Before I embarked on my odyssey, and since arriving here on the other side of the world, a lot of people have referred to my decision to leave everything behind on a whim as 'brave.' I don't know if this is the word that I would personally attribute to my decision. I say this mainly because, if anything, and as pointed out by my lovely best friend Porgie, I am at heart an escapist. I feel a little bit like I am running away from the realities of day to day adult life as fast as I possibly can, and this feeling has continued to grow since arriving here, as I really have very little desire to return home anytime soon, the thought makes me feel a little queasy. All of my friends are settling comfortably into adult life back in Australia, getting married, buying houses, moving up in their jobs, living with their partners. What am I doing? I am living in a foreign country, going out on the tear every weekend, kissing lots of Irish lads, attending music festivals, working in menial jobs, share-housing; in short, I am basically doing what most people do when they're in their late teens or very early twenties, before they settle down, going absolutely mental and loving it.
I am not complaining about this, but it raises some serious questions about my level of maturity, and my ability to settle generally. In a way, I missed out on the crazy lifestyle that lots of young people have, I went straight from school to university, I studied hard for six years, then went straight into full-time work. Of course, whilst at university there were some fun nights out, but I had never travelled and felt that something was missing. I spent a large chunk of time in a relationship with the King of Emotional Fuckwittery, and thought that that relationship might logically end in marriage (thank god that particular turn of events never occurred, I shudder to think of what my life might have been). By the time my parents were my age they had two children, were divorced, and were in new live-in relationships with different people. I can't say that I would have been happy with that situation for myself, not at all, but I sometimes wonder if I will ever settle.
I've never had a live-in relationship with a man before, despite two major, long-term relationships, and, to be completely honest, I've never really felt content with anything in my life before. I have always been restless, and coming overseas hasn't caused homesickness, rather it has just upped my capacity to be restless, I constantly want to be running around, seeing everything, cramming lots of activities into short spaces of time. And I feel the clock ticking ominously, counting down the months to when I have to go home, and it makes me feel a bit ill. Because at this point I don't really want to go home. Because it will mean facing up to reality and dealing with a few issues. Like why I can't seem to hold down a relationship, or why I struggle to establish them in the first place. Is it really because I keep picking the wrong men? Or is there something about me that makes it impossible for men to want to stick around. I am becoming increasingly convinced that it is the latter, and that is terrifying, because even though I don't mind being single, the thought of being alone for the rest of my life, and of never having the opportunity to have children (if I want them at all) is overwhelming. I'll also need to address what it is I really want to do with my life. Did I waste six years at university doing a highly specialised degree, only to find out that I don't have the willpower and/or talent to get anywhere that I actually want to be, or that the specialisation I chose for myself really isn't for me after all? I worry that I'll never make enough money to own my own home, or to be able to save. I worry about a lot of things, and coming here was a way to push all of those things to the side and focus on myself as a person, minus all of those pesky big questions. It has worked, to a degree, and I am loving it here, but the problem with that is it makes me want to stay in this limbo world forever, and that says something about me as a person which, quite frankly, frightens me.
Yours in restless contemplation,
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