Originally, my plan was to travel the country in my Mini, working at a Starbucks in each city I stopped for a few days at a time – connecting with customers, listening to and combining their stories along with mine right here on this site.
18 cities, 2 and a half months.
I’ve been a barista for a year and a half, and I’ve loved it–the people I work with, the customers, making the drinks, the rushes, the lulls, even the frustrating parts–it’s given me all sorts of insight into my self and into how I deal with other people (and how I would rather approach them) and being the shy, somewhat scattered person I thought I was (and how I would rather be). To that, it has also all been an exploration into the characters I take on in order to compensate.
Somewhere along the line, I missed the transition between my being withdrawn, shy, and indifferent to this whatever it is I’ve got going on now and how my characters have breached and sieged parts of my existing personality.
So, since Starbucks wants nothing to do with having me work my way around the country, picking-up shifts and blogging, Tweeting, and YouTubing my adventure, and since I haven’t found a full-time job in the past year and a half I’ve been looking, I’m hitting the road on my own.
I do have a few objectives.
Along the way, I will
- talk to as many people as I can about the personalities they take on in their different environments
- observe the way people interact
- compare both to observations about myself
- find that something that I love to do
- find my voice both physically, and as a writer
- discover, for myself, what strings us together
- probably reveal far too much about myself in a public forum
I’m far from perfect.
I don’t claim to be now, and I won’t be once I return.
All I’m looking for is a change of mind, and usually, when I’m looking to spend some time thinking, I go for a drive.
That’s all I’m doing, really.
That, and taking a ridiculous road trip.