Crazy
Imagine you were in Istanbul and had two options to get to Sarajevo, Bosnia. One would be to take a cheap, 2 hour flight directly there. Another would be to decide to take a bus, even though there is no direct bus this week, so you just decide to take another bus to Sofia, Bulgaria because that's the furthest you can get towards Sarajevo, only to realize when you get there that there isn't a direct bus from Sofia either and the busses are even less regular than in Istanbul, so instead you rely on dumb luck that there's an old Bulgarian woman with good enough English and 30 years experience working with the bus companies to know that there's a connection through Belgrade, Serbia. This option takes 3 days and involves sleeping only a few uncomfortable hours a night on overnight busses, and just barely gets to Sarajevo in time. With no hesitation, I took the second option.
Does that make me crazy?
You see, the flight would have been safe. Predictable. Simple. Maybe if you were in my position you would have picked that option. But 10 years from now, I wouldn't have remembered that flight. I'll definitely remember that chaotic bus journey though. And so I guess that means it's about narrative. Or perhaps more about the understandable desire to control life and have it behave predictably.
But don't you ever feel like you're having to fight the call to adventure in your life? Don't you ever feel like there's something more to life than what you've already figured out? How much more? What's it like out there?
I feel that. Regularly. But I don't know, maybe my life's emptier than yours. Maybe you're better equipped for life than me. Maybe I'm crazy.
Or maybe I'm just me. Ever since I was little it looked like fun. All these wild stories about artists and what it took to create something brilliant. About scientists with their quirky intuition, experience, and serendipity coming together to finally make a breakthrough that changed the world. Part of me wants to believe that if I have the heart to live out on a limb I could feel what that's like for myself. Maybe I'm romantic.
Or maybe I'm just a fool, caught up chasing a feeling I don't even know exists. Brainwashed by stories I heard when I was a kid and too stubborn to grow up. Maybe I'd be better off trying to be more like you. Just take the damn flight, and stop trying to search for transformative experiences. Everything we need might be the obvious stuff everyone already knows. Maybe that script is enough and we don't need to be consumed with romantic ideas about what might be happening out on the edge, and what we might do there. Maybe you're right.
Or maybe you're crazy. Just like me.