I wish I had your life
“I wish I had your life.” I get that a lot. “Must be tough!” they say with a smile. And I can’t disagree. I have it incredibly good. Incomprehensibly good. Sometimes I can feel the weight of the billions of lives lived and living that would give anything for a fraction of the ease, privilege, and pleasure my life has. I don’t know how to give adequate thanks.
Grace Cathedral
I can’t complain.
Today was another good day. Of friends, interest, safety and ease. And rain, musical on the windowpanes, while out in it it’s something harder, gusting to feel like stabs, only softening to water to run down inside your clothes.
A friend and I walked around San Francisco tonight, from Market Street up to Grace Cathedral, down for a meandering burble about Chinatown before finding ourselves in Long Beach and going with it, until we stood on Coit Tower’s promontory with the storm blown in off the Pacific. Back through the Financial District to drip on Bart trains, he went south, I came east.
Then a bike ride through streets like faucets open to any nook of me that was merely soggy not soaked, changing that.
For a moment, the unadulterated wind behind me, I was sailing with the vapor snakes that gave form to every vagary of wind. Grey writhing things that slid on the wet black pavement and made me feel like an windborn seaborn waterborne god.
The road curved out of that harmony, wind rocking my frame and tugging my handlebars, sticks invisible in the undertree rubble kicking my wheel out at sudden angles, tire lost in a mush of sodden leaves that my mind registered would make braking impossible under the bobbing red stoplights.
But I made it home, equally soaked and in love with the world. Moved a snail off my doorstep. And felt something unexpected and familiar.
Because I have it good. Really good. I love my life, my freedom, the fact that today I bought two plane tickets touching three continents. I don’t want to give this up. But standing in the stoop under a single yellow bulb
I realized that if I’d done things differently. Lived a little bit otherhow. There would be someone here when I got home. Someone to laugh at my soaked state, help me inside, take care of my clothes and set an old towel under my bicycle while I climb in the shower.
Instead I’ll do it for myself. And it’s fine. Really is. But here in these quiet moments after midnight, when it feels like everyone else is in bed with their paired each-others, I find myself looking over and “I wish I had your life.”
I get that too.
From: Vagabond Urges Reply-To: Vagabond Urges Date: Friday, April 7, 2017 at 12:09 PM To: Malia Everette Subject: [New post] I wish I had your life
WordPress.com vagabondurges posted: “³I wish I had your life.² I get that a lot. ³Must be tough!² they say with a smile. And I can¹t disagree. I have it incredibly good. Incomprehensibly good. Sometimes I can feel the weight of the billions of lives lived and living that would give anything “
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I wouldn’t have it any other way, but sadness fits in the bag sometimes too. Happy travels, and let’s meet up again!
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You might still get that life too. Poor John and I married—we were in our 30s—because we were both wanderers.
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That’s another thing I love about my job; I get to meet people who found love later in life (30s is spring chickens, still!) And I think you’re onto something, it takes a traveler to understand a traveler…
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Precisely.
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Beautifully written and caught in images, thank you for sharing. I know exactly what phase you are in, been there and still am.
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I hope yours brings you as much joy as mine does to me. More than enough to balance the loneliness. (Which seems to be part of the human condition anyway… Just gotta figure out how to love it too.)
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Thanks Tim!
Sent from my iPhone
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Thank YOU, Diane! This “life” business is a mixed bag o’tricks, but there’s a lot to love about it!
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Thanks Tim!
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Was preparing to write something like “So very insightful, as usual…also these are especially good photographs…” but this time…just… ❤
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Thank you, for all of that 🙂
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(ps, somewhere over the rainbow formed between the deluge in San Fran and the repetitive sunny days of Vila do Conde (average 50 inches of rain a year) there’s others, wondering how nice it would be to find the front door unlocked by someone who already is home or to be able to say ‘hey, it’s friday…let’s go for a coffee by the beach’…and may the universe still bring us to places where we find it’s all beautiful!)
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Beautiful words! It is somehow comforting to remember all the other lonely souls, at those moments where we feel alone. Sometimes it feels like the greatest community we humans share is the feeling of isolation.
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“I wish I had your life”
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Was a beautiful post and the pictures are gorgeous. Very interesting! Was a fantastic read. Thank you Vagabond Urges!
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Interesting blog, I am going to read more post later…
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I hear the phrase, “I wish I had your life,” too. And I keep thinking — you can! You just have to make those choices and sacrifices. Like you said, it would be nice to have someone to come home to, and sometimes it’s nice to have a routine. But I much prefer being able to take off to explore whatever parts of the world I want to, without having to consult with someone else about it. It’s all about balance.
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Absolutely! Balance, deliberation, and occasionally courage. And always gratitude and perspective. Thank you for being part of my mobile community!
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There’s no reason you can’t have that too. If you live long enough, you’ll be a hot old man and in high demand!
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hahahaha The number of gray hairs is always on the increase…
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