Anywhere but here

There's this picture in my folders on my computer, and its been haunting me all day. It's a picture of gray clouds and a telephone wire. And on those wires are these black birds just sitting there and chilling. There's writing on the top that says "I always wonder why birds choose to stay in the same place when they can fly anywhere on the earth." And at the bottom it states "then I ask myself the same question."

I  was sitting in my car earlier today in the Arby's parking lot sipping on my Jamocha shake with my mom and my little sister. We were waiting for dad to finish looking at the flowers across the street. My mother and she asked me if I had told Tigger that I want to live in Mankato and St. Peter after school. And I just looked at her and shrugged and continued to watch the rain drops roll down the front windshield. "No." I answered. "Everything's up in the air I don't know what I want to do." I looked back over at her and said. "You know I have this picture and it says something like why do birds stay in the same place when they can fly anywhere they want, and then I turn to myself and ask the same thing." 

Silence settled in the car, and my eight year old sister in all her infinite wisdom answered "Because it's comfy." 

My mother and I cracked up and I just shook my head. "Well we know she'll be sticking around." And my mother just nodded in agreement and then the air settled again. "Rachel is not going to be like me. She's fine staying in one place, but I want to travel, I want to see the world. I want to go live in Europe, go to New Orleans, live in a city preferably west coast since I've never been there. Maybe Portland, Seattle, LA, San Francisco, visit New York, go to Asia, Australia, South America, hey maybe I'll end up a Canadian and live in Toranto."

My mother answered, "Well then vacation." As if the answer would be as simple as just to vacation. But it's not. 

 I'm nomadic. Sure eventually I'll settle down and be happy but I'm not expecting that till I'm thirty. I noticed something about me. I dislike commitment, even when the commitment is somewhere that I live. I get restless. The idea to leave Gustavus just to experience a different campus and place has crossed my mind, but I'd hate it wherever I went because I love it here. I spent all of elementary school and middle school crossing my fingers that my parents would have this random idea to pack up and leave so I could move somewhere. By the time highschool rolled around I gave up that hope and instead crossed my fingers and hoped to get out of that school in three years, which I did. 

Maybe it's all just a dream though, the idea that ever city is different and new and exciting. And sure it is new and exciting the first year but after that it becomes routine. I'm probably just fooling myself. The next town will probably be like the last, but at least I gave it a chance. I've never been out of the US, the closest thing to traveling and vacationing I've been on is to NYC and that's staying in one place because first of all I was twelve, and second we were visiting family or the Jersey shore, which I love with a passion but will no longer see since we moved my great aunt to MN. I'm just restless, and the idea of going back to Monticello just for three months for the summer is making me even more restless. I just want to hop into my car, fill up the gas tank and drive. Drive, and drive, and drive until the gas and money run out just to say I've done that. Just to have the experience of going somewhere instead of staying in the same old place. Here.