Behind-the-Social-Media-Scenes

Real > Ideal

Carly Brand
Aug 24, 2017 · 4 min read

Listening: Soulfight by The Revivalists

Reading: Being Mortal by Atul Gawande (Yes, still. I’m almost done and WOULD RECOMMEND TO A FRIEND)

Thinking: “I am always doing what I cannot do yet in order to learn how to do it.” Vincent Van Gogh

Dear You,

My first four days here swirled away in a whirlwind. Until I talked to my mom, I hadn’t realized how they overflowed with activity. I navigated the grocery store, negotiated a bike, viewed two apartments, volunteered for 6 hours on the rooftop farm, met Mads for breakfast, took the train to Due’s for dinner, watched two films in the park, ran a bunch of miles, secured an apartment, found a roommate, endured 7 straight hours of rollercoasters at Tivoli Gardens with Kisser (who am I kidding I loved every second) — all while writing and working for Change Food and FRESH Med NYC.

When Sunday morning I woke without anything planned, I hated it. I became acutely aware of the ocean between me and everyone I love. And to that great distance I could add 50 states for most of my family in Seattle. I ached to be on Bainbridge Island spending time with Uncle Grady, whose hourglass lost a sum of sand much faster than could ever be fair or forgiven. Dear Grady, the “Fuck This Shit” socks we gifted you don’t begin to describe my sentiments.

Lunch at Grady and Dana’s on Bainbridge Island, July 2017.

After those couple of gilded months I spent in Ecuador after high school, I promised myself I wouldn’t omit life’s ugliness on my social media platforms and that’s why I won’t do it now. To scroll everyone’s social media during those fresh-outta-high-school months was to believe that each and every person lived a life of effortless adventure with new and everlasting friendships abound. I was just as guilty of it as anyone, posting the positives before phoning home and sobbing through a laundry list of negatives.

So while I love my new home and will sing its praises any day, I fully admit to pangs of deep loneliness. Like my second day here, when I was pulling weeds at the urban farm and talking to a woman about my idea for hospital rooftops.

“What are you studying here?” she asked.

“Global Nutrition and Health,” I replied.

“Well, you won’t learn what you need to know there. And you can’t just come to the farm and think you are going to be able to learn. You need to study agriculture. Have you learned anything about soil? Have you ever taken any classes on farming? When I studied, we started with agro-economics…”

“Oh, no, I don’t expect to learn how to farm overnight here, I know it’s not easy, I just — ”

She launched into a tirade about how students coming from the European Union take advantage of free education in Denmark (paid for by the locals’ taxes) then leave directly after graduating, never to contribute to society. I doubted I could be more of an outsider.

(Since then, this woman has been nothing but kind, if not opinionated and willful. And she’s also not Danish. Not to mention, everyone else at the farm makes me feel wholeheartedly loved.)

All the world saw of the legendary food poisoning incident in Ecuador.

It is uncomfortable to be excluded in Danish conversations, too, even though it’s never malicious. But the moments I dislike most are probably those when I think to call up one of my best friends or family members and see if they want to just do nothing together. I’ve grown unaccustomed to being alone for any length of time, actually, and so whenever my brain registers there’s no one to call, I think my facial expression must look surprised in the most pitiful way.

These are but fleeting moments in the spectacular now, and spectacular it truly is. It would just be terribly dishonest if I pretended it was all bike rides and rollercoasters over here, because it’s not always. Life is ugly. Loneliness is dirt. Distance is worms. Cancer is amoebas on flees on rats swimming in a port-a-potty.

❤ Carly

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