I change reality for dreams…For freedom.
This is for all you restless souls. For the lost ones and for the ones that want to get lost.
This is the story about freedom. About that unbelievable freedom that now seems million miles away. A story about dreams that are half awake and put on hold. Now, I have to be here.
But still, I dream of some distant lands. Somewhere deep inside, in a special place, when it’s silent, I call it. I call the freedom. And wait for it.
I still dream about picking oranges and driving on the wrong side of the street. I watch those yellow fields intertwined with gum trees and the cows that lie beneath them.
I change crowd in the buses for that one bike that’s flying over the dusty road while the sun is slowly waking up.
I change tired lifeless faces looking through the bus window while driving through the city with the happy faces of living beings who greet me while I roam through the fields.
And traffic lights for hayricks.
Artificial lights of stuffy offices with the morning sun that’s finding it’s way through branches of the trees.
I change looking at the excel tables for watching bushes while searching for that right blackberry to pick.
I change coffees after work in the smoky cafes for swimming in the river.
I change all those emails for my sister’s message that was waiting for me in the kitchen on my first working day at the farm: ‘Sandy, don’t forget to drive on the left side!’
And then sometimes, I would change all that for wandering through the big cities. For never ending waiting to cross the street of bustling Sydney. For continuously getting lost, going in the circles while looking for the apartment. For the first walk to the Opera House. For that feeling when you see something for the very first time, something you’s only seen on the postcards before. I want to arrive somewhere new and not believe I’m actually there.
I want…
I change sitting all day in the office chair for feet that have been walking all day somewhere on the other side of the world. For the pair of feet that brought me to a new adventure.
Then I would change the busyness of the big city with the most golden coast in the world, with the tiniest grains of sand which you won’t be able to get rid off, nor from your shoes, nor the heart.
I would wake up every day and there would be a message on my phone ‘Where are we going today?’, and I would come home all red from the hot Australian sun. But happy. I would look across the ocean at the skyscrapers while standing on the small hill. I would walk through the rainforest while sun is peaking through the branches and the lizard the size of a crocodile is waiting in the middle of the small wood path. And the only thing you hear is the waterfall. And sometimes a noise in the bush. I want to be woken up again at 5 am with the words: ‘Let’s go surf!’
I change swollen feet from sitting in an office all day for the bruises on my knees from the surfing board.
I change the adulthood for youth. For cooking pasta among the lost young souls in metal old dishes in a hostel with the most beautiful pool I’ve ever seen. For the ride in the canoes at the most eastern point of Australian land, where the last whale waves at you before the migration and where one of the oldest creatures on this planet is swimming around you. It’s time for beach parties and paint parties and barbecues. For happy hippie time. It’s time for Byron Bay.
I change my daily routine to work with the ride to a small place stuck in the 70ies. Was it real or just a dream? Will I ever ride in a car looking through the window into some other world?
I change looking at the miracles of this planet on TV with looking at them for real. I change the migrene from my office room without natural light with being seasick on the boat that’s taking us to the biggest living thing on the planet.
I change the comfort of my room for sleeping on the floor in the living room with the people I’ve just met.
I change the staleness of life for adventures that change you forever.
And then, I change all that for my room, my family, my friends and my country.
And while I’m daydreaming about all this, I can’t help wondering if we are ever really free..
And at the end, I change these shackles for the world that’s waiting for me.
