I don't know.
Maybe you didn't.
Maybe when you were a kid you never wanted to run away.
Maybe you never rode your bike to the park and cried on the swings as the night air turned too cold for your t-shirt. Maybe you didn't hide under the bleachers in the gym, only to reappear after the other kids got picked up and then you threw the basketball up at the hoop for hours. Maybe you never snuck out at night and flipped burgers and then used that entire shift's pay on a nightly room in a boarding house and had to share a bathroom with the other boarders on your floor. Maybe you never sat out on the sand or lay back on the band-shell or just walked the city streets trying to stay awake till the dawn.
Maybe you never wanted to run away.
When I was a kid, I always wanted to run away.
****
I arrived in New York with The City clear of snow, but its trees still without their leaves. Lafayette was brown and grey and I wandered it below Houston, trying to work out which way was west and which way was east. The City moved fast around me. Pedestrians and yellow cars and agitated folk spilling up out of subway holes and hipsters riding bicycles hands-free towards on-coming traffic up a one-way street. It was all so angry and remorseful and motivated and aware. And I didn't feel any of that. I had time and I took it.
The place before had been just fine. I could've stayed put. The weather in Los Angeles always suits my clothes and there was plenty of work around. Rent and drugs are cheap and the bands playing the late-night bars are better than anywhere else. Escape and romance come easy there. I had nothing to run away from.
And even if there was something, the older me no longer wants to run away anyways. Not like I used to. It's the same as how I am with doughnuts or chips. As a kid, any chance to shovel that sorta shit into my mouth, I'd grab with both hands. But not anymore. I haven't had a doughnut in years and I only leave when the next place is next.
Way down south, on the same day as my wander through Manhattan's downtown streets, Mexican authorities began trying to shut down the sprawling mess that is Mexico City. They closed schools and museums and banned concerts and public gatherings. The army swarmed out into the streets, handing out thousands of blue, surgical masks to any and every person they came across. A deadly new strain of the flu called 'H1N1' had begun to take hold and was spreading fast. H1N1 reminded scientists of a disease found in pigs and so it became known as 'The Swine Flu'.
Now, that would've been something certainly worth escaping. I would've run away from all of that business. Even this older me with all the plain yoghurt instead of junk food would have burned any bridge on my way outta there. But none of that touched me. I didn't know about it. I was too busy looking for my own drama.
****
I left New York a few times over the next year or two. Sometimes I was only gone for a few weeks and other times I left to stay longer. And I always came back. The last time I left the most I felt was cold. That winter, I had stuck it out through most of the chill and the winds and the dirty, black, piles of snow, ice and freezing water that take over curbsides all over Manhattan. I could do it. I was showing myself that I could.
And then I got a call from Key West. They had a six month contract on offer. The money wasn't great, but the job started immediately and they had an apartment lined up for me. In many ways, Key West is like an island off the coast of the rest of America. I mean, geographically that's true - it is speck of land out in the ocean. But it also functions like that as well. Metaphorically. They move in different circles and from beyond the mainland, they're able to look back at the rest of the country and see it.
Hemingway and Tennessee Williams wrote some of their best stuff living there. Hunter S also wrote a few pretty epic pieces on trips around The Keys. Maybe if I headed there I could catch onto what ever it was they caught. I'd get the bar open and become part of the island and its way. I could set myself up there and let time let me stay. Sometimes, just being around is enough. I told myself all this, whilst packing my suitcase and loaning out my thick coats and scarves.
The hardest part about not wanting to run away is that it means you have to stick through the winter. Well, most of it anyways. You have to stay through the blizzards and the runny noses and water-logged boots. And it dents you. It wears you down. Slipping on the frozen bottom step of your stoop and landing hard on the sidewalk hurts more than your arm. It takes your ego too. The neighbors who see it happen, smirk at you. Some even laugh out loud.
And I'm OK living with all that.
Because even if I did embarrass myself by staying too long - holding on too long - the next place always comes next.
And to the people of Mexico City, even The H1N1 Pandemic is now just a story.
