Friday, May 2, 2008

One Chapter Ends...Another Begins

I awoke early this morning. After months of waiting and enough bureaucratic paperwork to choke a starving donkey, my visa finally came through and I'm Australia bound.

I got the word on the visa on Sunday, and it's been a rush ever since. How do I consistently do that? It must be in my nature somehow that I can never, completely say goodbye to people and have things as organized as possible to make a change like this, even when I have months to prepare to do so. It may be some flaw in my character that resists closure and saying goodbye. Perhaps my Perceiver preference on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator spectrum that longs to be free of things like deadlines and, ultimately, decisions. Whatever, it's left me packing and repacking (which I did again this morning) and feeling like I should call all of the contacts in my cell phone and on my computer. And feeling guilty because I haven't talked to everyone I *should* talk to. But it is very me, somehow.

And here I stand looking out over Rubicon, wondering what lies on the other side. In this case, Rubicon has "Quantas" and a kangaroo logo painted on its side. Talking to a friend, the PAgent Man, the other day and trying to describe the feeling, I said that it felt like when I reported to basic. That same sense of unknowability and uncertainty are pervasive. The nervousness almost palpable. And yet the excitement of starting something new and really launching in to something I want to do. All mingle together in some strange cocktail of joy and melancholy. How does that work inside, I wonder.

So, if I haven't said goodbye to, and I likely should have, then I do so here. And I invite you come and see what it is I'm doing. And to keep checking back here for updates of another sort.

I'm beginning, just beginning, to see that things don't "end" as we understand that term, in life, they just change into something completely different. And completely unexpected. The one thing I do know? That whatever you think something is or will be, that is most certainly what it will NOT be. Now, you'll excuse me, I have to go south, far south, to find out what things aren't.

1 comment:

D Unger said...

Farewell, Jack. Do well in your time under the Southern Cross.