sense
of being a thing which is alive is drawn, I am, and forever will be, glad that
life happened. There are currently seven-thousand-million independent human
selves scampering across the surface of the rocky sphere we call Earth. And
though it may seem that we are organic automatons, stranded on a sphere, twirling
around the nuclear furnace which drives all life on this planet, the experience
of meaning does arise. Our incomprehensible insignificance in the grand scheme
of things matters not. Locally, we each represent an entity which can feel.
Sometimes the going is rough, and the capacity to feel is a
burden. At other times, the configuration of the Universe is such that being
able to feel is the greatest of joys. For now, I seem to have found a solution
to a passing phase of stasis. The dynamo in my head and soul is active once
again, and it compels me to travel ever onward. This particular trip is nearing
its end. I will soon sell the bike, and return home. As always, the larger
journey continues, and I am already dreaming about the next phase.
My apologies for not getting back to the people who messaged
me in the past few months. Such messages were a source of the few smiles I did
have during my random bout of depression. Of course, I intended to formulate a
reply to these messages, but that task was on the ‘to-do’ list which was preceded
by the infinite loop – the aforementioned hopeless, obsessively driven task of attempting
to read the entire Internet.
Thanks to all who have read this blog. I hope to add at least
one more post regarding my thoughts on depression in general, with the hope
that it may be helpful, or interesting, to anyone who wishes to read it. All
humans go through a wide range of experience based on causes external, and
internal. My last depressive episode was instructive to me in that it had a
ratio causes which allowed me to maintain objectivity throughout the experience.
I was continually aware that my subjective experience (that of being depressed)
was at odds with my objective circumstance (that of doing exactly what I wanted
with my life; doing things that I supposedly enjoyed). Because of this, I never
lost touch with an appreciation for the bigger picture. I felt lousy – and recognized
that I may feel lousy again for no particular reason – but I never lost sight
of the ceaseless march of time, and the change it always brings. Everything is
temporary.
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