Have Passport, Can Travel. Also, Fuck This Place It Reeks of Pedophiles

After cancer, I’m not sticking around to save a country that doesn’t want saving. I’m chasing life, not permission.

I have always been a wanderer, I have always been willing to exchange security for an enhanced life experience. Wanderlust. And then cancer stripped everything down to bone and nerve. It burned through the lies I’d told myself. The dreams I deferred. The people I tolerated. And the bullshit I accepted because I thought there was time. But here's the truth: time is a con. And America? It's disappointing.

I’m fighting to survive something that’s trying to kill me from the inside, and I live in a country doing the same thing, just slower, and with more paperwork. I'm done pretending that living here is anything but a slow bleed. The healthcare system alone nearly broke me, and the politics? That’s just ritualized cannibalism with flags and hashtags.

I made my decision two days ago: I’m leaving.
Not in exile.
Not in bitterness.
In freedom.

Because I will survive. And I won't waste that gift here.

I’d love to stay and fight for democracy, I really would. But I’m not sure this country deserves it anymore. Both parties failed us. The GOP has always been cruel. Openly, proudly, blood-on-their-teeth cruel. They’re the kind of people who’d push a cancer patient off a cliff if they thought it’d lower the deficit or own a liberal.

But the Democrats? They're just as toxic. Different flavor, same poison. Too busy waging culture wars on Twitter while real people rot in emergency rooms. They talk about equity while doing fuck-all to change the math. We're drowning, and they're debating which pronouns the life preserver should use.

I’m not playing anymore.

I got my passport. I’ve got scars, wisdom, and an open mind. Cancer will be gone by Christmas. That’s the plan. That’s the prophecy. And come December 25th, I’ll be in Morocco. Not in some sterile hospital room. Not arguing politics with ghosts on social media. I’ll be in the ocean, surfing the Atlantic, laughing hash smoke into the wind.

After that?

Spain. Tapas, more hash, sunsets, and sanity. Maybe Seville. Maybe Valencia. Definitely wine. Definitely a café, a friend, coffee and a joint, and a moment that feels real.

Then Portugal. I hear the waves are loud there. I want to hear them scream.

Then east.
Bulgaria, maybe.
Istanbul for the call to prayer and late-night chaos.
And then Bombay.
Yes, Bombay.
Not Mumbai. Because the soul I fell in love with called herself Bombay, and I will always honor her by name.

India, you beautiful, brutal, overwhelming mess, I miss you. I’m coming back. I want your temples and your traffic. Your monsoons and your masala. I want to sit on a train that smells like chai and sweat and talk to a stranger about the meaning of it all.

From there, who knows. Asia is wide. I’ll walk it. Drift through it. Vanish into it.

I don’t need a reason anymore.
I just need motion.
I need to feel alive, I’m not going to be a cancer survivor, I am a cancer thriver.

This isn’t vacation. It’s resurrection.

I’m not a tourist. I’m a traveler. And I’m not asking for permission to live.

While they argue over who gets to legislate whose body, I’m out here reclaiming mine, one step, one surf break, one country at a time.

Because this life?
It’s mine now.
And I’m not wasting another second of it waiting for a broken nation to fix itself. So sadly I must say, very soon.

Bye Felicia.