The Sunniest Days Happen in Ibiza

All I seem to write about is techno and disappointing men and drugs and good sex, y’all know this. So you know damn well why I hopped on a flight to Ibiza after a breakup. Ibiza is where all the famous It girls of the early 2000’s went to foam parties and took Molly and watched the sunrise while floating in the ocean, drunk and high and surrounded by the glory that comes with being rich, famous, officially unemployed and able to do whatever the fuck you want. It’s not 2007 anymore and I’m not famous, but I am rich, unemployed, bold, and open minded. I figured I needed the Ibiza experience even if it doesn’t involve MDMA. After weeks of planning, I had a hostel lined up, a car booked, a 50 pound suitcase of clothes, and thoughts of making new friends, laying in the sun, partying in strange places, eating good food, and enjoying my own company. Endless summer vacation. Ibiza was the first stop. I zipped out of my Boston apartment and 17 hours later (long layover in Amsterdam) I had arrived in the ultimate European party destination. 

What they don’t tell you about Ibiza, or at least I missed the memo, is that it’s expensive. And filled with drunk assholes. And some of the clubs are so packed you won’t even be able to move. Yikes! A good time to some is not a good time to all, and there’s nothing I hate more than an oversold nightclub. Except maybe people who don’t know how to handle their alcohol. Just because there is a legal limit to how many people you can fit in a room does not mean you have to hit that limit. I hold firm to that belief. The whole island is built around parties, this I did know. I did not know that a lot of the people who go there just… don’t know how to party. Woof! I’m making it sound like Ibiza should be avoided all together, and a lot of the locals I befriended said exactly that. It’s gotten too crowded, and the DJ’s the clubs are bringing to the island are all mainstream EDM DJ’s, which brings in a bad crowd. Too many bad tourists clogging up the clubs. House music is what everyone who knows anything talks about, and word from the Ibiza locals is you can have a better party in Barcelona for cheaper. Yet there’s something about the island that I found captivating, magical even. 

I made a friend in the hostel I stayed at who has been going to Ibiza for years. “I took my first pill here when I was 28,” she told me after asking how old I was (28 at the time.) “It changed my life.” I know that song by heart. Good drugs really can change the direction of your life, but you’re lucky if that’s a positive thing. She became like my Ibiza big sister, telling me about all the good parties to go to and the beaches that aren’t too crowded. She brought me to a club I will never forget that wasn’t on my list of places to go. It’s up in the mountains of Ibiza, set into a cliff, has a bougie restaurant and an outdoor stage as well as a typical club underneath. They played progressive house, which I hadn’t really listened to before, but I do now! She looked out for me that night, gave me the night in Ibiza that I had heard about but still felt like a myth after a few days of being there. We danced as the sun went down and the music was so good, the forest was so lush, the sky so pink, it made me feel some things that sound like hippie dippie nonsense to those who don’t understand. I was able to explore what it felt like to really be in my body. I felt light, strong, sexy, loose and wavy. The crowd wasn’t anything crazy, so I was able to really move in the way that felt good to me. I felt open and free. I could see it on the faces of everyone around me, too. Something was going down at that club and it wasn’t just pill popping and binge drinking. That night was a convergence between my body and my mind. I spend a lot of time trapped in my own head, sometimes feeling imprisoned by it. That night I didn’t think anything other than how fucking good it felt to be me. I actually laughed to myself at one point, because I had no idea that convergence was possible for me. I thought I’d always be at least a little anxious, always a little tired of being in my own body. I felt like a world in which I feel at home wasn’t just possible for me, it was happening right at that very moment. 

As it turns out, I’m not a crazy person. There is something special about the energy of Ibiza. There’s something going on there that has nothing to do with partying. I just was able to access the feeling through partying. Legend has it, the island of Es Vedrà, able to be seen from Cala d’Hort, is the third most magnetic point on the planet. It sits right in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea and can only be accessed by boat. A beautiful, unexplored rock. Intriguing. Some stories say it’s a piece of the lost city of Atlantis, others that its magnetic properties are capable of attracting aliens, others say the Egyptians used pieces of the rock to build the pyramids, and stories abound about old explorers seeing all sorts of mythical creatures there. I’m not that into conspiracy theories, but what I will say is that if the limestone in the rock contains such a high concentration of energy, that energy has to go somewhere. Energy doesn’t die. It only changes forms. 

Energy: the power to do work. We need energy not just to work, but to laugh, to cry, to dance, to have difficult conversations, to have a good time with our friends. What I felt in Ibiza could just be all in my head, but I know better than to second guess myself. I have no choice but to bring that energy I felt on the dance floor around with me now. For the next month that I was in Europe, I wasn’t always dancing, but I was always myself. Legend has it you have to play the drums at sunset in front of Es Vedrà to be able to return there. I’m already there, babes. I’ve been here all along. I’ve been ascending and now I’m transcending. All that energy has to go somewhere.