How brilliantly ironic! I sit typing in the living room of a sunny apartment in the heart of Barcelona, simultaneously watching the rooftops of my neighbors and listening to Barack Obama's speech about the change stirring in America. It is that I am both here and there, my mind firmly attached to home in the immediate and the big picture. The attachment to the immediate, as in Spain and my particular living situation in Barcelona, is not hard to understand.

To begin with, the temperament of this country and especially it's most lively city is exactly suited to my needs, or maybe it's the other way around. Regardless, it is to say that my overall comfort, ahhh simple pleasures of life, dare I say happiness of the past three days is off the charts. It's not that my time here has been wildly adventurous nor in any way dull. It's just an extraordinarily happy medium to which I have aspired for a very long time and have arrived at finally for this final month of my trip.

Of course I hesitate to predict the future, but that reluctance seems to be overcome by the fact that I am here, it is sunny every day, and that every person I meet is interesting, friendly, and able to communicate (I with them!). I am thinking about where to go next- most likely south to Valencia and then a bit further to my friend Liza's house on the coast- but there is no urgency in the planning. I have a full month to circumnavigate the peninsula, from Valencia to Gibraltar, Madrid to the Pyrenees, and Galicia back to the United States via some nearby airport. Plenty of time, no rush, and no agenda except that which happens to inspire. At this point in my 30th year after some rough and tumbling around the planet, I figure why not be a bit selfish. Let my whole skinny self hang loose, get fat, so to speak. Perhaps strut a little with an air of confidence like never before. I mean why the ---- not!?! It's a damn good way to be and I really can't figure out why it never occurred to me before. Not only is it good to enjoy life and one's own way in the world for selfish reasons, but I would also venture to say that it makes the whole world a better place for everyone. Well actually I am only making that statement in regards to me and how I feel at this particular moment. Unfortunately, that's probably also the same way that George Bush and serial killers justify their existences and pursuit of happiness... Needing to be free to be one's self... But ---- that, obviously I am talking about sane people with brain cells to spare. People who can afford and deserve to be their true self; easy going, honest, open, relaxed, highly impassioned when necessary, comfortable with the craziness, accepting, humble, and extremely grateful.

Which brings me to exactly why people like Barack Obama are so essentially appealing to their fellow human beings. The man exudes this poise of true self. He comes not from the most dire of circumstances, he has not personally experienced the abject poverty, extreme physical suffering or total despair that is characteristic of some of the world's poor. But through his own relatively unique, and not excessively easy background, the man has experienced life through the eyes of the world. It is primarily this empathy and deeply personal understanding of the globe, and secondarily his ability to connect with the American people that gives Barack his super cultivated equipoise. His is confident in both his own experience and the very nature of humanity. He is confident in the direction that he is taking as it is a real reflection and response to the world in which he has lived. From Kenyan birth to Indonesian primary schooling to Harvard Law, this could very well be the embodiment of the ideal, rounded, modern education. This as opposed to an over-privileged, under-able Yale frat boy who had never traveled let alone discussed the world outside of North America before taking the office of presidency of the United States. It really does seem then, that wow all signs do point to a very new and different era on the horizon for those of us who care to participate.

I am only writing this this morning because I can't help but relate right now, in my own strange way, from own unique vantage point, to this conceptual 'new' era. But of course, let me be the first to say it, and remember it again and again, that it is no more than that. Pure concept. These ideas we discuss, the grand speeches we hear, the words which inspire and make us applaud, this is no more than the initial guidance, the version 1.0 users' manual, hopefully providing useful points of reference for later refinement, and in the ideal a contract to which we can adhere later on. But of course the real groundwork for the project itself has yet to come. The moment the first stone is laid, seemingly opposing ideas will emerge rapidly, new so called pioneers will gain the reins, potentially the old concept will be discarded or forgotten, and eventually this movement toward a new era shall once again be converted by the societal pressures and physical constraints that never ceased to exist throughout the time of heady planning. But this common tendency, surely a reoccurring theme in my own life and perhaps a larger trend of humanity, is by the same token not inevitable. Of course there is proof: The world is built by the labor of those that were not perpetually constrained by conceptual tail chasing, nor status quo limitations. That is to say, those who have achieved success in creating, augmenting, and evolving this place have done so from a place of balance, combining both practical flexibility and unrelenting mindfulness and retention of the original concept. This original conceptual force, the all powerful seed ideas, the foundational thinking, the structure, the logical framework of a constructive movement, this obviously is not to be discarded with yesterday's rotten apples. Somehow it ought to be vigilantly kept at the forefront of everybody's mind throughout the long potentially arduous road to come.

Alas, any tourist who has been to Barcelona with the slightest coherence should know exactly what object is driving the analogy I am trying to construct. Ain't no two ways about it, the 120 plus-year ongoing construction of Gaudi's Sagrada Familia is by all means one of the most powerful reminders I have ever seen of the human ability to conjure up and sustain greatness in action. It is an Obra in the highest sense of the word, a work of art and a physical manifestation of ultra refined human ingenuity. The embodiment of universally applicable laws and geometric form. The very reason for its existence is conceptual; it is an offering to the world of something new, inherently valuable, and fundamentally needed. And the concept itself is highly structured, centered around a reproducible system of geometry and a specific ascetic. It is only nebulous and sentimental to the degree that one fails to notice the inherent framework linking and guiding all continued efforts to construct the whole system. As a result of the unrelenting reincorporation of this conceptual framework as well as the practical accomplishments of the epic-spanning stone and steel engineering, the church is more appealing and attractive today than ever before. For me it is a simple testament to the fact that for any revolutionary movement to sustain itself and fulfill its destiny to truly evolve the world in a permanent fashion, there needs to be a clear accord upheld absolutely amongst all of its members, workers, and supporters.

There is no denying that Gaudi's Sagrada Familia and Barack Obama's program for change both utilize universally compelling concepts. When in the presence of both, the reaction on people's faces is the proof in the pudding. With Gaudi's church, there is little controversy and great support for its continued conceptual preservation and physical construction. The underlying concept in this case, the multi-nodal capital pillars and overall geometric design, is in no danger of being compromised or subsumed by new leaders. However in the case of Barack's movement as it rapidly gains traction towards securing the presidency, it seems the potentials for backsliding or complete hypocrisy are dramatically much more apparent, to say the least. The movement is in its infancy, in fact yet to be born, but the conceptual strength of both the individual candidate and the candidacy's ideas are undeniable. So as such, all I'm saying is damn we'd be better take some leads from the few cutting edge projects out there that have managed to survive and avoid the crumpling effects of status quo tendencies. I for one need to do the same thing on a very personal level, because of course my new era is also in its infancy and god knows the last thing I want to do is look back on this time and say oh how naive and misled, if only I had known how to maintain and persevere.

With that in mind, I have to venture out immediately as the morning stretches into the middle of the day, voy por the city of Barcelona, to check the Contemporary Art Museum and its surroundings, and hopefully to return empty handed triumphantly once again, god willing so to speak.