The Inevitable Wanderer

I read the prettiest quote on Pinterest the other day. I have no idea whose it is, and I take absolutely no credit at all for writing any of it, but I just wanted to comment on how pretty it was along with what it made me thinks of:

"If I knew where I was going next, I wouldn't be taking so many naps, or reading all these books, trying to divine my future in pillowcases and stitched book bindings, lost in the small decisions of each day, only a little bit numb. I am the inevitable wanderer. The girl who always says goodbye, but never knows how to leave."

So beautifully said. Sometimes you just don't know. You don't know what you will do after this day, or week, or month, or year. It's all in the air, up for debate; "the world is your oyster" type thing. And while that is at times scary, and perhaps results in a feeling of restlessness as possibly conveyed in the last sentence, there is also a beauty to it. To being so free. Your time has become your own. And what you do in your spare time when you don't know what to do, is somehow the way we as people subconsciously search for who we are going to be and what our goals are. 

You manage your time yourself, taking that nap on a Thursday afternoon for no other reason than the fact that you can, or you can read books you've never heard of before a new friend recommended them and disappear into a world completely new. I've come to realize even these small decisions matter too. Who knows? You might get an idea. You fall asleep hoping that somehow the dreams hidden away in your mind will spill onto your pillowcase in bright colors to read like a canvas when you wake up. You retrace your steps to the well-loved books from years before with cracked and creased spines and worn in letters and hope the memories you left behind in between the pages will prove to be clues pointing out a direction among so many endless possibilities.

The wandering is indeed inevitable with a future so misty. In a way I love it, and I also don't. It means new skylines. It means exploring and independence, which I absolutely have to have. But it also means saying goodbye. Over. And over. And over. But that is the price to pay I suppose. I say goodbye and start anew, and yet don't know how. Maybe because it feels like I left so much of me behind, but also because maybe complete freedom results in my doing even less because the concept is so foreign. I want my own compass to guide and direct me rather than continue to stumble forward blind. Just something for me to head towards, and yet part of me thinks that since the choice is entirely our own, even the compass will not show anything. I might cradle it in my hands, begging it to show me any way whatsoever, and the arrow would just spin. Spinning around and around in slow circles. Leaving me with the conclusion that I must start walking before I will get directions. After all, one won't get anywhere anyway if they aren't first moving. If the direction I receive later ends up being "Turn around and start over in this direction" then so be it. It's all temporary anyway. And that adds to the joy of it. A beautiful opportunity to collect some really neat stories to tell when I go home. But for now I will nap, and read, and dream, and by so doing hopefully discover where that leads me.