I step into this shower of my hotel for the 17th time, but this time in a sombre mood. I'm starting to feel anxious that the time I've spent on this project - resisting the pressure from the client to toil constantly on the project and feeling on edge from lack of rigorous activity - is to be the summation of my experience with the new company. Things were starting to gel well in Sydney, I was starting a routine again and looking forward to staying progressive with learning Salsa, tennis, yoga etc. Aside from the heaps of knowledge I've picked up on the job, being here feels like a waste of precious life. My work has encroached my personal life, the client is the most demanding I've ever had. My life still feels like a whirlwind that hasn't stopped spinning for over 2 years. I crave some roots.
This shower is going to be different I decide. I put on some music - LadyBlacksmith Mambazo the remixes. There are 2 songs on this album that transport me. I need to be somewhere else, the vocals are an incantation that carries me to the plains of Africa. I recall the time when I was in Tanzania on the Serengeti, large rain laden clouds rolling in the skies above and the warm wind sweeping the savannah. It was a wild and unrestrained place. With my eyes closed I am running - a bushman. the sky flashes with lightning and I am urged on by the voices in the song.
The song shifts and now I am sitting by a fire with a tribe. An elder is placing some earth in the open palm of my hand and speaking in a strange tongue. The sparks from the flames leap high, the faces around the fire reflect admiration and love. I feel a sense of belonging and purpose. It is some sort of initiation...
I want to feel, only feel... and so I do something completely uncharacteristic in the shower - I dance. And when the mind attempts to intervene, I dismiss it and the limbs are moving on their own, I am not even aware of the movements. In my shower stall there is no trace of civilization, just a naked man in a primitive dance.
I'm haunted by that same accusation I thought I'd buried - that I'm selling out on my dreams. Time is whittling away. This island city feels like Alcatraz at times. The knowledge that there are millions of people crammed on a piece of land that can be traversed by foot in a day is unsettling to someone who gets a high from great expanses of wide open emptiness. I know something isn't right because I seem to find it quite impossible to enjoy the company of most people. It seems that my grand aunt and uncle who live in Singapore are the only people I enjoy being with for extended time. It is nice to sit and not feel judged or analyzed. Where does this come from? I think I just need to feel appreciated. There is that aspect too, I miss being appreciated for nothing more than being who I am. Sitting on their couch sipping tea is food for my soul.
