Journey Into the Gentle Wilderness of Love

1 - I had to leave

Ihad to leave. I had to leave the city. I had to leave it like oneleaves a burden, an illness, a cancer, a disease behind. I had toleave the city; my life depended on it. I had to leave the hustle andthe bustle, as if I was amputating a gangrenous limb. I had to leavethe city, like a prostitute pushed to the end of her limits, finally,one night, has the courage and drive to leave her pimp and the dark,cold, heartless shadows of a back alley industry that takeseverything out of her and leaves nothing behind but a ravaged,abused, desolated and merely the shadows of a destroyed soul; alimping deconstructed, mangled, broken pieces of the self, of thesoul, of the heart, escalating the burdens of bruised flesh andwounded soul into uncharted territories of unimaginable pain anddisgust.

I had to leave thecity, like a thief in the night, with barely the essential, theprecious treasure of my freedom, my sanity, my pride, my confidence.I had to leave the city, like a battered wife finally unveils thewill, one night, to leave the tormentor that makes of her home aliving hell. I had to leave the city, like a prisoner escapes theprison, jumps straight in the icy cold currents below and swims withthe desperation of a dying man hanging on to his last thread of hope.That quintessential last string of hope. The one that changeseverything.

I had to leave thecity; for my health, my mental health, my soul's health, to avoidanother useless waste of time and energy, another useless depression,depleting me once again of my life, voracious, vicious, vampiretaking without consideration, without recognition, without an ounceof gratitude, without anything, really. I was just a whore, servingclients, nothing more than a body doing the motions, a soullessgolem, an automata of my life, scraping and brushing existence,almost like an external witness of my shadow. Was it life though? -an automata of my existence, not even life, because it had beenreduced to that. Existing. Not living, not surviving, merelyexisting. Yes, I was smiling on the surface - but deep down inside, iwas bleeding away my precious life points, replenishing my « healthbar » just enough to keep going for the next couple of days.

I wanted to settle, ithad become not an obsession, but the cord thrown at me from the topof the well, something to grab and hang on to to climb out of misery.I wanted to have a home, not a place where I would store my junk andmy possessions - of which - I was never sure what the ratio reallywas. Was I hoarding useless junk or was I collecting usefulmeaningful belongings which, to an extent, defined me? I wantedfreedom. The absolute amazing freedom of being able to produce noiseat the ungodly, unholy, hours of the witching hours, read my Tarotcards by candlelight, smoke my sage bundles, listen to weird musicand do suspicious or auspicious moon rituals, like a witch of ancienttimes. I wanted to reconnect with nature and earth. I neededgrounding. I needed the freedom of being able to touch grass, to walkbarefoot on the grass and the dirt without feeling ashamed, orawkward because I was in an otherwise public setting which would, ifnot frown upon, definitely see my behaviour with a weird judging eye.

I craved the freedom ofcollecting twigs and herbs and plants, weave wreaths and collect deadbugs without the fear of being reprimanded. I wanted for things andevents to have meaning, to enrich my life, not to be useless burdensto drag around day in day out - like a heavy bullet, like a set ofheavy chains, not even knowing clearly why I was carrying themaround.

I craved the power ofdeciding of my time, how to invest it, how to live it, how to enjoyit. I craved stability, safety, belonging to a home. Not just being ...a body in a closed space where my stuff was stored at.

When I was living in myfirst apartments, after the loss of the one which had been my homefor the majority of my life, I had a curious adverse reaction ininvesting into furniture - as if I was myself chaining myself toheavy burdens that one day, sooner than later, i wouldn't be ableto lift on my own and the sole thought of that scared me. I had a bed- in the second apartment, but for four years, in the previous one, Ihad slept on a futon (the sort you fold, normally in a living room)and only had an office L-shaped glass table and a kitchen table inthe latter year, in the beginning, a need for surface, more than atable purpose. In the second apartment, I finally decided to assemblea bed which had remained an unopened box for four years and get aproper mattress, not the Japanese futon which has served prior. Inthe new one, I had kept my small kitchen table and got a new secondL-shaped wooden and metal framed table for my tarot reads, separatingentertainment and nourishment from the potential career and passion -the clean aesthetic and dedicated space for my practice.