How long will it take me to realize where I have navigated myself to? I haven’t a map. I am observant, perhaps at times of the wrong landmarks. The metaphor of this life as a journey is hack kneed(sic) to the point of ridiculous, yet, I cling to cliche in these open waters. I’ve reached a spot where no land or other boats give me any indication of my positioning. Often the wind has left entirely and I am baking under the open sun, sewing the holes in my sails during the down time, feeling as it this task may be meaningless so absent the wind, so marooned in open water I am feeling. I set my course for just this spot years and tired years ago, but mostly I’ve forgotten that. Great work can happen here because without the wind, without camaraderie, without markers, it is truly up to me. Up to me to what? How off the beaten track can I get? Way, way off. But this was the plan. The Uranian path is lone territory. There will be no signs, no maps, no broadcasts of reality to satiate the longing for validation. There will be no pats on the back, nods of knowing, except from what most don’t see, and if they do, they find these signalers inscrutable, inanimate, voiceless. Getting to the place where the sun and water speak looks like desolation. Hold tight, M. Don’t toss it all away for some cheap fixes now. Have the courage to linger where you’ve tried so hard to get. The passing of the clouds reveals the nature of time and experience, as does the sun and the evaporating salt in the air. Soon enough, you will return to the population, but if you linger here, you will not miss the sea within. Risk insanity, I say to you. Risk dehydration, risk capsizing your security. Linger, dwell, the dog days are still far off. There is no other way to smell the currents, but to sink into this spot. Trust no promise of anything else to come. The novel stops here, leaving the reader hanging; the protagonist sputters, stalls, not even drowning – present circumstances (the boat, the open water, pretending to be captain of this raggedy boat, no wind, no current, no direction) dictate only presence.
Life as Improv 