Unintended

The only thing you can possibly do is to take a deep breath and dive into it. Once you jump, there is no way back. The ice cold water will cut through your skin, paralyse your limbs, and disarm your mind and body. When this hostile coldness envelopes every inch of your being, the question-Why did I do this to myself? -will burn brightly inside your head to continually remind you of your foolish decision.

In that precise moment of shock you will be lured by two choices leading to immensely different experiences. You may use the feeble remains of your strength to spring to the surface and escape the unfamiliar... or you let the shock vibrate through your body until it slowly disappears, you start to feel and regain control of yourself. And perhaps, when the cold will seem no longer alien, you will learn to swim in unknown waters... So, what do you do?

***
Well, what did we do?

When I wrote those few lines two months ago, my intentions were to flood the blank pages of my never failing companion, Mr Microsoft Word 2007 (who so kindly takes care of my sadly numerous spelling mistakes) with countless first impressions that overwhelm us every time we dare to step out of our ‘territory’.

Yeah, it would be an interesting read, I guess. However, before I had an opportunity to finish my arrogant epiphany on those peculiar stages of shock, surprise, refusal, depression, confusion or enthusiasm that affect others, I was swallowed by the ‘living abroad’ monster myself. To my own amazement, I was on the top of it all... calm and confident; I was skating on thin ice with mastered precision. This is what I was used to... It was a different stage but the rules of the game were the same. They always are. I walked the path step by step countless times and I was more than happy to help others to get through the first three weeks of hell... to safely guide them all to the ‘I am having the time of my life’ stage.

And so, I find myself in mid November, sitting on my bed and listening to the gusts of cold autumn wind pressing on the windows of my studio... some people gave up and left back home, but the most part made it and successfully slipped from ‘holiday fever’ to ‘Real life eventually happens everywhere’ perception.  And this is exactly the memorable moment I reach my personal sticking point. Everyone is fine, except me.

Nothing about this is real. I have nothing.  I see my friends mostly on the computer screen only. I speak five languages but I have no real practical skill or knowledge. I travelled and studied but in reality I did nothing that would seem to have a significant value. I have never dived honestly into a relationship because I always knew I will leave sooner or later. No matter how much I try to play it off, I still have a great difficulty to trust people. I cannot decide to stay somewhere without turning my back on someone close to me.  Most importantly, what I believed to be an effort to embrace life, turned out to be only a way of escaping it.  For four years I have been running away from reality... moving from place to place with such ease, people ceased to understand me. Not that I ever tried to explain myself. It is difficult to breath with realisation that my ‘no strings attached’ attitude has hurt a few people...

The reason for such a drastic melt down of The Ice Queen stands in the disappearance of the huge glacier of optimism that grew around me ever since I took my life into my own hands. I do not know where it came from, but I did not once doubt anything I set my mind on... and everything always worked out. If you read this, you probably think it is not possible for everything to be coming your way... well, trust me, it is (obviously not without problems... but even those are just a silly threat to that kind of bottomless well of optimism).  I built on it my entire philosophy of life.

However, few long, long days ago, it was gone, and I have never felt this lost and helpless in my entire existence. That morning I knew that I was misleading myself, my life was not going exactly the way I wanted it.

How come that during the time I claimed I had all wanted, I also brought my writing into a complete halt. As much as it hurts me to admit it, I have not written anything, anything at all in four years... I dismissed all the stories as not being good enough or I just let them stagnate till I forgot, so I would not have to deal with them. I might have been studying business, cultural differences, literature, history, film, psychology or languages... but that I did and do only for the sake of broadening my horizons... to better understand people.... to understand the language that I love so much that I express myself in unnecessarily long and complicated sentence structures, just to enjoy their lovely melody and rhythm when I read it out loud. I create bizarre metaphors in random conversations only to be able to use the words I find particularly beautiful in everyday life... And yet, I did not write a thing.

This is the only failure in my life that has a real power over me, that has strength to crush me like a little cockroach. So, you see, I did what I despise the most... I did nothing.

Secondly, the melt down revealed the hatred I felt towards Edinburgh. I loathe that city for steeling my liberty, I ability to leave everything behind. I hate it for changing feeling of homesickness from a time to time poke of memory to permanent omnipresent phantom that messes with my head no matter how far I go. I hate it because it took away my last valid excuse to avoid settling to a real life once more. I can no longer say ‘I haven’t found a place good enough’.
I need it. I want it. However, despite all I have been saying, claiming with a straight face and persuasive tone... it petrifies me to lose the comfort of ‘the deadline of departure’. What if my courage was only a result of absence of reality?

The truth is, suddenly, I don’t know what I want... I don’t even know if I have the guts to get it.

***
But then... then I talked to my best friend.

Actually, she talked to me starting with: ‘What the HELL?’

You know, listening to her giving me a passionate lecture... listening to that litany of why I have no right to think or believe those things... I was proud of her. I had to smile as my mind drifted into a series of flashbacks about me doing the exact same thing, saying the exact words with the same irritated passion to her and to many, many others I have pleasure of calling my friends.
And then, somehow, my ‘no regrets’ theory found its way to the surface and I smiled even more. Perhaps I did not do anything particularly significant, but I did live up to it. I do not regret anything... the things I did and those I did not do. All those moments... happy or sad, embarrassing or funny, preposterous or deadly serious... they are all there and I would do them all over. Maybe they are not so significant in themselves, it is important that I lived them. After all, they led me to a major breakdown that revealed the life defining BIG things I have neglected.

Ice glacier should not epitomize optimism. No matter how powerful that particular optimism might be. There is too great of a risk your mind will grow numb and your reflexes slow.

Well, it’s time to face the greatest fears... even though it means to write, trust and stop leaving.

This is the end of first Ice Age.... I guess.