Where Do We Belong?

                 

The title represents an intriguing question. Obviously it is a question posed by an incurable romantic, a question that can occupy many minutes and hours of the day. The context in which the question is posed has to do with those of us who live our lives not so much by genetic and environmental formulae but by the seat of our pants, those of us who have some insatiable nomadic quality that pushes us over the next mountain, over the next body of water, or over the next arid desert. The context has to do with that indefinable impulse within us that makes us ‘moths to light’ or ‘creatures of instinct and passion.’ I’m really a simple man but somehow I seem to be making this sound complicated…

Here’s the deal! I’m sharing me with you. I’m currently living a lovely life in a penthouse on the beautiful Sea of Cortez. Now, as I write, I look out my big windows at the beach and cobalt brilliance of ‘Cortez.’ The sun is slowly making its western arc thanks to our spinning orb. There are sail boats out there, jet skis, occasional yachts, and people adorn the sands dreaming whatever dreams within them. I’m living here near three years now and I’m restless, somehow needing and wanting a new venue, perhaps going backward in time to the state where I was born – Tennessee. What! Give up this sea, this constant sun, and return to the hills of my youth? Am I nuts? No, not nuts, just some inner wiring that makes me long and yearn for where I’ve been and/or what I’ve had – that nomadic thing, that ‘wisp in the wind’ thing, that ‘moth to light’ thing.

Maybe it’s because that opportunity is there. I can move to the Cumberland Plateau in Tennessee, exchanging what I have here for the four acres of hardwood trees, a canyon, and a big lovely three-story log house. It’s compelling. The urge is strong…to be going back to the state where it all began for me, and not necessarily in the best ways. The property is near the most exquisite Sequatchie Valley, a long and narrow valley that stretches far and parallels the Cumberland Plateau of the Appalachian Mountains. That current within me that sends these strong romantic impulses cannot be quelled. What do I do? But, that begs the question to which the answer is already likely known. If the promises are met by the Tennessee person involved, it will in all likelihood become a reality.

So it becomes a reality. I leave the sea for Tennessee and the Cumberland Plateau. What then? The ‘what then’ is rather predictable for an incurable romantic, is it not? The romantic will come to miss his Sea of Cortez, the constant sun, and the far distant southern horizon. He will feel new wanderlust urges in his senses. It is the way of a romantic.

An incurable romantic knows not about the ways of practicality!

 

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