How many times have I left a place? I can't even count them all up anymore. And it has taken until *this* time, this umpteenth time, to realize the funny feeling on the way out, even if it's a move you're chomping at the bit to do, is fear. Or a lot of it is fear. There's a lot that pisses me off here but they're all known quantities. This is a familiar place, and soon I won't be in a familiar place. That's frightening. It'd be frightening for any animal, let alone a human animal with a consciousness of mortality. Because I know who *I* am here, and whoever I am next, wherever I am, I will have different challenges and be older . . . . eventually frailer . . . that many more minutes closer to death. If you don't have these life stages all harshly chopped by a complete change of environment maybe it's easier to ignore that. Probably hadn't realized that until now because me at 18 vs me in my 40s haven't felt much different health- and energy-wise. But these days as soon as a mirror pops up it's clear the crone stage is on her way. Fair enough but it does take getting used to.
Sometimes I get a feeling that every feeling we feel, all that bewildering and subtle range of emotion, is some exacting cocktail of maybe four things. Fear, joy, love, hunger, and sleepiness. Is there anything else happening up there in our spandrel-ly little brains? Maybe not. Honestly, that's already a lot.
