The right amount of tick-tock

Has enough time passed for strangers to become friends again?

In my mind, perhaps it has - in your mind, I cannot tell...

I feel an overwhelming loneliness, anxiety and pain that resonates from your soul. My prayers are with you, as it always was.

Reach out to me when you are ready, when the time is right.

Memories...

Every now and then, out of the blue, your face pops into my head and your voice echos in my mind and I find myself transported to other times.

My heart pangs. My emotions flare.

I find myself missing you. Missing us.

Somewhere in time there is a golden nugget that shines with our story. We do have a story. A comfort in time.

Curse of knowledge

The more I learn and the more knowledge I obtain, stories of leather without the lace, 3 without the crowd, touch without the feel, the more I feel as though I have entered into a deep hole. This rabbit hole is endless and spans back to a walk on a winter eve, pondering the truths that are now rethought. Perhaps I never knew the real man inside, the real expression behind the mask and the true desire of the heart? Was I deceived for that long? The rabbit hole offers no answers sadly, rather offering more questions - perhaps, however, the answers lay in the cursed knowledge I continue to receive now. When all actions betray the promises made, when all of the present contradict that which was once desired, the conclusions are logical.

Perhaps this knowledge is a blessing wrapped in a curse; to give the insight needed to satisfy the rabbit hole.

Two kinds of people on this earth...

The older I get, the more of life’s crests and dips that I go through and ride out, I have become convinced that there are two kinds of people on this earth.

Through my many opportunities of watching people, of studying their movements and behaviours, to simple listening to my friends talk about their various lives, my thoughts about these groups of people have become more solidified and my understanding of this universal divide has become clearer. Apart from the countless number of boxes and subdivisions that humanity has places on all of its people, that marketing professionals have grouped humans into, what society has grouped us in and the racial drop-down of categories that is found on job applications, I have understood a different division of people that have never been clear to me.

Perhaps my thinking is archaic in this regard, maybe I am just delusional, but bear with me.

I think everyone has an acquaintance or a friend, maybe even a family member, who seems to have life pinned down. Someone who has their ship safely berthed in their harbour of life. The universe, God or simply random selection has ensured that these individuals have found their place in life and society with relative ease and minimal discomfort, selecting the appropriate career, finding a spouse or a relationship construct that works for them, always seeming to achieve professionally, having all the physical possessions that make them happy and content. Life, as glorious and traitorous it is, has given them its graces. These folks, I call, the settlers.

The settlers

This fragile world that we temporarily house our bodies in, need the settlers. This group of individuals are particularly good at keeping everything from economies to medicine stable and evolving at the pace that it needs to. The settlers are the stability that every society needs.

At this stage, I do need to make clear that I do not believe a settler to be a boring person, or group of people. Not at all. Within each settler there is a creative mind, a cerebral conscious, a spirit and a desire for some form of adventure. Fortunately for this particular group of people, due to the nature of their lives, usually there is funding or finance available to explore their passions and adventures. Travelling. Cooking classes. Sky diving. Climbing a mountain. Be inventive. Create something new and fantastic. However, throughout the adventure, there is a knowledge of temporary state of being, the comfort of knowing that the settlers home and routine is waiting, their creature comforts are an arm’s reach away. They step outside of their comfort zone for defined periods of time, sometimes unknowingly taking their comfort zones with them on their adventures.

The settlers are traditionally the individuals that are admired, that are considered to be inspirational and pin-ups on how to be a success in life. Rightfully so. No one can take away what has been achieved, the work that has been put in and the benefits that are enjoyed because of that work. It is theirs to claim and own outright.

Now, there are the other kinds of people, people who do not know what that comfortable feeling is of life gracing them with all its gifts and pleasures so easily. I call these folks, the explorers.

The explorers

Explorers have a different kind of life. The life of constant unease and internal urgency to go, go, go and find something else, to be somewhere else all the time.

An explorer has a lifestyle that seems very appealing, yet unattainable to the settlers. A life of constant adventure and change, evolution and inspiration. The explorer is used to having only temporary harbours to restock and take count, mentally and physically preparing for the next trip and next journey unknown. The explorer has no other choice but to live the lifestyle of the vagabond, moving around and having no comfort zone other than the comfort of something new. A new job will get boring after a few years and a change needs to happen, an apartment becomes a prison and a new housing is hunted down, new friends are constantly found and relationships are fierce, but brief. The explorer takes pleasure in the instability of it all, the excitement of experiencing something new, of interacting with new people and strange places, breathing in air that has yet been inhaled by them. The urge to move on is strong, almost primal, driving behaviour as much as hunger drives towards food.

The explorer, unlike the settler, truly sacrifices all that is comforting and secure for that which is unknown, taking nothing with them and living without the ultimate security of their safe life that awaits after a temporary adventure.

Often being good friends, explorers and settlers do get along famously, however neither can truly understand the lifestyle of the other. There is respect but no true understanding. The lifestyle of the other is inherently appealing to the other, the settler desires more freedom and the explorer long for more stability.

However, in a twist of fate, neither can truly embrace the lifestyle of the other, inevitably returning to that which is comforting and familiar.

Yes, the settler can make the conscious decision to live the life on the explorer, living the life of the vagabond, the reckless traveler and the worldwise passport holder, however, the universal force that calls the shots, will ensure that life returns back to that which is intended. Self-sabotage and unexplained emotions create the environment required to bring comfort, a settled life or an explorer life. I have seen it often in my dealings with people. The explorer that tries to settle down and create that stable life, or the settler that ditches it all to go and explore – temporary states of existence that cannot hold.

Eventually the converted explorer will be tempted into a stable job, a big house in the suburbs and the lifestyle of the comfortable and universally blessed. The converted explorer will find themselves finding ever more appealing reasons why their stable job is becoming stifling and excuses for leaving their suburban lifestyle behind for unknown horizons.

It is the way of their existence, the core of their desires.

Ultimately though, the two groups of people are each essential to the life and balance. The settlers provide inspiration for the explorers to achieve, and the explorers entice the settlers to life and go beyond that which they know. Roots of the earth, and wings of the wind.

The settlers and the explorers are in a constant dance around each other, interacting and altering realities, inspiring and changing perspectives. 

Admit it...

Admit it. You aren’t like them. You’re not even close. You may occasionally dress yourself up as one of them, watch the same mindless television shows as they do, maybe even eat the same fast food sometimes. But it seems that the more you try to fit in, the more you feel like an outsider, watching the “normal people” as they go about their automatic existences. For every time you say club passwords like “Have a nice day” and “Weather’s awful today, eh?”, you yearn inside to say forbidden things like “Tell me something that makes you cry” or “What do you think deja vu is for?”. Face it, you even want to talk to that girl in the elevator. But what if that girl in the elevator (and the balding man who walks past your cubicle at work) are thinking the same thing? Who knows what you might learn from taking a chance on conversation with a stranger? Everyone carries a piece of the puzzle. Nobody comes into your life by mere coincidence. Trust your instincts. Do the unexpected. Find the others.

Go where the love is...

Something cheesy