The end of the road
The journey has ended, then how come I am still here. Doubt wrapped in unknown and courage trapped under fear. This was supposed to end differently, or so I thought. I was meant to be wiser, to be more sure, to come back with a sense of joy that would fathom no other. All I am is tired. I yearn to sleep in a bed and not wake up for hours at end… the bed may be on the floor for all I care. It needs to have clean sheets and a comforter and I need to sleep. That’s all I really want in life right now.
The ability to sleep without fear. Without fear for those I love, for myself and for the world. It’s not escapism if it is necessary. Long ago, now I don’t even remember when it was; I was in Montepulciano and I would want to go to sleep and would want to wake up. Both desires intermingled like coffee and creamer. It is important to sleep, in order to wake up. Not to quote closing time here, every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end. It is important to let things go to make space for new things. I used to be a collector now, I am an experiencer. I experience and let go, that’s an art. Feel the love, hold it close and let it go.
Don’t get me wrong. I love having things up on the wall and each of the little trinket I put up would be a part of me, however.. putting things up on a wall is no longer necessary to express. I want my life to be open and spacious and welcoming. I don’t want to jump desires, I want to settle on what I love. A part of me wishes that I hadn’t left my moka behind in Portland. It was meant to come over. To HK, to India, to the rest of my life. When I question that desire to hold on tight to that moka, it is so I could remember Spain but I do remember it even without the moka. I do remember the stars, the quietness of Cabo de Gata, the late night walks, the sound of “can’t take my eyes off you” with the smell of the sea. Vivid. Distinct. Full of life. Ingrained in memory like handprints on cement.
Letting go means accepting the present. We seem to teach each other about letting go of past. When you really dig deep, it is all about the future. Letting go is only about control. You can only know so much. Going to Portland was a weird decision and to some extent a wrong one. It didn’t feel natural being there. I still shed a tear when the flight took off though because it gave me memories. Memories that I could not have experienced elsewhere. Stories of people I wouldn’t meet otherwise. It didn’t change me. I came back still without a rain jacket for goodness sake. However, I will be buying myself one.
When I was there, I wanted to be here. Now that I am here, I want to be elsewhere. What you resist, persists. I resist here (whatever it may be) so much that the feeling of here comes back. You can only run so far. The reason Portland got to me was because every week I would follow the same routine but it wasn’t good enough. HK got to me for the same reasons too. Isn’t that funny?
Words have power but only if they come back to you at a later day. Some words haunt me. Come back to me, again and again. Just like to Kaladin: “We are not meant to survive”. The reason why he protected Bridge 4 was that they were inherently sentenced to death. He did what no one else would because the alternative was to give in and not try.
What’s the worse that could happen? I suppose that’s why I got my tattoo. I choose one life sentence for another and then, another. I suppose that’s what life is. In Portland, I wanted to stay home and cook and then invite people over to eat. The problem was, I didn’t have any people. On returning back to HK, I still don’t have any people cos I am quarantined.
Loving ourselves is so hard, no wonder we don’t fully do it. We keep trying to change and adapt and evolve ourselves so as to increase our liking of ourselves. Never fully accepting, loving or trusting. In darkness, we are afraid alone but with another we think there is less to fear. It is facing unknown alone that is scary as humans. Facing a lifetime of unknown alone has started to scare me. I would like to make the right choice but there isn’t one.
The most important words a man can say, “I will do better”.
Life before death. Strength before weakness. Journey before destination.
P.S. I wrote a lot more on the plane but I will not include those words here. They are about marriage and dating and choices but all unimportant. I want to end this journey with: “I will do better”.