An arrow lay across the floor shaped by shadows, light, and maybe my own wishful thinking. A sign, probably meant to redirect my mind to the church sermon I should have been attending to. But instead, my mind wandered after it, the thing my body longed to do but couldn't. I traced patterns of rugged bronzed mountains sewn in copper thread across my new scarf. Another shape rose up like the Arc De Triomphe with silver lines of thread sparkling like the headlights on the Champs Elysees at night. The pattern on my boring brown acrylic crocheted hobo bag (appropriate name) spoke of tilled fields or lines of sediment along a canyon wall.
I was so carried away on this train of thought (wishing for a real train) I didn't see the shadow of the boat the arrow pointed at till later. I should have noticed it as I blame the Pixar animated movie, Moana for reawakening my wanderlust. This exquisitely beautiful and touching narrative about a young woman called by the ocean, ignoring family and duty, following her heart on an adventure across wide seas full of peril, excitement, and the unknown spoke to me. When she sings the line "One day I'll know, how far I'll go" the pressure of the tide mounted in my breast swelling with salt water and longing. I can still feel it travel down to my fingertips, the place I channel all my unfulfilled energy, writing it out before it consumes me.
Because my feet are planted firmly in my black faux leather boots grounded to duty, to husband and children, landlocked from lack of funds or available time. Where is my window, bound between soccer practice, Cub Scouts, school, work, Christmas plays, cookie exchanges, all fun things but not the antidote for this nagging virus making me weak-kneed and dizzy with desire. I see castles in Spain in the clouds. Castles I long to conquer with camera and the wisdom of a aged tour guide.
Unable to fulfill my heart's quest, I shut down, grow numb, a mental hibernation that makes people pre-judge me to be cold or distant. It's a coping mechanism to tamp down the longing, my rational brain preaching the merits of doing my duty. Ignore the call to adventure. I am not my protagonist, unfettered and flush of funds or a sturdy horse.
I am blessed in life with home, health, family, and friends. I find joy in the simple pleasures. Yet, just under the surface, fighting for freedom lives this other woman, the gypsy girl, ancestral daughter of sailors still genetically predisposed to go where the wind and sea call.
Someday, I'll let her free. Follow the arrow to adventure.
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