When I told my friends I've decided to quit my job, leave my apartment in
the middle of the lease term and buy a one-way ticket to Rome, Italy, most of
their responses were "Coooool". No doubt, self-fulfillment is very
popular these days. So popular that it almost seems like people study computer
science and work in high-tech just so later the Huffington Post title would say
"After ten years in front of the screen, Wilma finally left everything and
became a farmer".
Most my family members'/older acquaintances' responses were
"Really? Why?". And really, why leave a perfectly good, well-payed job, a nice, comfortable apartment, a (wreck of a) car and most importantly,
the hip Tel Aviv scene to go work on organic farms in Italy and France?
Sometimes, I have no answer to that question myself. Sometimes I just shrug and
say "Because.", while my insides twist and shout 'What the f*** do
you think you're doing?". But more often than not, I find myself being
able to answer that working with my hands has always felt most right to me (no,
beloved colleagues – hands on keyboard doesn't count) and that nature has always had a therapeutic effect on my body and soul. Urban life, interesting
and full of action as it may be, is also extremely hectic and stressful; every
step you take, you're required to pay someone money for something; the air is
polluted and hence not ideal for my asthmatic lungs (mom, I promise living in nature
will reduce my smoking! I mean, I hope…).
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| A previous attempt of mine to do something different |
And so my trip started to take shape. 5 months, 2 countries, 7-8 farms
in total. Yesterday I even bought my return ticket, so there is a deadline.
There is only so much adventure my anxious self can stand. Signing up for
agriculture studies next year is just another one of those decisions I question
every other day, but it's currently still part of the "master-plan"
to become… seriously, I don't know what one becomes after studying agriculture,
though something inside tells me it might just make me a happier person.
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| Yet another attempt. |
Until the trip starts, I'm spending my days at the office and my nights
worrying, or drinking my worries away in one of the bars I'll miss after I
leave the neighborhood, city and country. Before I fall asleep my brain
involuntarily makes lists of the things that could go wrong between now and
the moment I first land in Rome; between now and the moment I land back in
Tel Aviv; between now and the moment my life ends. The lists are longer
than I can bear because they're endless. Murphy's Law states "Whatever can
go wrong – will go wrong" (trivia fact - all the other "Murphy
laws" are actually just people's variations on that one) and I couldn't agree
with him more. Not in the manner of "if I move to the other line it will
surely become longer than the previous one and so on, and then I'll check-in
last so will be on stand-by on my flight and my Couchsurfing host will have to wait for
me at the meeting point and get angry and leave after not getting a message
from me that I'll be running late, while I desperately try to save my phone
from dying after it fell on the airport floor and someone stepped on it".
So not like that. But in the sense that there is actually no "right"
and "wrong" and when something gets "messed-up" there is no
parallel universe in which it didn't get messed up. When things get
complicated or unexpected all we can do is smile about it because that's the
only course of life we have (said by the girl who's often not able to breathe
when she misses a bus. I try, though).
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| Gonna miss you, balcony |
So, spiritual talk aside – I'll miss you, Tel Aviv. And hopefully the
next post will be written from Rome with a cone of Gelato in my hand.
