Out Of Time

This month makes seven since we left Tulum. If someone had asked us in October where we thought we'd be in seven months, there's no way we could've known exactly, but we definitely wouldn't have even imagined we'd be in Xalapa, Veracruz. This is one of life's greatest lessons we've learned on the trip: Don't make plans.

The other day I was talking to our friend, mentor, and fellow cyclist Paco whom we met in Coatzacoalcos last November. I was telling him we hadn't even left the state of Veracruz yet and he responded with this in a voice message:

"That's the way the journey goes, my dear Alys. The journey is letting yourself be driven by what the journey asks of you. Sometimes, the journey asks that you go faster. Sometimes the journey asks that you stop. Sometimes the journey asks that you reflect. Sometimes the journey asks that you break down. That's the way life goes, isn't it? One must always be open to what our existence asks of us."

And that's exactly how it goes. Our journey hasn't been consisten nor predictable, and we're definitely not the same people as when we just started out. Out bodies are different, our purpose is different, our perspective, expectations, habits and abilities, our interests, dynamics, priorities and motivations have all been adapting to each of our own personal growths.

Some changes are more evident from the outside, like my hair that is now about 13 cm. long, or Delta who now ways 17 kg., or that fact that there's one less person in our travel team (we miss you Yenina!) However, I've noticed some changes that are a bit less obvious, and perhaps may even go by unnoticed to someone who has never experienced this lifestyle.

Traveling by bicycle also implies a shift in consciousness of the person who chooses to do it, especially when it comes to the perception of time. We experience and measure time differently, as if our bicycles created their own temporality. Time has actually becomes one of the most palpables uncertainties in our day to day life: How many hours will it take us to get there? How many days will we stay here? In how many weeks will we arrive over there? Where will we be after several months? How many years will we continue do to this?

At some point, these questions flooded my mind on a regular basis, whether because of my own questioning or because someone else would ask, and I would try to approximate my answers as best I could but now they all just felt like wild guesses. I've come to realize there will never be a right answer, so instead I should stop agonizing over them in exchange for the wisdom of our new best friend and travel companion, miss Patience. she has taught us that there will always be a right time for everything, and that the times will always align themselves. If you don't believe me, I'm not the only one trying to live this way. In fact, every plant and animal I've met is moved intuitively by time, as if equipped with an internal clock that tells them when to flow and when to grow. The thing about this clock is that only they can hear it. So when we practice this listening to our internal clock, we are also becoming closer to nature and her cycles. We are learning to synchronize with our own natural rhythm and live more presently.

Personally, the greatest gift lady Patience has given me is the gift of slowing down time. Seven months actually sounds like a relatively short amount of time considering everything we've been through and the stories we've gathered. I now understand that time passes by only as quickly as you live it, and if you're anything like me, and enjoy taking in every minute, wishing they would never end, you're better off living slowly and patiently.

After a month and half reflecting on this and so many other lessons in Xalapa, the time has come to move on, because the journey has asked it of us. We will continue to practice listening to our internal clocks day by day, though it's not always easy to coordinate between three very different people. In fact, our clocks are seldom within the same timeframe, but somehow we always manage to make it work. And when it doesn't, we at least try to have fun and laugh about it... because as far as I'm concerned, that's the way family journeys go. :)