On: Social Experimentaion

I went to Edinburgh, Scotland to work, but I managed to squeeze in some R&R too, and of course that nagging pull I have to continue exploring the world...

It was a rainy night and I was craving real conversation, I decided I wanted to have an evening out, so I got to work setting those wheels in motion. I pulled out my phone and began swiping left and right to find a companion. Before long, I had managed to secure a meeting place at a local pub, with a man who had two pictures and no profile paragraph. Over brief texting we both agreed on liking beer. There you have it, meeting in public for beer with stranger. This should be fine.

As it turns out, it was fine. All those miles from home, and right there in a tiny Scottish pub, I sat drinking American beer with a fellow American. Bizarre as it seemed, suddenly I wasn’t lost and alone, suddenly I wasn't thousands of miles away from family and friends. Suddenly there was a touch of the familiar, a burst of comfort, and with just 5-weeks left in the UK, I was delighted in all that was happening against whatever odds.

Background: A week before this moment in the bar, I was feeling a bit lost; a few factors had me questioning my future. I wasn’t eager for tour to end, as I was enjoying being a traveler, but I just felt this intuitive feeling that my life couldn't just be a broken record of on tour after the next setting myself up for no chance at ever meeting anyone I would get to know longer than a week or two. 

It’s common in my line of work to wonder which direction to point.  I actually remember this moment when I was thinking, “I want to be unlost” and then I thought about how I could tackle that. Before I knew it, I was very relaxed there, still not sure how to un-write my conundrum, but I fell asleep. And I think my subconscious took the reins from there because I ended up in a Scottish pub with a series of events in motion that made me unlost.

Dr. Patrick, you won’t believe how glad I am to have met you. (The names in this story may or may not have been changed to protect the innocent) What a mind you have; it’s a brilliant, curious, edgy—and now, it's famous. Congratulations on those 10,000 words.

You have the potential to leave something behind and I hope you do. What’s that brain made of? Maybe it has those golden flakes you can see delicately wafting in the liquid of a snow globe.  Whatever the case, it’s your nucleus and it took years to lather and marinate in a million curious ideas. I loved observing you, listening to you, and talking with you. For what it is worth, I felt pacified in the tiny sliver of life we shared, on a friend date, in a foreign country. At some point I truly believe we develop our own soul and that budding forces begins to pull towards it likeness until you collide with the one you could and will spend your life alongside.

This person is definitely was not Dr. Patrick PHD and author from Texas. But he was a metaphor for that person. He was an opportunity to see an opportunity.

I am one who never found comfort speaking of my grand illusions plainly. I’ve been told I think a little deeper than the standard comfort zone permits. And yes, I contemplate fantastic ideas and possibilities of the mystical, but insofar, I tend to scare people.  

But who cares? I simply hate the idea of spending all my beautiful time with people too busy or fearful to just wonder. What a splendid thing...  just to allow yourself to wonder.  So, I’m still doing that, wild and often and it leads me to every open door I think, I thought, I ever wanted to walk through.

I said it was our fault that we had met. I believe it was.