Upheaval

[Aardvark]

One day, I will change my life. Again. Something I do every now and then is to change my life. After years of silent contentment, an upheaval is what I need to keep me from cracking and drooping down to a level of mediocrity. I feel the time will be soon. There are always loose ends that need to be tied, that SHOULD be tied, but half the fun of changing your life is seeing what becomes of those loose ends. Although, all the ends with dollar signs attached must be tied off and fused with fire. I've had too many of those loose ends almost strangle me.

 

My job is quite mundane at the moment. I enjoy my work, it's simple, requires little to no thinking, but I'm not going anywhere. I haven't achieved anything worth writing home about since starting. So that has to go. It won't be any time soon, but it will happen. I'll wait until I've saved up enough to survive several weeks unemployed, then I'll quit. There'll be problems, of course, but I'll deal with them when the time comes.

 

Quitting isn't enough, though. People quit their jobs every day. It's just another stage in life. True, it's a small change, but it hardly counts as an upheaval. So when I quit, I'll make sure I have enough for the few weeks of unemployment, plus a new car. I've had my eye on one for a while, now. An HQ Monaro. That's the one I want. Deep blue, 383 Chev V8 engine powering the thing, manual of course, automatic being reserved for women and old people. Racing fats almost as wide as a small car on the back wheels. Not really necessary unless I plan to be draggin' in it, but they look cool, so I'm gonna get them. And twin exhaust. Two and a half inch, all the way, baby. Maybe turned down at the end, I don't know, yet. Beautiful cars, Monaros. So few of them left, but they do go for reasonable rates. My idea of a reasonable rate being around the five grand mark, with some restoration required. I'm almost there and I don't want to wait until I'm fifty to be driving the car of my dreams. That's way too old to enjoy it.

 

I'll probably get the car before quitting, though. Give me time to restore the thing, give it a few touch ups, fix those niggly little things that shit me about it, as I know there'll be. There always are with second hand cars. But that'll be alright, as I'm required to give two weeks notice. Buy the car, quit, spend two weeks fixing it up, then I hit the road. Leave my phone at home, take enough clothes to last a couple of days and pick a direction. Not that there'll be too much hassle there. Living in a coastal city, east is already out and north and south are more holiday destinations. So I'll head west. Across the mountains. Over the plains. Maybe even out to the deserts.

 

Recent upgrades to the roads have made heading west easier. One road is all I need to leave the city. One big road with a high speed limit. A perfect starting point for such a thirsty beast. Eight cylinders pumping in fifth, low revs, less petrol, the car'll sing. Maybe I'll have the radio on a classical station, maybe a metal. Maybe I'll just switch the radio off and enjoy the purr of the engine and the sound of wind rushing past me. Hopefully I won't be worrying about the horns of angry rivers or the sirens of police. But who can see the future?

 

When I hit the mountains, I'll have to make a few stops. I'll have a camera with me, because I'll be a tourist at this point. Being more of an amateur photographer than a snaphappy holiday maker, I'll be enjoying photographing the scenic view more for the act of capturing it forever on silicon than having an image to reminisce over. An image in my mind stays forever. I don't need a reminder. But I know there'll be relatives who'll be expecting photos upon my return. And I won't be disappointing them, but they'll be secondary to the act of photography.

 

Coming down the other side of the mountains, I'll shed my tourist persona. There isn't much on the other side, I already know. There's only so many cattle stations and pubs that are set up at the boarder of two main roads and three farms that you can see in your life before they become dated. Once I descend, I'll be exploring myself. Long distance driving is when I think the most. There's something about switching off and leaving my subconscious in charge of keeping me alive that relaxes me. What I'll be thinking about, I wouldn't know. Will I be in a relationship then? Will my current social circle be the one I'm still in? Or will I have moved on? And where do I see myself in the grand picture? These questions are somewhat rhetorical, as I'll be mentally discarding all answers as soon as I've pondered them. Even though I'm too intelligent to believe the notion that mental space is limited, I'd rather be devoting all thought to one idea, then moving on. Also, I already know whatever answers I come up with will mean naught when all is said and done. I accept who I am.. I like being me. If I could be anyone in the world, I'd choose myself. If I had to choose someone else, I'd choose someone else, just so I could wish I was me. Yes, I'll still be an egotist.

 

Where will my driving take me? That, I cannot foresee. Every crossroad will require a dice throw to determine what path I take. Decisions like that I'd rather not make. And who cares if I get lost? I'll have nowhere to be and all the important people in my life'll know and accept that I may be a while. But I will have a map. At some point, I know I'll want to go home. But now I get ahead of myself. I'll still be driving out..

 

Maybe the dice comes up a constant stream of sixes. I head west and I keep heading west until fertile farmland turns to desolate sand dunes or rocky wastelands. Will homesickness set in before I hit the boarder? And if it comes up all ones? So I've crossed the mountains, only to head south. Or threes, sending me north? North west would be where I'd hope for. North for the weather, west.... well, because it's away from my home.

 

Who will I meet on this journey? I'll be mixing with the locals whenever I feel the need. Why go to an armpit out past the black stump if not to speak to the locals? Can anyone learn about a place without talking to those who live there? Another fixation of mine is accents. I love how different people talk totally differently, but still in the same language. The slightest inflection on a word can change the meaning to one party, but not the other. Also, I enjoy pestering foreigners and accents are sometimes the best thing to go on. But how do people talk out west? I'd imagine slowly. They've got a lot of time on their hands. Can't rush agriculture. No need to say or do anything in a rush. Slowly but surely. As by thought, action and words. But that's just the opinion of a fast talking, fast thinking, illegal driving city boy. Based on nothing.

 

The natives have started leading tribal lives again, but the taint of western culture is still with them. According to legend, they were always friendly and would welcome strangers, but now they try and sell them stuff, too. I'd have to go and spend time with them. Anyone with such a strong link to the earth has gotta know a lot about a journey into the centre of being. And I've always wanted to learn how to throw a boomerang.

 

I hope to find someone I've never met. No one's ever met. Someone who's lived their life uninterrupted by the outside world. Alone, isolated. I want to know if such solitary figures still exist. The best way would be to meet one, shake his or her hand and ask them one simple question. A question with such deep ramifications as to shake our society to it's core. Or would, if I wasn't asking someone who'd shunned society in favour of solitude

 

"Who would win in a battle between pirates and ninjas?"

 

Yeah, a hermit would know the definitive answer to that one.

 

By now, I will have found all the answers I seek and will have turned around. At first, I'd trust my senses to get me back home. They might succeed, they might fail. If they fail, there's always the map. Can't forget a map. I'll take the highways again, listening to country, classical or silence, depending on my mood. Maybe I'll be stopped by police. They seem to have a habit of stopping young people in big cars. No one's ever figured out why that is. But at some point, I'll once again reach the mountains. This time, they'll flash by, as I've already seen them. My mind tends to filter out irrelevant things I've already seen. Then I'll re-enter my city of birth. I'll return home. And when I reach home, the first thing I'll do is grab a newspaper and start circling want ads.

[WrenWind]

*smiles* sound like a great adventure