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Explore
Explore. Look around, look around. Look at where you are. Look at where you started. The fact that you’re alive is a miracle.
Those are the words that come to me when my writing teacher tells us the day’s prompt: “Explore.” Those words from Hamilton, which I, like much of the country, fell in love with.
What does it mean to look around? To really look? I’ve been feeling half-dead for some time, I realize. Bored, yet anxious, which is a particular form of awful. And then guilt, to top it off. Guilt at feeling bored and anxious, when so much is going right, so much is going well.
Gratitude. That’s what I need to explore. Just saying the word, writing it, hearing it reverberate in my brain, makes me pause slightly and take a deeper breath, which is what I need. I need these deeper breaths. I need to stop breathing shallowly.
Yesterday, I did something crazy that fits right in with the “Explore” category. I bought a ticket to Istanbul. And I reserved an apartment on AirBnB. The ticket was a great price, the apartment so much nicer and so much cheaper than anything in California.
Yet, last night, fear began threading her tentacles into me. I thought about catching Covid-19 on the flight, getting sick in Turkey, not being able to leave, and dying alone in a foreign country. Hey, it could happen. (It actually could. Right?)
