Modern Booty: Experiences

I've been away from home 33 of the last 84 months. That's almost 3 of the last 7 years. Seems more impactful when said the latter way. I started when I was just about 18 and suppose I really only stopped in between for university. I'm not sure where the instinct comes from, if it's even some kind of inborn quality, but I'll just say I fit into the category of people with an adventurous spirit. Aaargh! I'll also give some credit to my lovely parents who possess similar spirits and took us road-tripping around the Southeast when we were growing up. Everything has a beginning, and this one is right after high school graduation.
      There was something about that first taste of true independence when I was 18 that changed everything. It was the catalyst that came at the right time, as so much of life depends on circumstance and developmental experience.  It was Rehoboth Beach, Delaware (the first state) in the summer of '05 when Mario and I arrived after our typical senior trip in Cancun, Mexico, which was a time when I didn't even stop to think, "Wow, I'm in Mexico." Fresh out of high school, Mario's long lost biological father began to reconnect with his maturing son, and advised us to spend the summer working at Funland, a beach-side, family-oriented, amusement park. It was our first communal living experience, and the moldings of our future began then.
      That summer we were endlessly stimulated and enthralled. We had escaped Southern Louisiana and we were making friends from all over the world who were equally open and excited to new experiences. In the end, that's the essence of traveling I think. The underlying group consciousness, the "we're in it together and we're all loving every second of it." We shared stories from Colombia, England, Scotland, Germany, Kenya, ate together, laughed together, were embarrassed together, roamed the boardwalk together and admired each other for being so different but similar all at once. We weren't each others friends from back home. We were young, free and enchanted with life.
      Now, 7 years later, I'm in my shadowy kitchen in Northern Spain processing the circular green tile patterns on the wall in my periphery. My cup of coffee is going cold next to me, it was too weak anyways, and I'm waiting for the right time to go surf at the city beach. I'm again living next to a cold, northern, Atlantic beach. I'm still living communally by having an "open" apartment and accepting couchsurfers when I can, and by trying to assure friends that they can drop by whenever they please. I've taken immersion a step further by deciding to live in Spain for 2 straight years and realize that I'm still chasing and catching that initial experience from Delaware. That's what we travelers are, right? Experience chasers, it's why we can't stay put in the same place for too long. At least for now. There are too many open, interesting, interested, free and fun people to meet and learn from. I know it won't last forever, and don't think that I want it to, but for now let the adventure continue.