GYPSY SOUL – the story

“I’m leaving,” she said.
“What do you mean?” her friend asked in alarm.
“I’m going to quit my job and leave.”
“Leave where,” the brunette said, sounding hurt. “You just got back!”
“I don’t know. New Zealand maybe. Beunos Aires just confirmed how much I have to do this, Lisa. Two weeks wasn’t enough.”
“You’re just going to pack up your stuff and move to New Zealand? Why, Calypso?”
“I’m dying here.”
“You live in an awesome place with a good job and a great life. Why can’t you just be happy?” She was beginning to tear up.
“I don’t know – I wish I could. I love it here, but I just can’t handle doing the same thing day in and day out. I mean, is this it? Is there nothing else to look forward to? Everything I have may be great, but it’s not exciting anymore. I’m not ready to stop experiencing new things. New people and cultures…I still need adventure. Remember when we took our first trip to Europe?”
“Yeah.”
“Getting lost in the streets of Venice, floating in the waters of Greece, going into overload on everything we took in as we tried to remember which country we were in and what language to speak…did you ever feel more alive?”
“It was pretty amazing, but I wouldn’t want to do it all the time. And I definitely wouldn’t want to leave the people I love like that.”
“That kills me too,” Calypso said, looking down at the ice cream cone in her hand. “I may not have it figured out yet, but what I do know is that being confined to this same mundane routine in the same tiny life with the same influences day after day is killing me. I can’t be with all of you if I’m mentally and emotionally a million miles away.”
“Why don’t you get out to more museums, galleries or step up the volunteering? I know you like that stuff. Go to the theater if you need culture,” Lisa said in a near panic. “Or if you really need to get away, take another week to go to the horse ranch in Montana you’ve been talking about. Why do you have to quit your job and leave the country?”
“It’s what’s in my heart, Lisa. I didn’t choose to feel like this and would change it if I could. I love you and everyone else that have become family to me. The last thing I want to do is hurt you, but you know I have to do this. I know you feel like I’m leaving you, but I’ll come back. I swear.”

Calypso tried fighting her wanderlust with the week in Montana, but a month later she was on a one way flight to New Zealand.
Now on a plane with everything she owned, she sat there and thought about how sad she was to leave so much of what she loved, but how exhilarated she was at the unknown adventures, both good and bad, that were on their way. Eventually she’d find her way back to face the consequences of what she had left behind. For now, she embraced who she was and the happiness that came with. She was finally living for herself and felt a love for life that she had never been able to find before. In the middle of the skies and in these unknown lands, she had finally found home.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

I’ve always known who I am. I write, I love the arts, I love people and I love travel. I’m passionate and need to fight for what I believe in. I never had a problem knowing who I am. My battle has been fighting the outside forces that would tell me I am wrong.
There’s only so long we can run from ourselves before surrendering and that’s where I am now. I’ve given into who I am and what I love. That is what you see here.
Bobbie White