The Next Movement

I flip through "Eat, Pray, Love" intermittently; usually while brushing my teeth, waiting for the shower water to heat up, or something similar. See, it's my bathroom book. The only to be read a few pages at a time while I take care of whatever business I need to take care of book. The author, Elizabeth Gilbert, is recently divorced and in need of some major life re-assessment and affirmation. For one year, she sets off to Italy, India, and Indonesia in search of herself without having to worry about obligations, finances (her publisher is paying her in advance for her travelogue), or any other worldy thing.

Basically, Gilbert is doing what we all want to be doing. Which is why I can't get myself to actually sit down and read her book. I mean, really sit down and read it. While the book comes with high recommendations and certainly possesses insights that would probably be beneficial to me, it contains a journey that I hope to make myself this year. I won't be visiting Italy or India if I can help it but this is the year I'd like to travel and explore.

It's a luxury that few can afford nowadays. Who has the time or the money to take a year off and go cavorting around the world -- or cavort period? School, relationships, jobs, leases, obligations. All of these things tie a person's life down don't they? I mean, how utterly selfish and irrational is it to take an entire year off from life without some sort of cataclysmic reason or financial windfall?

My mom tried to have a nice heart-to-heart with me today -- on the heels of a "what are you doing with yourself?!?" two weeks ago. Her main observation and complaint is that I'm falling behind everyone. I'm headed towards a murky future and she's not comfortable with it to say the least. As a friend told me yesterday, I've essentially been a dilettante for so long that it's now surpassed being a character flaw into the realm of amusement and fascination. I'm like a T-Rex in the Age of Mammals. "Shouldn't you have been extinct by now?"

I wonder what people would do if they could have a year carved out just for themselves. Would they holiday? Would they change something fundamental in their lives? Would they hope for a rain check on that freebie year until a later date (and collect interest)? Then again, perhaps it's better to keep trucking and get that year in snatches of vacations, long weekends, and cough cough sick days.

I guess what I'm saying is: Everything ends, but not everything begins. So start something.