Another Year Older and Losing Hope

Travel does terrible things to a person. I know that this sounds funny, even ironic coming from me, the girl with the travel bug, but the bug has been dying and replaced by a desperation to settle down in one place. I am not sure if it's age or exhaustion catching up.

I went away for two weeks back to the States with a bunch of the students, an educational trip. Great for these kids since they had never seen America before, and awful for me as it just made me feel more homesick than ever. Not just homesick but desperate to live the sort of life that I've always longed for: one home, one man, one relationship, one child, a vacation a year. I am now convinced that it's never going to happen.

Increasingly during the trip I found myself getting angrier and angrier, cursing myself for deciding to become bi-continental. It sounded really cool for a while, and the flying back and forth was exciting, but now the excitement has worn off. In a month I will celebrate my 37th birthday, which is a milestone of sorts. My 20th high school reunion is around the corner and almost every classmate is married with kids, almost everyone except me. I have the feeling of sitting on the sidelines, waving my arms and screaming, "Pick me, pick me, I want to play!" So why not me?

The father is convinced that the real root of the problem lies in my wandering mind, shifting goals, and impatience. Most people stick with one thing — maybe two or three, but certainly not 20. Besides, I talk to too many people and say the same things, he said.

"You are too easily swayed by others' opinions," the father said. He compared me to the guy who got in trouble for punching someone else out when he got fed up with the gas line after Hurricane Sandy. "You can't use brute force to get your way," the father said.

If anything, I am very lucky to have such a wonderful father, especially at my age, but I keep trying to explain to him that my desperation is tied in with the knowledge that we are all getting older. "I want to be independent and have my own family and life," I tell him.

"If you're a bit more patient and you think of others more, it will happen," he says. I am tempted to use ADHD as an excuse again. As much as I want to believe, on many days I just don't see it happening.