I’ve worked so hard to setup this separate life for myself. For no real reason, actually, other than I just wanted to. I didn’t have some horrible childhood or anything like that. I don’t think I was ever running away from anything. Not sure I was ever running to anything either, though. I just wanted to blaze my own path.
So part pioneer, part explorer, with a touch of rebel thrown in. Those are the ingredients that make up my gypsy soul.
Anyway, all I know is one day I realized that my hometown seemed really crowded and I felt the call of an open road and other places.
This was my thing. I took huge pride in it. I lived in places, had experiences, had jobs that were all different. Different from the way anyone else I knew had lived their life. And different from the way I had ever imagined I’d live my life, too. And I’m realizing that was perhaps part of it, too. The need to break through my own chains and defy my own expectations.
My own dreams, my own goals, my own path to get there.
Loved the physical distance from everyone I knew in my life, even people I loved very much. That sounds strange to most people. Sounds like some kind of punishment or exile to many. But for me, it was freedom.
Loved the psychological distance, too. I could stay out of the drama I had always known by simply hanging up the phone. Or getting on a plane – to fly in the opposite direction.
It was the best decision for me. This gypsy has built an incredible life that I love very much.
However.
Now an event, an illness, has turned it all on its head. Someone I love so much it hurts is facing something huge. And I can’t be there. Not easily. And it’s killing me.
I find myself craving the comfort of the love of a family more than I ever knew I could. I want to be there, I want to help (I know if I were there and in charge everything would turn out alright J).
And I’m hating T. S. Eliot right now:
We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.
