I've come to find two times of the year to be particularly difficult: 1- the second half of winter and 2- the second half of summer. There is something about staleness even though I know everything is constantly changing.
The summer is flying by as all of the days of the year. 11 weeks of internship at the law firm, check. Summer class, check. Now, the two-week long intensive workshop in documentary making. The truth is that I'm exhausted.
I broke my ankle trying to learn skateboarding in the park. It has been nearly a month since I ran. Inactivity is taking a toll on my mental health. I spend a lot of time alone. Sometimes I'm lonely. Perhaps movement and activity was my way of coping with loneliness. Running, for the most part, is a solo activity. When I run I focus on the way my body feels, my breath, the moving scenery. No music, no headphone, no gps watch. Just me and the road. And that's how I feel when I travel. There is no time for loneliness when all my senses are activated by a new experience.
Some people think I'm addicted to traveling and that I have no way of grounding myself. Frankly, I don't travel that much. And why should there be a conflict between movement and grounding? I am trying very hard to love everything I do. I am trying very hard to be grounded wherever I am. I must admit that during the last week of my summer internship, I fantasized about taking a year off to walk the most iconic trails around the world: Iceland, the Scottish National Trail, Kings trail in Sweden, Mont Blanc,
Israel National Trail, Kilimanjaro, Australia, N. Zealand, Patagonia... It would be like Endless Summer except I'll be walking instead of surfing.
It's not uncommon for people to ask me why I'm single. I have no shortage of hypothesis. In short, I simply have not met the right person. Lately I'm starting to wonder what it is like from the other side. I dated all through my 20s and some of my ex-es are finally settling down. When I see their engagement photos on FB I can't help but to notice the lack of similarities between me and the women they eventually choose to settle down with. I am fortunate that no one has ever broken up with me. I was and probably still am, a person with many extremes. People liked my sense of adventure, tenderness, and zealousness for life. Yet underneath all the exotic extremes are the unsettling unknown.
I'm the wildcard. I move. I travel. I change careers. I acquire new hobbies. I meet new people. I grow. I change. I transform. I challenge myself and those around me. That's all great when looking from inside out as a single individual. I had no idea what that looked like from the outside until one day I joked with an ex that I'm going to pack everything up and move to Africa to build schools. He couldn't tell if I was joking. I suppose, to him, anything could be a real possibility with me. It is both a blessing and a curse, a complement and an insult. After all, a wife is the greatest investment a man could make. What kind of man would invest his all in such an unpredictable creature? Clearly not that ex. He's future wife is a Russian beauty with porcelain skin, a smile to melt any man's heart, and hands that never get dirty.
My smile is genuine. It needs not to launch ships as I am here to cast my own sails.