This is an old passport photo from the early 1970's when I backpacked around Europe—all by myself—for an entire year. You might think I was brave, but truth is, I was just highly naive and very lucky.
These days, I am constantly reminded of this earlier incarnation of myself. In fact, at the start of my voyage, I found a girl standing in the line waiting to board the flight to Paris and she reminded me of that earlier version of myself.
She really was a girl. Okay, for all I knew she could have been thirty, but since I turned seventy—pretty much everyone seems younger than me. She had lots of caramel curls flowing down her shoulders. She smelled like sunshine and fresh air, as if she was a tiny French village nestled all by herself in the land of overpriced airport food, expensive lattes and sushi.
I asked her about the gate. Was I in the right place? This is another thing that’s been happening to me lately. My confidence has flown out the window—ever since I walked into the wrong house in Baltimore. In my own defense I was standing in front of a line of row houses and they all look exactly the same. My daughter chastised me and said that it’s not a good idea to walk into a stranger’s house, unannounced, unexpected. (As if I didn’t know this.)
However, this experience has left me with the sense that I could easily walk into the wrong house or board the wrong plane or the wrong train—which I also did while traveling from Penn Station to Baltimore. But never mind, I ended up in Philadelphia and a very nice conductor wearing a handsome red coat gave me a tour of the station and set me on my way again.
But, this girl in line at the airport--she assured me that I was at the right gate. I felt happy about that, but the thing that really delighted me was how she looked just like every other girl at Bard College in 1973. The long curls, the backpack, the eager smile. I had a fleeting thought that she was actually a ghost from my past. I’ve had that feeling a lot lately, perhaps because I feel like a ghost.
In fact, a Parisian friend recently told me that I look like a ghost. She said I need to cut my long white hair and that I should never wear my father’s blazer because it’s too long on me and just emphasizes my ghostly appearance. She told me she knows about these things because she was in the fashion business.
So, I not only feel like a ghost, I look like a ghost. I walk around all the time, and I’ll look at someone and think—didn’t I meet you at H.B. Studios in the Village in 1979? Didn’t we take scene study together? Didn’t you introduce to the joys of shopping for vintage at Screaming Mimi’s? Surely, you remember me? I always stop myself at these moments and say, girl, get a grip.
By the way, I never say girl, get a grip. I don’t talk to myself like that.
The girl at the airport gate (who was not a ghost) told me that she was on a pilgrimage. She was at a crossroads because she had gone to university to study engineering and graduated, but now she wanted to be a writer.
I told her I was a writer!
And then we talked about how to be a writer and also pay your rent and not piss off your parents. I told her about MFA programs and artist residencies and Poets and Writers. I gave her my name and email. I vowed I would help her.
And you know what--that’s not something a ghost can do.
Creative Friends, be assured that you are not a ghost either and so while you’re living, your assignment is to recognize your fellow-travelers and do what you can to make their journey a little smoother.
Love,
Jamie
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