Was that a dream or is this a nightmare?

On a plane again, where I find myself so often. I must have taken off one hundred times, yet, it still seems as incredible as ever. One hundred and eighty people being lifted thirty thousand feet into the air, before travelling one thousand miles in two and a half hours… C’mon! Somehow it also still scares the hell out of me, you’d have thought that over the years I’d have developed a sense of indifference, but no, as we speed down the runway I still start wondering how my friends and family will react when they realize that BA 1626, whose wings exploded on takeoff, was actually the flight that I was on, I begin to wonder if my facebook page will just go on existing, and how long it will take for my friends to remove me from their profiles. Then, at, I’d have thought, around ten thousand feet I usually look around and realize that I’m still alive, as opposed to being on fire, and I look out the window, and try to identify the lights below, but often find it more amusing to conjure up constellations of street lights and motorways! I remember when I was about fifteen and I believed in fate, in the conventional sense, I’d study the crowd boarding the same flight as me at the departure gate, wondering if they looked like their time was up, before wondering if I should get on the plane or not! ‘He looks slightly ill’, I’d think, ‘what if this is it for him? And those guys look a little grey, lifeless even, oh my, I’m going to become god’s collateral damage, I need to alert the flight attendants!’

I’m sad to be leaving, terribly sad! I’m going to miss everyone, my Mum, my house, Loulé, my friends (all a y’all), my dog, the clear skies, the rainy skies, the cold coffee, the delicious ham and cheese toasties I refuse to call paninis, the stupid bets among friends you know you’re going to lose, and the ones you know you’re going to win, the warm reception I get from people I don’t know, but have known all my life, the complaining, the praise, the stupid arguments over forgetful draws and inconsequential turns, the open road and the traffic jams, the food, even the food I don’t really like, the love I get, the love I get to give, the sunglasses and the darkness! Why am I leaving? I feel as though I’ve been asking myself the same question for four years. At what point do you admit you need to live a little, where do you draw the line between living for the moment and investing in the future? The last week hasn’t been extraordinarily especial, that’s the funny thing, that’s what makes it so great, it has served to remind me how absolutely remarkable day to day life is in Portugal… Now, I’m going back to work, going back to a well paid job, where people are only interested in me for what I have to give them, for how I can make them money, where the only interesting girls are over 28 and where dogs wear coats and eat boneless meat… Where you can’t sit at a café on a street corner without worrying about being mugged, where people get paid for being lazy, and get bonuses for being single parents, sure, Portugal has its faults, but that’s only because Portuguese people tend to go a bit power mad if they’re given any authority, as opposed to being dosey, politically correct cretins who turn human rights into an absurd pathos which ends up punishing the people they were initially designed to protect. I know, I know, I’d be asking myself the same thing, if I feel so strongly about it, why am I going back then? Well, I suppose right now I just don’t see myself living at home, it’s not conducive to being a big businessman or a young lawyer, or a law student (which would be the most I could aspire to for the next four years anyway.) I’ve learnt to make decisions whilst on dates, when buying a movie, when choosing an answer to awkward questions such as: ‘Does my bum look big in this?’, however, it’s somehow considerably more difficult when you know your decision will have a visible impact on the rest of your life. (I’m sorry if this is a bit vague, I went to bed at four-ish this morning then had to wake up at 9:00 to greet the carpenter. (I’m listening to artists I’d otherwise never listen to, whose sole purpose is to keep me awake at times like these! (I can’t really complain though, I do have a whole isle to myself and have somehow found a way to take up all three seats!)))

I can’t believe I didn’t make it to the beach! It really says something about you if you go on a Mediterranean holiday, manage to make the casino, but not the seaside doesn’t it? Uh, uh, uh! I also learnt how to play squash and I kick arse!!! The first time I played I managed to lose gracefully, and the second time, I actually won a match, but lost the set, but that doesn’t matter I WON A MATCH! I also managed to beat Hugo at foosball last night, making twenty bucks, which he gracefully transferred to my pokerstars account this afternoon! Oh, by the way Hugo, thanks for the net ;) !

My Mum made my dog obese! He can hardly walk; I’ve never seen a dog have to hop six times so as to build up the momentum to actually lift its front paws off the ground! Although, my Mother does have a habit of making things fat, sometimes I could swear that the garden gnomes look podgier than before!

Anyway, I’m out, thanks to everyone, thank you to you all, hang loose, I’ll be back!

Peace,

K