Enjoying myself

So the time has come, and now harvest is over. I can´t say I am sad to put it behind me. I suppose it was partly culture shock, and partly the difficulty of working at a larger winery, but the style of working here drove me crazy. And the mood around the intern house was already rather Debbie-Downer, if you catch my drift. Sometimes I woke up sad, sometimes happy and ready to go, but always after 10 minutes talking with my housemates and coworkers, I was in a bad mood. We spent most of harvest complaining about harvest. That being said, oftentimes we were complaining about harvest over a few (or 15) Liters of beer, playing dominoes or going out partying all night...

So with a mixture of harvest-from-hell and fun times behind me, I moved to the center city of Mendoza. So did Mike, and the York twins, and we had a few fun days. Right before Jesse left, we had a crazy day of winetasting (we were just a little bit drunk) and I was reminded of how retartedly, awkwardly strong I am when I accidently bodyslammed a dear friend and gave them a minor concussion. Seriously. But besides that, everything was great, and we let off a lot of steam from harvest. Jenna and Mara (the twins) headed back to the US and better, richer things, and Mike and I continued our adventures. More amazing wine-tasting (few things are better than amazing wine, served by beautiful women, in a gorgeous winery, with a view of the astounding Andes mountains while eating a 7-course gourmet meal), more going out at night till 6AM and meeting cool people.

Hilariously, after all of this relaxing, I guess I felt the need to work more...I joined a local gym. I´ve been going twice a day and am in some of the best shape of my recent life. Today I rode my bike for 5 hours in the park and hills surrounding Mendoza, it was quite exhilirating and amazing to get out of the city for a little while, see some nature...

Besides variously indulging in gluttony and excercise, I have been sleeping odd hours (the daily schedule here involves a long nap late in the afternoon, a very long night, and then another nice long sleep until I wake up late...), practicing lots of Spanish (the place where I live has lots of older, very lonely women working who follow me around talking to me, so I get lots of practice), walking around the city alone while people watching, walking around the city with Mike while people watching and making lewd comments, and uh...more gluttony, excercise and sleep...

I have no clue what I am doing with my life, even less than I used to. It is definitely fun, and definitely unique. I don´t regret a moment of it...but I am losing my connection with reality and convention mores. I am so lost amidst beautiful distraction and people and cultures, that I often forget who I am, and what morality and philosophy control my actions. I have come to understand so many different cultures and philosophies, that at any given moment I can justify my actions by utilizing any of the above...it results in a shitfest of actions that retain very little central reasoning. I chalk it all up to experience, to the remembrance that I have rarely regretted things done, only things I did not do. So I act, act, act, and try to remember who I am, as I continue to drastically change...for awhile there, I had an anchor that I drifted around, which kept me stable, but now I am fully adrift...Gocke will join me soon, and together we will travel this crazy land called South America, and hopefully he will lend me some stability and reason for acting and remind me of the drive and inspiration that started this whirlpool...