Middle Ground Blues

I guess I always thought that in most of my past life I was living an inbetween nowhere, or at least somewhere there in. School was hum-ho, it didn't inspire me, and other things, like the thought of travel and a more exciting life always promised relief. Or, then there is high school where the future seems rosy and the world is your oyster... It is really easy to live your life in the shadow of a dream of something to come. That dream will always be in front of you, and then, one day you will have passed it without ever really knowing when you were there - that is, when the Inbetween Nowhere became a reality. Is it ever a reality??

About a month ago, I had a whole different kind of hindsight. Back then, in the good old days when I wasn't working, being stuck in some midlife nowhere seemed a lot like just not having anything to do. Going from getting up in the morning and powering through mega bus rides and sight seeing and getting yourself fed and housed, to sleeping in and having no real purpose wasn't easy. I guess it seemed like I was stuck in some weird middle zone, which seemed mostly caught up in the fact that I didn't have a job and that a job would give me purpose.

When you have been travelling for a long time people always ask you, don't you just miss home and having a bed and a place to rest? You do and you don't. When you are in the thick of something you just do it and you know the end is a long way off so you aren't really thinking eveyrthing through. The dreams of home or of a different future definitely sustain you through and whether you love what you are doing or not, the idea of something beyond that moment keeps you moving forward. When you are home again and you realise how nice clean and crisp sheets can be or the wonderful rough feel of jeans it all comes back to you how much you really did miss it while you were gone.

But how quickly it fades. And the reality of finding a job or paying off bills begin to sink in. How I wanted purpose and a job in those few short weeks I was without. And now, now that I am a working person I dont really want to be back in those jobless days, but the reality that I am not travelling any more sinks in. The people, the sights, the diversity and the smells. All the ups and downs I took for granted.

Some people talk about Culture Shock, for me, the worst has always been coming home. Trying desperately to enjoy the pleasures and the wonders that our society offers, but missing desperately the life and freedom of the road and the all the adventures it holds.

At the time I thought it was the time I needed to re-integrate, but now I see it wasn't quite that. It wasn't really the jobless factor, it was just the being in middle and having no dream, no vision of what the future was. For a girl, who for the last 3-4 years has been driven by the idea of travelling, standing at the end of that long road is hard. There are new adventures and things to uncover, but it is a different path trying to dance between fitting into society and being your own person and figuring out where your path is and what new things will drive you that way.