For some reason I find myself reminiscing this evening. Perhaps it is being back in the US for two and a half years and that London feels like a lifetime ago. Or, that I have had so many lives, really. I've lived in so many areas of the country, so many homes, with different people, and even in a different country. Each time I reinvent myself and I wonder what I take from the past life to the new one?
Looking at my siblings and their lives - filled with children, partners and homes - and then mine, which really is more like a college student - I wonder if I am stuck in time. Is this a lucky life I lead - where I can pursue anything and everything with little accountability - or is it a life where I keep dodging responsibility? No, I am quite responsible. Three years ago I would never have expected that I would be on this journey of continuous self-discovery.
I suppose it was being sick these past few weeks that has made me think about the past, present and future. My friends are my family and my family are my friends. I live without a partner, kids, a pet, a mortgage, following whatever path interests me.
Last week I had my culinary students write out their goals and if they had a panic-zone goal, how could they bring it into the stretch-zone. One student wrote that her greatest fear is becoming the crazy cat lady who sits in a rocking chair and looks out the attic window. I wrote on her paper that I share the same panic-zone visual. It is just difficult to imagine, as I age, that I will not become more unusual and eccentric as I live for myself. Maybe that is a good thing - being my own character? Sometimes I wish I could see the future and the twists and turns that I will maneuver. But at the same time, I don't really want to know what lies ahead. Is this denial or a sense of adventure?
