Jeff's Place - Travel - Jeff's Trip

Instead of hitting the beach, I headed inland to Mount Tamborine.

Riding out to Mount Tamborine in Victoria's rented Jeep.
(photo by Victoria)

Lori and Natalie in the park.

Lori unwraps a birthday present.

A kookaburra. They sound like monkeys.

A goanna scales a tree.

Walking into the park.

?, Victoria, and Lori.

Victoria and Lori go for a dip in a cold stream.

Victoria lounges on the rocks.

From the mountains, you could make out the hotels that line the beach in Surfer's Paradise.

From: Jeff Nyveen
To: my friends and family
Date: Thu, 27 Jan 2000 20:29:20 -0400
Subject: :(

Tonight, we went to a bar called Shooters to celebrate Lori's birthday. We went in, had a few drinks, and turn around to see a very drunk Neil was all over this rather hot chick. Next thing I know, I'm drifting into that state of mind that I had quite often at home and hoped to escape while in Australia.

I'm not sure what this is called, and how many other people have it, but every once in a while, usually every 3-4 months, something clicks inside my mind to send me into a world of loneliness, depression, and self-doubt. I start thinking about whether or not I am really happy, what it would take to be really happy, and whether it's even possible to be happy. I think about family, friends, and girls, or lack thereof. I think about my life back home, and whether or not it's the kind of life I really want to have. I think about my career and money. And I think about how different from everybody else I sometimes feel. Sometimes, I suddenly feel like I don't fit in, while everybody else around me seems to fit in just fine. And, despite all I have to be thankful for in life, how everyone else seems to be enjoying themselves a lot more than I am. Then I start philosophizing, trying to figure out the meaning of life and the secret to the universe.

All this, and then I come home to find two people having sex in my room. As I open the door, I see two pairs of legs shuffling to conceal themselves under a tiny blanket. Out of courtesy, I immediately leave and mention under my breath that I'll be back in 15 minutes. I sit on the steps waiting for them to finish and for someone to come out so I can go to sleep. No one comes out. Fifteen minutes pass, and I walk back into the room to find two
of my roommates, both male, laying separate beds. No wonder the chap was more than happy to let me read his magazine while I took a crap. It was FHM, the UK equivalent of Maxim, "The Magazine for Men." What a joke.

It comes and goes. Tomorrow, I'm sure I'll wake up, have a chicken salad sandwich and a flat white for breakfast, and continue having the time of my life down here in Australia. That's how it usually works. Apparently there are some virtual reality batting cages around here. Baseball always seems to put me in a better mood.

My friend Louis wrote me an inspiring little note and I wanted to share it with all of you:

Don't worry about going broke. You have the rest of your life to make up all the bread your spending. Fuck it.

Stretch it out.

If you have to become destitute for a while, just do it. Can you really put a price tag on the kind of adventure your having? No way. Money is over-rated anyway. What you are doing now, at your age, is priceless -- because it will only happen once. Now.

Someday you'll be sitting at a table in a conference room with a clutch of weak-minded, self-important, businessmen, listening to them drone on about budgets and deadlines and exposure and stepping on toes and hitting the ground running, and as their words collapse onto each other into a gray, nebulous, benign puff, your thoughts will reach back to dusty nightclubs and lesbians, jumping out of perfectly good airplanes, southern hemisphere sunsets, cockroaches and the heat, beer and condoms, busrides and mutton.

They'll know your mind is in more excellent places, but they won't dare ask where.

Thanks, Louis.

Tomorrow, I'm off to Brisbane for two days, and then to Noosa for five.

Jeff

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