In the evening, we went to a restaurant called “Falafel King.” It was my first time trying falafel, but I don’t think it was the falafel itself that didn’t agree with me. I must’ve contracted a food-borne illness from something that was in the falafel, because the next morning, I had to vomit, and I was so deficient of energy that I could hardly move from the bed I was lying on. To make it even worse, Josh and his soon to be wife Mary had already gone to work, so I remained at the house to suffer alone. It was a long trip back home to Madison, and it was pure will that got me up and back to my car, practically crawling to it, and surviving the entire four hours plus trip where I would finally be able to rest in the comfort of my own bed at the end of it.

“No wonder! With a name like ‘Falafel King’ I’m surprised they didn’t have the toilets sitting right there next to the table!” my cousin Greg, Josh’s step brother said as I recalled the incident during the wedding.

Perhaps, in some strange and roundabout way, having to drive home with food poisoning increased my resilience in preparation for the bigger trip that I was about to make around the states. If I were going to think of every little thing in life as having a definite purpose, then that’s the best lesson I can take from it.

Aside from the wedding, while I was in Wisconsin, my second purpose was to collect my remaining funds and close my bank account after having only one dollar left. I wasn’t sure when or if I would ever come back to Wisconsin to live again, so it made sense to me to do that. The money I withdrew would at least be a start in Albuquerque, but it wouldn’t last long.

For the trip back to Albuquerque, I also took the Southwest Chief as I did on the way up. Up until the train arrived at the Kansas City train station mid-morning for a brief stop, the ride was uneventful. While we were stopped, I was suddenly awakened to a federal agent who rushed onto the train, singled me out, and asked me if she could check my luggage. This was still during the whole terrorist boogeyman scare campaign that proceeded after 9/11, and I must’ve fit the profile based on my appearance. I was so tired from just having woken up and hardly had a rational thought floating in my head that I could grasp onto as well as having nothing to hide, so I just said, “Go ahead,” still half asleep.

After rummaging through my suitcase and discovering that I had nothing illegal, she thanked me sternly, and I just remember dismissing her with a, “Yeah (whatever)...”

A couple sitting nearby who were a good three decades older than me saw what happened, expressed empathy toward my situation, and made an invitation to treat me to breakfast in the dining car, which I accepted. In the dining car, sitting at the same table, the three of us had a good meal and a good conversation as the landscape rapidly passed by us just out the window, and we all exchanged contact information before going back to our assigned seats. It helped pass the time meaningfully, and it was nice to get a free meal considering how little I had to spend, regardless of the reason which initiated the invitation.

As we got closer to Albuquerque, a man in his late twenties to early thirties sitting in a seat across the aisle started up a conversation with me. He was from Albuquerque, and knew the place well. We also exchanged contact information before arriving at our destination. It seemed like doing such a thing was more of a formality than anything, because 99 percent of the time it never seemed to lead to anything, which is just as much my fault as anyone else’s. His final words to me were words of caution.

“Whatever you do, avoid “The War Zone.” When you see a cop car chasing another car down the road and they’re shooting at each other like in the movies, you’ll know you’re there,” he said.

“Yeah, I will.” I replied.

Seemed like easy enough of a thing to avoid. I did notice on the TV, when I stayed at the hotel just before returning to Wisconsin for the wedding, that there was a news report in which three people had been shot and killed in one day. I didn’t think it was my lucky day to see that, and guessed it wasn’t an unusual occurrence that happened in the city.

After arriving at the Albuquerque train station where I disembarked as the train proceeded on its way to Los Angeles, I found my vehicle, which I was grateful was still there. Someone had begun some construction work around it and had put up chain link fences nearby, and there were no longer any other vehicles parked in the stalls except for mine. It was fortunate that not only didn’t I get towed, but there was no ticket either. Since I was only gone for less than a week, I guessed they decided to give me a chance to get back to it before too long.

I still hadn’t contacted my friend Cameron yet, so that was obviously the first thing I needed to do. Since I had a phone with no service, I had to find a pay phone. There was a gas station on Central Avenue that had a pay phone that I used. Reaching into my pocket, I realized I was short on change. A woman walking by on the sidewalk, observing my situation, stopped, reached into her pocket, and grabbed some change and handed it to me. I was very thankful, as nobody else I ever encountered back home likely would have been so attentive. Despite this place still being ”The Wild West,” it seemed like it had another, more hospitable side to it as well, if that woman’s behavior was any indication of anything. If I wanted to navigate this city successfully, I would have to learn how the two fit together in order to avoid certain outcomes.

I dialed Cameron’s number and got no response. I waited for several minutes and tried again. There was still no answer. I realized then that it probably wasn’t going to be easy to get a hold of him and needed to be prepared to get through the day without his assistance.

So that I wouldn’t be bored beyond my tolerance limits, I drove around the city, finding different locations that had pay phones, and kept trying to reach Cameron. As I mentioned previously, the radio was like the soundtrack of life for me at that time. A new song that just started playing on the radio called “Oye Mi Canto” was featured heavily. As I drove from location to location, across the hilly desert terrain, I observed the street names and architecture of buildings that had a lot of Hispanic, Latino, and American-Indian influence. The song fit well with my new surroundings, but unfortunately, this was a time of heavy frustration, not enjoyment.

Finally, after two or three hours of failed call attempts, I was able to get through to Cameron, and he apologized for not being responsive. At least I got a nice self-guided tour of different parts of Albuquerque while I was waiting to become more familiar with the place, though there was still a lot more to see.

Cameron and his mother as well as one of his aunts lived in an apartment together. They invited me to live on their couch until I could find a job and be able to afford my own place, which I was grateful for. I used their apartment as a base of operations during my mission to find a job. Since I had more restaurant work experience than any other kind of work experience, I made that kind of work my first priority. Driving through the city, I scoped out a couple of restaurants not too far away to apply to. Interestingly, one of them was located on the corner of Madison Street and Monroe Street. What was especially ironic about that is that my previous job was in a Southwestern restaurant in Madison on Monroe Street! My old restaurant also took a lot of artwork specifically from New Mexico. Those three separate items lined up perfectly in the way that they were reflected here. They didn’t have any jobs available at this restaurant, but I took the street names as a sign that I was at least on the right trail.

If I learned anything from my previous stay in Florida, it was that I needed to be strong. There’s no way to know what kind of enemies or extreme circumstances I would meet in a new place such as this that had already proven that it had a very violent side. While everyone else was gone for the day, and while I wasn’t job-searching, I would turn the TV on to the cable music stations that played music endlessly each day. As a fan of electronic music, I found that station particularly motivating. I’ve always appreciated electronic music because of how easy it can be to get into the zone while listening to it, and it often has high energy and isn’t tainted by negative or egotistical messages, though some of those types of songs I appreciated in different circumstances. When it came to making achievements that demanded a lot of focus, it wasn’t the ideal time for me.

I didn’t have any exercise equipment, so I kept to the basics, mostly sit-ups and push-ups. My max number of push-ups I could do in a single workout session was around 200 reps, and sit-ups were around 100. Of all the songs that played while I was “training for battle,” the most memorable ones were: “How Did You Know” by Kim Sozzi, “Free Me (Full Intention Remix)” by former Spice Girl Emma Bunton, “You Move Me (House Deluxe) by Amber, and “Nothing Fails (Peter Rauhofer Remix)” by Madonna. It was like the lack of a female presence in my life came in an unexpected form, one which helped get me motivated to keep fighting for my goals each day.

Based on my childhood experience, I came to value strength over intelligence in some ways, but I had also brought some books my friend Richard had given me to continue learning about the mysteries of life. The mundane didn’t interest me very much, but that also hurt me in a few ways, like not fully understanding what is happening in the moment when my instincts didn’t alert me to anything, or when I didn’t listen to them. I wasn’t so balanced in that regard. The big appealed to me while the small did not.