June 8, 2018. While boarding a flight to Washington D.C. to spend the weekend with my grandmother, I got a group message:
CNN confirms Anthony Bourdain dead in apparent suicide.
The air left my chest and a wave of sadness washed over me. The passengers still boarding the aircraft became a blur as I fought back tears. Was I really going to be the person who cried about a celebrity death? I don’t cry much about anything and certainly not in public. Yet, here I was switching between staring out the window and scrolling my Twitter timeline as reactions to the early morning news rolled in.
Before enabling my phone’s airplane mode, I dropped a quick message into several group chats to tell people I value that I love and appreciate them. It felt like the only thing I knew I could do right then to alleviate this pressure in my chest. This news hurt.
Unlikely Inspiration…
Anthony Bourdain is one of my biggest inspirations for one of my most cherished passions: travel. He’s in every travel vision journal I’ve ever started (and abandoned over and over again.) I have blog posts planned to visit the most interesting places from his popular shows No Reservations and Parts Unknown. Listen, I wanted and still want Black Girl Meets World to make people feel the way Anthony Bourdain made me feel.
I assure you I never thought I’d credit a white man as my personal inspiration for… anything.
Bourdain was different.
Photo By Miller Mobley
When I didn’t see my thoughts reflected in his introspective monologues, I saw we shared the same passionate curiosities about the world. Through his inclusive approach to travel and food, I saw worlds often forgotten and left unexplored by mainstream travel media outlets. Bourdain made me want to fall in love with a destination’s underbelly, because that where the real magic was. He perfected using his platform to center the people, allowing them to control the narratives about their homes, their history, cultures, and most importantly, their food. I wanted to be like him!
My personal truth…
I remember the year leading up to the launch of Black Girl Meets World. I convinced myself I need do as much travel as possible so I’d have lots of content for this big moment. If there was an inexpensive ticket, I was there! Cuba, LA, Atlanta, Dallas. Vegas. D.C. San Francisco. At one point it seemed I was in the air every other weekend. Always on the go.
Truth is: I was running from myself.
The plan was always to launch the site on my 25 birthday. I just didn’t know my “travel year of yes”, a kickoff to my dreamy travel life, would also be a test to overcome one of the darkest times of my life.
My battle with depression had been particularly rough, exasperated by the stress and emotional traumas of things I’ll probably never put on Al Gore’s internet. My odd (and financially irresponsible) way of coping? Book a trip.
Travel was saving me from myself. I couldn’t bear the thought of being still, being home, alone in my room. I was afraid I’d spend too much time with myself. If I stayed preoccupied with where I was going next, I wouldn’t have to deal with where I was running from.
I was in therapy up to 3 times a week, ending each session only able to muster up excitement about what weekend trip I’d be able to tell my therapist about during the following week’s sessions.
Moment of Realization
It became harder to escape those nights I went to sleep hoping I didn’t wake up, only to be disappointed when the morning came. On a particularly gloomy weekend, I fell victim to a Netflix marathon of Parts Unknown. Anthony Bourdain was Anthony Bourdain-ing. He was somewhere interesting with someone interesting discussing something interesting, par the course for his recipe. I wish I could completely recall the clip that triggered my epiphany, but I realized in this moment that Parts Unknown was a part of Bourdain’s journey of self-discovery. His journey around the world uncovering truths buried in parts of the world not glamorous enough for your mainstream travel channel coverage was, what I’d like to believe, a metaphorical representation of the search for his truest self.
It was that very moment when my admiration of Anthony Bourdain made most sense to me. I reassured myself that those thoughts and feelings I paled in comparison to passion I had to see the world, a passion Anthony Bourdain inspired time and time again.
Re-commitment
I launched this blog on my 25th birthday, a day I often doubted I’d see. While I haven’t been as consistent as I intended, I’m re-committing myself to travel writing. The news of Anthony Bourdain’s death hurt a little deeper than I imagined. It brought back thoughts and memories I had tucked neatly away. , particularly memories of a despondent Bourdain staring at the shell of my being through the TV questioning his existence while traveling the world to highlight and celebrate the existence of others.
Anthony Bourdain was as passionate as he was unapologetic. He painted travel as this intimate and provocative leap of faith outside of one’s own backyard. His work confirmed that connecting with the world was about connecting with people through their realities.
I hate that his death will be what I remember most about what inspired me to recommit to travel writing, but I’ll be forever grateful for his legacy and inspiration.
For more information about suicide prevention, support, and awareness, visit National Suicide Prevention Lifeline.
Until Our Next Adventure,
Raquel Seymone
