Merriam-Webster defines a Walkabout as "a short period of wandering bush life engaged in by an Australian aborigine as an occasional interruption of regular work"
To white employers, this urge to depart without notice (and reappear just as suddenly) was seen as something inherent in the aboriginal nature, but the reasons may be more mundane: workers who wanted or needed to attend a ceremony or visit relatives did not accept employers control over such matters (especially since permission was generally hard to get)
This is my ceremony. To talk with God over the course of 14 days in the Rocky Mountains.
It is a spiritual journey that is long overdue. At a time when America is rife with indecision and weakness, I've decided to follow my inner compass and go to the last place I experienced excitement and wonder - namely, the great state of Colorado.
In the late 1970's, my family took a series of road trips to the American Southwest and, at a time when Italian Americans were portraying Native Indians in emotionally loaded television commercials about environmentalism, I was oblivious to what happened around me. My only concern was what wonders awaited beyond the next mountain, or even at the next campground site! Funny how children think of life in such simple terms...
Over the past 20 years I've pushed hard to become the responsible person everyone ELSE wanted me to be. Whether that was a corporation, or my parents, or just society in general. I've learned quite a few things in just two decades, the most important of which are 1) it is nice to have stability in your life if you crave it and 2) nothing is guaranteed. It is the latter that now pushes me to move beyond the daily monotony of driving to work, performing as someone else would expect me to, and coming home to try and wind down and prepare for the same event tomorrow and the next day, and the next day, and the next day.
The average human is bound to get tired of this repetitiveness.
Nevertheless, I've had a penchant for turning the mundane into a new fascination.
I once bet family members that I could sit still, in a chair, for 6 hours if they paid me $20. No one took me up on the bet, but I would have done it.
That kind of determination now comes into play as I prepare a small toolbag with wrenches and other biking paraphernalia that will support me in a 14 day adventure in the Colorado Front Range. Biking is about all I have left that keeps me close to God, and being a recovering Catholic, that's saying a lot! It naturally follows that this hiatus from work is long overdue, and having the guts to admit that when you are very comfortable with consistency and comfort is a statement in itself.
I hope I run into some friends on my trip. Life is too short to spend worrying about pleasing the same group of folks over and over again... I thought I'd learned that in my first 8 years of tech work but since I am a creature of habit I guess there is some barrier to progress I refuse to acknowledge..
Maybe I will surmount that obstacle on my trip.
Or maybe I will just return, as usual, to my humble home and submit once again to the whims of other people. Letting them tell me who I am supposed to be and why I should fear any true change in my life...
