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Journal Entry #2:

Evidently I was not meant to maintain a diary of my life, because it has literally been two weeks since the last time I wrote in this. A lot has happened, to say the least.
I successfully arrived in Ireland and met up with my friends Colm and Rocky. The first time I came to Belfast was with a pro-diplomatic, apolitical organization the summer before my freshman year of college. I met people from all over the world, especially Northern Ireland and throughout the United States and places like Belgium, Norway, Italy and Russia. Made a lot of good connections then and some lifelong friends, all of whom I still keep up with (and many of whom I have made contact with since I began this, well, for lack of a better word, quest). The second time I visited Belfast, it was the summer after my sophomore year of college, the third time was about two years ago, and that time Sarah came with me. That was a great trip, getting to introduce her to all of these friends I rarely got to spend time with. This was my fourth time back. I feel like I could afford to spend a lot more time there, as in like, maybe move there and get a job there. Live there, even if it’s only briefly.
The first night, the three of us went to dinner, hung out and played guitars and whatever while drinking a few beers and talking about life and it’s multitude of mysteries. Being with these guys made me realize how much I missed them. When we went back to Colm’s flat to hang out after dinner, I met Colm’s younger sister, Eimear, for the first time, as the last few times I’ve been to Belfast, she wasn’t here, but this is her second year studying at Queens University, my last visit having been a year prior to that. She’s very attractive. Medium height, light complexion, blonde hair and very pronounced blue eyes. She’s almost a foil to Sarah, who is taller, with dark hair and dark eyes.
The next day we drove out to Rocky’s relatives in County Londonderry. The scenery was amazing. Rural Ireland is not to be missed. We stayed the night there and then came back the next day. Rocky’s relatives were very nice, but I had to repeat everything I said to them about five times. That evening, I played a show at this bar. I got paid like, £100 for the gig and then another £60 in tips from the audience. I guess they thought I was pretty good. Anyways, wound up doing another show the next evening, got another £150 or so, and then the day after that Rocky and I played on a street corner for a few hours and earned about another £100 between us. Made more than enough to buy a rail pass.
My last night in Belfast Colm had a big party at his flat, which was really a going away party for Rocky, with whom I was leaving for London the next day. The party was insane! There was so much alcohol, I felt as though there was a haze of it in the air. At the party, I spent a lot of time with Colm’s sister, Eimear. I had never met Eimear before this trip because she had never really been around, basically. I got really drunk at the party, and Eimear didn’t help. She kept on getting drunker and drunker with me. Colm, if you’re not already aware and this is how you find out, I mean you no disrespect, but Eimear and I had sex. I guess I’m a charming drunk, either that, or Eimear picked up on my attraction from our introduction, but we were definitely hanging out together at the party all night, and then I remember sneaking off with her to her room. She woke me up at like, four in the morning, my head was pounding and she kicked me out of her bed, so I stumbled into the extra bedroom.
The next morning Rocky and I departed for London, and landed there about lunchtime. Rocky had just moved back to London after spending the summer in Belfast. He’s doing some type of fellowship at I think the King’s College London, so he lives there and teaches there and also has courses he takes. His flat is small, but nice.
That night started out normal, but changed for the weirder, we went to dinner and then got some coffee. On the patio of the coffee shop, we met a couple of English girls, who found us fascinating for whatever reason. We went back to their flat with them, had some wine and interesting conversations as we got drunker and drunker. By the end of everything, we were playing spin the bottle. I think I kissed Rocky? I don’t exactly recall, but I wound up messing around with one of the girls, I don’t even remember her name. Rocky and I got back to his flat at like, three and crashed hardcore.
I woke up on the floor next to the couch. It was the second morning in a row I woke up with a nasty hangover. Also, it was the second night in a row I’d been with a woman other than Sarah. I decided I needed to pace myself with the women. In order to do so, I decided I would go spend a little time with my relatives in Kent. So I spent another uneventful day hanging out in London with Rocky before I caught a train to go meet my family in County Kent. My grandfather, Charles Thorne grew up in Kent and served in the Royal Navy for like, twenty years or so, including serving through WWII. By the time he settled down in the U.S., he was probably in his mid-forties, I want to say forty-four? But he married a girl who was an old family friend’s daughter, and she was about fifteen years his junior. My dad was born in 1951, Charles and Clariece Thorne’s second son, but the first American born in the family. My grandfather died a very old man at the age of ninety-five in 1999, giving me fifteen years to get to know him, and I am so glad to have known him. Such an interesting and intelligent man. He spent a lot of the Great Depression era stationed in Hong Kong, and was called back to England about a month before Japan began it’s conquest of Asia. He spent the war fighting the Germans, having been almost sunk by U-Boats on multiple occasions.
Anyways, I hope you enjoyed my family history lesson. I met up with my cousin Dan, I called him from Rocky’s phone. He’s about two years older than me. He just got engaged last month, so he was pretty sensitive to me, knowing that I just came out of a long relationship. It’s refreshing to have a European perspective on what I’m going through and my mindset. My relatives here don’t blame me for my decisions. They understand that I have my reasons and they respect them, granted they don’t know I’m trying to live off the radar. I’m sure that my relatives on my mom’s side of the family back home are having a field day with my “craziness”. My mom understands and that’s all I really care about. I was picked up from the train station by my cousin Dan. I always remembered whenever we would meet up with this side of the family, which was reasonably rare, seeing as how there’s an ocean between us, our relatives would always laugh about Dan and Dave playing together. The last time I saw Dan was my sophomore year of college when he and his then girlfriend came over to the states on a holiday. We always stayed in touch. He’s been nothing but nice to me, and it was good to hang out with him again. I stayed with my relatives in Kent for about a week. It was a pretty nondescript stay. They were all very courteous and glad to have me around. Everybody in the Thorne family thought highly of Charles, so being his descendent had its benefits. Where does that put me? Five days in Ireland, two in London and seven in Kent, so that’s fourteen days... and at this point at which I am writing, I’ve been overseas for two weeks. Currently, I’m on a flight to Berlin and I’m going to meet up with Anna Kreuz. I stayed with her and her family when I visited Germany about nine or so years ago with this other “diplomatic/apolitical” exchange thing, which is really just an excuse for people to travel cheaply. I’ve already been in contact with her and she wants me to come visit her at her apartment in Berlin, where she works. She’s from this small town out in Bavaria, so I’d go visit her in Berlin, then go with her back to her town. The first time I visited Germany was the summer before my senior year of high school, and the second time was the summer before my sophomore year of college. Then I met up with Anna once in Paris the summer after I graduated.
Now, the entire time I was with Sarah, I never fooled around with any other girls, I never once let it escalate and I always tried to avoid those situations, but I wound up kissing two other girls when I was dating her, one of whom was Anna and the other was some chick that was my friend’s beach house neighbor in Florida. Luckily, she’s never found out. Lord, do I regret doing that. Even now, after we’re over, it still eats away at my consciousness. I don’t know if it’s called cheating, or if it’s called slipping up when Sarah’s not around, but I tried really hard to not let it happen, and when it did, I could never forgive myself. Anyways, when I was in Paris, I’d gone with a few friends from college, we were celebrating our graduation, and I had never been to Paris before and I told Anna about it and she happened to be there at the same time doing some kind of study program. She came out with us one night, and we had all gotten rather drunk. Around probably three of four in the morning, I was walking her back to the university housing she was staying in. I went in with her and we got to her room, and as I was starting to say goodnight, she grabbed me and kissed me. Being inebriated at the time, I kissed her back at first instinct. I realized after a few seconds what I was doing, and I pulled away from her and said “I can’t do this. I have a girlfriend” and she said she knew and that she was sorry. We said goodnight and then she went into her room and I walked back to the condo I was staying at. We talked about it later, labeling it a misunderstanding, but we both knew it really wasn’t. This will be interesting, as Anna is kind of the only other woman who’s meant anything of significance in that manor to me besides Sarah in a long time. I’ll let you know what happens in Germany next time I write.

-Dave