Dreamer Poet

Remember high school?
When we all had dreams of what we would eventually become, and how we would go about obtaining our goal. And sometimes, when you tried to envision this some-day "new and better self" - was the vision cloudy? Murky? Maybe even blank?!? I know I certainly had problems seeing my future self, it was all too easy to drift. And drift was just what I did. For years. Letting random currents nudge me along, sometimes bumping into a log or rock, sometimes finding myself bruised and bloody as I fought to get through the rapids, only to find myself eventually in a slow drift once again.
During this journey, my inner matrix didn't change, the things I loved as a kid, I still loved: Peter Pan and Tom Sawyer, swinging in the park, searching for arrowheads , fossils, or lovely river rocks, sitting in the dark and staring in wonder at the vast starlit sky, reading science fiction,and exploring the pure beauty found in nature (tree roots breaking free from the earth, hidden creeks that sparkle in the sunlight, the thrill of seeing the first shy trillium in the spring, the lullaby of evening crickets). . .
Then a few years ago I discovered I was no longer content to just drift along. I wanted to stand at the helm of my ship, albeit a sailing ship, star ship, or even sinking ship, but darn it I needed to plot a course and discover the world I knew was out there beyond the oceans; oh, I had read lots of travel books alright, but had never left the States.
Thus one day I disgustedly threw down my latest National Geographic fuming about my drifter life, and decided the time was NOW. I wanted to experience adventure, see the world, get off the sofa! Abruptly I quit my job, sold my trusty old pick-up, and bought a ticket for the Orient. China to be exact.
Beijing to be precise.
Of course, while on the plane flying over the Pacific, I found myself hitting my head against the window with the horrible knowledge that I was an idiot since I most certainly did not know how to speak Chinese, didn't know anyone over there, and since I was not independently wealthy I had very little cash in my pocket. Moaning quietly over my fate - a somewhat rather dramatic first-time-mid-life-crisis - I knew I was stuck. The plane certainly was not going to turn around and head home.
After landing in Beijing, I found myself wandering along Wangfujing Street, breathing in the scent of leather as I passed by the Tongshenghe Shoe Shop, inhaling the sweet, yet sharp, aromas of jasmine, green, and black teas drifting from the Wuyutai Tea Shop, stopping to admire the jade and pearls softly glowing in the window shops - oh, and carefully doing a two-step-hop-one-step-skip to avoid the globs of spit marking the sidewalk. Well, nothing is perfect.
Within a few days I had signed a one year teaching contract at the Beijing University of Science and Technology. By the end of the first year, I had explored the faded beauty of the Forbidden City, climbed the crumbling ancient Great Wall, and stood in awe and sadness before the thousands of stalwart stone clay soldiers at Xian and while absorbing all the sights and sounds and tastes of this exotic world, somehow I evolved. My world view changed, expanded, and was enhanced with wonder. And so I stayed. And stayed.
Over the next four years living as an expat, I became trusted by my students and fellow teachers. I was taken to places forbidden by the government and was able to gain insights that I will be forever grateful for because it altered my life irrevocably - for good and for bad - for I had seen the many faces of China.
I learned not to trust Mother China's propaganda machine and not to trust the United States propaganda machine either. And so, when I finally came back to the States, I found I had changed, evolved. I had learned to question. I had learned the United States is not the center of the universe, let alone the earth. And I learned that people, no matter what race or religion, were essentially good, if only given the chance.
Also, during my years in Asia, I was constantly writing, and I am grateful I did, for those notes, journals, letters, articles, essays, poems, all bear tangible witness that for a time at least -
I led the life of a wanderer/dreamer/poet/explorer.