Is it cheesy to blog an old journal?

Then crown me cheese-boy. I decided to give my journals from when I lived in Bogota, Colombia an online home. I have kinda mixed feelings about this, but think I'll be glad to have done it in the end. Some of this is going to be hard to revisit, I think. Funny thing is, for all the time I spent down there (Five years), I only managed to keep two sporadic journals. So much for Good Intentions.

I moved down there in May of 1995, after taking a teaching position at a prestigious English Institiute (Centro Colombo Americano). What began as a One year contract turned into Five. I struggled with the decision to move down there, but it was reading Henry Rollins' tour journal with Black Flag, Get In The Van, that cemented my decision.

That book simply Destroyed me. I had moaned during college (like many of us do/did) about "struggling" and whatnot. The lads in Black Flag lived it. They did whatever they could to play the show. Henry lived and wrote about that when he was in his early 20's ... I was 23. When I saw that someone my age could make such a ballsy decision to Go For It, I made my own. I went for it.

I got to meet Henry earlier this year at a spoken gig he was doing in W. Palm Beach. I wrote him an email detailing my experience and how his book was such a Big Deal for me. To my surprise, he remembered the email and we spoke for a few minutes. He seemed appreciative that it was such an Important Book for me. Got a pic and he signed another book for me. I think I walked 6 inches taller for awhile after that.

I should write about that sometime.

What follows over the next few days/weeks/months will be my various journal entries from that time. Good or Bad, these are the years that defined who I am today.