a scribbling traveler

I am a scribbling traveler, one more of many things that date me.  I keep a physical journal and I write real letters.  An e-mail from Tuxtla Guiterrez looks pretty much like one from Tulsa, but an actual letter, with exotic stamps and mysterious stains and blotted ink and words crossed out and looking like an iguana might have chewed on it: that is a gift for a friend back home. 
    Nothing from the bright-lit workshops of Steve Jobs compares to an old travel journal with its entries made on the spot, its ink blurred by rain and perspiration, its handwriting reflecting my mental state, rumors heard and fleeting conversations and what I saw, what things cost and what was the exchange, quotidian bother interleaved with labels and wrappers, banknotes and boat tickets, with hand-drawn maps and sketches and bar checks and squashed insects.  The confidant of my travels, who was there with me at the time and can take me back to Elsewhere & Elsewhen whenever I want to go.