When You Decide to Wander, Like Fungi
I sailed 4,500 miles & still wondered if a 21yo stranger thought I was cool
I was racing through Zone 4 in Guatemala City, hustling to meet up with an old friend I knew back in Denver. The first person from my past life since setting sail from the U.S.
I was running late because I couldn’t decide which t-shirt to wear. I couldn’t choose which version of myself I wanted to show up.
For 6 weeks now, I’ve lived in a modern high-rise apartment plopped in the middle of a booming & colorful Central American metropolis. The sailboat is in storage. It’s up for sale, too. And I don’t have much disposable income. But I can drive 2 hours to witness lava shooting up in the air & flowing down mountainsides.
“What do you like most about Guatemala?” It’s a question I get a ton. Usually by fellow Americans. And this is my best answer:
There’s zero pressure to be more than I am.
My neighborhood looks like any trendy area in a big city during summer. Cafes, shops, bars. Cars honking at long traffic lights. My neighbors spend their days operating their shops, walking their dogs, talking with their friends & family via voice & text, and pacing around their workplaces counting down the minutes before they can baste in a steady 76˚F & slightly breezy evening.
But these people don’t know any version of me. They don’t know the ambitious buttoned-up person I spent years constructing in the U.S. They don’t know the person I became at 38yo, before I decided to turn my life upside down to go sailing. They don’t know the much richer version today at 39yo who spent the past 1 year living on the water, & finds fulfillment in ways money or professional affiliations can’t measure.
We just make eye contact & give a “Hola” or “Buenos” to each other with huge smiles. And that’s enough.
Today, I feel even more contentment with the face staring back in the mirror than I did back in my Denver days. Even with slightly saggier skin than I had 2 years ago. The sunspots that the dermatologist promised weren’t cancer. The off-white teeth that I’d probably get whitened if my culture here cared more about that crap.
That day I met my Denver friend, I decided to wear my torn green Vans & slightly-faded shirt with horizontal purple & blue stripes. It was 1 of the nicest outfits I have. But to be honest? I was nervous.
He was passing through Guatemala City on his way to the common tourist sites, including the fiery volcanoes near Antigua & Mayan relics in Tikal. He was someone I hung out with a couple times back in Denver. We would still trade texts occasionally over the past 2 years. Pretty casual. I liked him a lot. But he knew the old me.
I was 4 minutes late.
I was about to face a ghost. And I had no clue what he’d think about me now.
When we started our sailing adventure in June 2025, we first trekked up the East Coast for ~2 months, mostly through rural & conservative areas of North Carolina and Virginia. I didn’t see myself in any of these places. The culture was as foreign as anything I’d experience in the Caribbean islands & beyond. I’d feel more at home in Guatemala.
But I was so excited to land in our first “big city.” I knew it’d feel similar aesthetically to parts of Washington, D.C. (where I used to go often for work). I used to walk around such towns with a feeling like I belonged.
We traversed under the bridge in Annapolis, Maryland.
When we first anchored, I hadn’t taken a freshwater shower for 3 weeks. I hadn’t shaved in 4. I still have the first picture of us, proud to have made it so far already with such limited sailing experience.
But that picture didn’t show what happened after. How I felt during the first few days wandering that Navy town, passing people who were impeccably clean-shaved, immaculately dressed, & in the upper echelons of American life. And I was insanely insecure.
I vividly remember it like a scene in Into the Wild, when the newly rebirthed Alexander Supertramp wanders past a trendy bar in Los Angeles, dirty & dressed in rags, & he daydreams a different version of himself standing in there in impressive cocktail attire talking to beautiful girls. Then he makes eye contact with that fancy Alex who had taken a path in life that was absolutely available to him at 1 time. Then the imagined-him smiles & raises a glass to the real-him. And a frantic Alex immediately scurries out of the cosmopolitan district of L.A., back to the trees & fellow travelers where he felt 100% at ease.
In Annapolis, even fellow sailors were living in a different universe. Very few were frugal nomads like us. Many were day-sailors who had sailboats with amenities indistinguishable from land life.
Then I went back to my little vessel. Only 100 sq. ft. of living space & no working fridge. And even while I had my husband & our old cat, Pineapple, I remember thinking, “I’m such a loser. What am I doing?”
When we left Annapolis after a couple weeks, we found secluded anchorages further north, & we started to discover more of our type of people again. They were either on tight budgets and/or small boats. They didn’t mind our rags & beards, and they talked about the things we cared most about.
And all those insecurities evaporated.
Back in Guatemala City, I walked into a trendy thrift shop (1 of the coolest I’ve ever been to in my life) to meet my American friend. He had gotten there maybe 20 mins before me & had been busy trying on clothes that would’ve cost triple back in Denver. He was so happy to see me.
He told me, “I can’t believe you live here!” He gave me a big hug. Then he wanted to hear all about my sailing trip.
“Sailing was awesome,” I said. He hadn’t been reading my Substack. I wasn’t sure whether to give him the 60-second version or the 10-minute version.
“I’d say it definitely had an effect on me.”
We both flipped through clothes on the double-story racks as we continued sharing life updates.
The clothes were totally my style. One shirt depicted a scene from Re-Animator, a cool-looking film from the 80s that I hadn’t seen but was pretty sure I’d love. It was $15 USD. It would’ve probably been $50 in Denver. But before I went in the shop, I made a decision I wouldn’t buy anything.
I didn’t need anything.
He tried on some cool-looking cowboy boots. I later found out they were $150, or maybe more. I wondered how many times he’d wear them back in Denver, but I was honest. “Those look good.”
He said, “I think I’m going to buy them!”
Then a 21yo Guatemalan girl from behind the counter turned our duo into a trio. She looked like someone you’d expect to work in a hip place like this. She had black diamonds painted on each side of her eyes. Dressed in black & dark blues, so stylish, reminding me of the punk Latina girls I spent time with in the L.A. suburbs back when I was a kid.
She told my friend that his future cowboy boots were “so cool.”
I garbled out some hesitant Spanish to her, but she responded in perfect English.
She looked like a beautiful sphinx.
Then she asked why I lived in Guatemala & I told her a lil about my sailing adventure.
“That’s white shit!”
She couldn’t believe that me & my husband, 2 people with so little sailing experience, would just take a sailboat out in the ocean like that. I showed her a picture of our sailboat, Chérie. Then, when I asked if she wanted to see a map of our entire 4,500 mile journey, she said “Duh!”
And this created even more disbelief.
“People don’t do that kinda stuff here,” she said. “They don’t even talk about doing it. They see Americans who do this crazy stuff & say, what the hell is with those people?”
My American friend pushed back. “Not all Americans do that either, believe me! I want to do something like that!”
She asked what I did for work & I told her I’m a scientist & that I make money doing different things online.
“That’s white shit too!”
We all laughed.
But I explained how it really felt INSANE to quit my good job, hop on a sailboat, & leave everything behind. That still, my husband & I ultimately decided this was a better path than what we were doing before.
She nodded then said, “And you took your cat?!”
“Yes!”
Then she asked what kind of scientist I was.
“Biologist.”
“Oh, I love biology!”
“What makes you love biology so much?” I asked her.
“I love insects!”
She then told us how, along with a couple friends, she regularly hosts free events for her neighbors in Guatemala City to help them understand the connection between science & art.
She said that it makes her sad sometimes because she thought people in Guatemala would care more about their jungles, trees, & the infinite lifeforms that surround them. “This is their world! But many of them don’t care. They’re busy with their lives.”
Then she told me the most beautiful example of what biology means to her.
“I love fung-E. You know fungy?!”
My friend & I both nodded, understanding exactly what she was saying through her slight accent.
“I love how they will grow underground through the dirt, making their own path through life. Even through the mud. And if they hit rocks or areas with no nutrients then they just turn & grow in another direction. And the jungles are full of this stuff! They all communicate & help the trees stay alive! I don’t know why, it’s just so inspiring to me.”
Then she talked about her path in life. How passionate she is about music, science, & helping people. And that, at 21yo, she recognizes she has limited resources but that doesn’t deter her.
“I can’t wait to keep exploring the insects in the jungles, & learn as much about the world as possible!”
I asked, “would you wanna study biology more someday, like in college?”
She said, “I’m 21! I already chose my path.”
Then I said, “What about the fungi?!”
Then I thought to myself, “I think this is 1 of the coolest people I’ve ever met in my life.”
Then I thought, “Wow, I wonder if she thinks I’m cool, too?”
I KNEW she had reminded me of someone.
In the following days, I thought back to where I was at 21yo. A version of me, long before I sailed 4,500 miles to get to where I am today.
A younger incarnation of myself.
At 21yo, that guy was newly sober from alcohol & meth. He had just met his future husband & sailing captain. Then they uprooted their lives to relocate from L.A. to Portland, Oregon on a bit of a whim — with their 1yo cat, Pineapple.
They only planned to visit Portland for a 5-day vacation, but on the 4th day they loved it so much that they signed a 1-year lease for a huge 1-bedroom apartment. It only cost like $635/month — about half what it’d cost in L.A. Then they went home, packed up their small, overpriced apartments, & gave 2-week notices at their jobs.
Within a month or so, he was a resident of the mighty Pacific Northwest.
He spent the first summer in Portland riding his bike from his apartment to his classroom or part-time job. He’d stop at food trucks for $5 pad thai (the best in the world to him up until that point). He went to cafes where it was $2.50 for a mug of brew & he could keep getting 50-cent refills all day if he wanted to. He would stroll the aisles of Powell’s Books for hours, & occasionally bring home a used book or 2. He didn’t have more than $999. But yet he felt like a billionaire.
He didn’t need anyone to tell him he was cool then, either.
18 years passed. Who am I now? Who am I becoming?
21yo Cory would keep charting his own path, like the fungi. He would go to college because he wanted to learn. He would stay sober because it nourished his soul. Then he’d follow new curiosities & take risks to do the things that made most sense to him in order to build a different version of success than what his culture fed him. He’d continue to Boston for a PhD & then to Denver to see where else that led — because he & his husband wanted that. It didn’t matter what anyone else thought.
And for a long time, it was the perfect path.
At some point though, decision by decision, he got stuck in the muck. But he’d keep pushing, ignoring the lack of nourishment, passing over the organic signals that told him “maybe you’d preffffffer something else.” He was no longer changing course when his soul demanded it. But he didn’t think he had a choice anymore.
And as the years ensued, even with a job he liked OK, the ability to buy nicer & nicer stuff, & being surrounded by infinite nature & people who wanted nothing but the best for him — he slowly lost touch with that younger & more fearless version of himself.
Until 1 day, he got a second life.
But what would everyone think if he left it all & went sailing? Would he ever find his people again?
After trudging all those miles in that little sailboat, from the rural & urban areas in the U.S. to the lush jungles of Guatemala, he — I mean, I — still had doubts about whether this life is the optimal reflection of my potential.
I imagine all sorts of people I knew from a bygone era & all of a sudden wonder whether they’d approve.
I think back on a much more lucrative & promising career path and how I literally decided to take the opposite direction.
And though I feel as rich as I did back in Portland, I will still occasionally wonder, “Holy crap, what have I done?” Especially when I’m faced with a contrast, like my American friend visiting from Denver.
Then I wonder whether a 21yo, super-stylish stranger in a Guatemala City thrift shop thinks I’m “cool” or not.
After the thrift shop, my American friend & I went to 1 of my favorite restaurants in Zone 4 to experiment with some lengua tacos. He told me lengua was amazing. I was doubtful. (I would’ve guessed the opposite about cow tongue.) But I ordered 3 lengua tacos. And we sat down to chat.
He put down a bag with newly-purchased cowboy boots on the chair next to him.
He then told me that he’s not really loving the direction he’s heading with his career. He’s in his 30s now, too. He’s been at this job too long. And he’s second guessing a lot of checkmarks of success that were pushed down his throat throughout his life. But he has some money saved, he knows he could live much simpler than he does, & he wants to do something different.
“You look really happy, Cory.”
“Yea, I am. I’m much happier than I was.”
The lengua was good. He was right about that, too.
Then he asked me more about how I’m making it work.
I’d love to know if anyone else has a version of themselves from a previous era who would be inspired, or disappointed, or both?
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Until next time,
–Cory
Great piece, Cory.
I think that no matter our age, we are always just trying to figure life out. It is easy to romanticize other people's lives, but no one has it all figured out. Ever. Life is a moving target.
There are thousands of ways to spend our days, build our lives. But the only person who really knows what we want is us. We try different things, learn and grow from the experience, and decide if we want to continue that or change. Society and capitalism define success in a very neat, checked-box kind of way. Maybe that fulfills some people, maybe they never bothered to ask themselves what they actually thought. Regardless, finding a tribe that sees things the same way as you helps enormously. Because indecision and confusion are parts of the path. But having people to talk to about these things, that is priceless.
What a beautiful analogy. It's inspiring when you find your life reflected in your everyday experiences. And it's sad to think that young woman doesn't feel like she has any options. But these are the paths we choose.