I'm not a Wanderer

I just got back from an amazing run on the rain-soaked streets of Provo and I feel great. Today was a beautiful day and the night was no exception. There’s a smell that comes with rain that’s so invigorating. I felt invigorated, at least, enough to be out a lot longer than I had planned. And in that time I got to thinking. There’s a lot of uncertainty ahead; a lot of -I don’t have a clue where I’ll be in two months and that’s slightly frightening. I have all these plans, and it’s coming down to the time when I have to decide one way or the other.

Well, tonight as I was walking around to cool down, I thought about some of these plans. I thought of Alaska; of how two people have called me about a job there and I still haven’t called them back. I want to go. It’s been a goal of mine for years now, to live in Alaska for a while and check out the wilderness. What better time than now? That’s what I keep telling myself to try to outweigh the regret I feel about things I’ll miss out on if I go. My best friend having her first baby; a real family reunion with people I haven’t seen in years and other family members I’m just starting to get to know; a lot of new friends that would be really awesome to have around this summer; and anything else that goes on that I’ll be too far away to even hear about…so many things. While these thoughts twirled around in my head, I reasoned with myself that there will always be things to miss out on. But I can’t not live my life, right? Then I started thinking about the Peace Corps, and how I want to join that in 6 months. That’s a huge commitment; a whole lot of missing out on things and not being a part of people’s lives. If I can’t even decide about Alaska, how can I leave for two years? But in those two years I’ll be shaping my life. It is a dilemma.

So while I thought about this, and felt the familiar rain softly fall around me, this wonderfully obvious realization spread through me.

I am not a wanderer.

I like feeling like I belong. That’s what I want. I have all these great ideas of traveling; I feel inspired by that Bob Seger song, and especially the lines

“Stood on a mountain top staring out at the great divide. I could go east I could go west it was all up to me to decide. Then I saw a young hawk flying and my soul began to rise. And pretty soon my heart was singing-Roll, roll me away wont you roll me away tonight. Gotta keep rollin gotta keep riding till I finally find whats right. And as the sunset faded I spoke to the faintest first star light next time, next time I'll get it right”

I love that. I really do. I am at a cross-road; my life is in my hands, and I can do anything with it. That’s so incredible. And daunting. And while I do dream big dreams, and plan big plans, I’m much more of a dreamer than an acter, and I think that all I really want is a home, with people that love me and things that are familiar. I want to belong somewhere. I’m getting to know Provo on a much deeper level than I have before, and I love it. But Provo’s not home and never could be. The problem is - no where is home. I don’t feel like I belong anywhere. And maybe this is my wandering time, where I drift along, trying out new places until I find something that’s right. But if there were ever a time when I wished I had someone I trusted unquestionably with my future, that I could ask exactly what I should do with myself and where I should go, it would be now. Not that now is a particularly hard time to decide, or I’m faced with anything out of the ordinary in life’s unending quest for surety and confirmation. It’s just that right now I have decisions to make, and I’m too lazy and indecisive to make them.

At least it’s somehow comforting to come to this definition of myself, that I don’t want to wander my whole life; that I do want a place that claims me.

Sometime I'll get it right.