"Have you ever had that feeling - that you'd like to go to a whole different place and become a whole different self?"
A book I was reading yesterday confronted me with this rather other-worldly parallel universe question. And me, like the sucker to always fall for arguments which talk about fitting-in somewhere wanted to agree. But for once, I did not find myself forcing slight tweaks in personality or phrase in order to fall in line. It was just flowing naturally. And it is a well established fact by now in my universe that if the flow is right, it's all bright. That does sound like a nursery rhyme and it's just perfect for the feeling of innocence from a lost era it helps me keep close.
So, coming back to the question and to answer it with all honesty.
I would love to be a boatman, say somewhere in the interiors of Bolivia, maybe with a farm or two, speaking spanish or maybe not speaking at all and spending my days dreaming up fantastical realities like underwater elf life or planting magic beans by mistake.
Maybe not the row-row-rowyourboat kind of boat I would won. That's just too many 'rows' and it makes me feel tired and reaching out for my inhaler even as I saw it in my head. But one with the big round precision polished wooden steering wheel and a steam engine. It would be probably called 'Veronica' for lack of appropriate naming mind space in this moment.
I love the paragraph above. It's a whole life. And I love it. And I can even live it. And that for me, is a beautiful feeling.
In reality, though, I'm going back to the start. Way back to the start line. Even before that and beyond. To the time I decided to run. To where they told me that the race is my destiny, that this is what I am supposed to do.
It's like stopping at one of the water counters at the marathon and just dropping out of line casually, to start walking back. There is no drama about it. It's not a walk of defeat. But not of victory either. Not even of disillusionment or one born out of revelation. Cut it with the right background music and it can become anything, my cinematic mind says.
I'd maybe stop at an ice cream stall, numb up my mouth and deliberate over new flavor ideas or buy some balloons and leave them one by one at sporadic intervals hoping I may accidently be talking an alien language. Just plain wondrous casual walking back with the cool breeze drying up my sweaty self, thinking of the days when the sky being blue and earth round was magical and shoes feeling happy about the unexpected breather.
I'm going back to the start.
I don't want to play anymore.
I want to be a boatman.
