I was on the road for kind of a long time. During that time, as a dude, you learn how to basically be a hobo but still be allowed to use the computer at the library. Most libraries don't let people with huge backpacks come in and hang out, which sucks. Sometimes you need to print a boarding pass or use a photo editing program or just read a book that you don't have room for in your bag-that-has-everything-you-own-in-it.
So I learned to keep my facial hair nice and tidy. I made sure to speak clearly and concisely when addressing new people. This helped dispell the 'yikes' vibe that some people give you when you obviously don't have a house or car to put your shit in. There are lots of little things like this.
Additionally, when you are volunteering and working for your food and a bed, not just for currency to be dispersed any way you wish, there are other etiquettes that must be observed. For the most part, I had to blend in with whatever crowd of people I was living with. I had to make sure not to rock the boat too much. I had to be pleasant, a good presence, and worth the effort for my hosts. This wasn't too hard, I AM generally pleasant and enjoyable, at least on the surface. I enjoyed my short relationships with many different people. It gave me perspective into the lives of others, allowed me to see the similarities that exist in all humans, and showed me things about myself that I should be happy about and grateful for.
Now, I've settled in. I've found a home. Not necessarily a physical structure, but with another person. I've found someone who I actually like (not that I didn't like my other friends, but part of the enjoyment was that I knew that our time was limited). I have room to stretch our and explore again. I am vastly interested in who she is and what she has to offer the world. I want to help her achieve her goals while at the same time teaching myself how to care about another human being.
The downside is that I'm becoming weirdly uninterested in the rest of the people in the world. Sure, they're great, but I'm cool with spending my nights with just her. I'm not wondering what's going on 'out there' as much, and when I do, I want to go out and explore it with her.
I write a lot, and this change in pace is showing up in the art. For a while, I was recording thoughts that I couldn't exactly spill onto my 'single serving' friends. Now I went ahead and threw that out there for everyone to see. You can check it out here if you want. I have a lot of ideas about art, creation, fiction and the responsibilities that are required of participants in that process. We all have a job to do. Everyone from the writer, to the reader, to the subjects, to the characters. They aren't really different. If fact, as far as I can tell, they're all the same. The 'me' that I write about is no different than a character that I 'make up' in a story except for that maybe I have a little more insight into the character of me than I do into anyone else. So, I kind of feel like a better writer AND a total failure when I write about other people, especially when they don't exist (whatever that means). I get to guess at their lives, and that is cool, but I know that sometimes I get things wrong, and that makes it feel inauthentic.
Anyway, I have the time and means to explore all of this right now, and it's cool. As I learn how to listen to another fully actualized human being, learn that she is not me and she has different motivations and reasons for doing and thinking the things that she does, and that I don't really have a say in her internal process, I feel like that helps me to write about everybody that I write about, including me and her, in a more productive, complete way. It also makes me kind of scared to fuck it up. What if I kill someone off and it's a total mistake. Yikes. Maybe I'll call George R.R. Martin and ask him how HE sleeps at night. He'll probably just tell me that it's not his fault, it's just the world that he's writing about. Or maybe he's just a lunatic.
Hell.
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