Lim: North

I just returned from Italy. I got lost a few times—just like I did in my dreams but I eventually found my way home. With Pokefi and Google Maps, you can always find your north.

It’s been 35 years since I threw coins into the Trevi Fountain and made a wish. I never told anyone my wish because they say if you do, your wish won’t come true. But it has now so I can tell you. My wish was to return to the Trevi Fountain one day.

No one throws coins in the fountain anymore. It’s just passé. Bloggers are all over the place, though, with the best photographic equipment capturing their youthful glow.

The glow of youth. You never really realize the value of something till you have lost it. Now I feel like I need to sleep for four weeks just to get the glow of looking alive and still kicking.

Now I know why everyone complimented me after the surgery. They said I looked great. Of course! It was almost like incarceration. Enforced rest did me a world of good. Now that I have returned to my crazy, busy life, most days, I have to struggle to look barely alive.

The freedom to choose does not always become me because sometimes, I make bad choices—to work, to work and to work.

So I endeavored to make a good choice—to go on vacation. But mostly, to make use of a non-refundable airline ticket.

We feasted on pasta, pizza and gelato throughout our Italian sojourn but stopped short of stuffing ourselves with those sinfully delicious Italian pastries and desserts. I’m lactose intolerant but the cheese is divine in Italy. Wine is a steal. Thank God, I don’t drink!

The agony of age. You go overboard on three meals and your waistline grows three inches overnight. And then, it takes you three years to get rid of it.

To justify our carbo binge, we walked as much as we could and walked even more when we got lost. The perils of age. Your memory is not really as reliable as you think. Oh no. Not anymore. So you should just dig yourself out of your deep denial and consult Google Maps.

But as you know, Google Maps is not always right. At least, that’s my version of the story.

But we discovered many interesting places each time we got lost. Wandering through the maze of narrow alleys and cobbled lanes in Italy, we got to know each city more intimately.

I think it is the same in life. Sometimes, it is in losing our way or in wandering through the labyrinth of choices in life that we get to know ourselves more intimately and learn how to live our lives more profoundly.

All my life, I have never felt rooted to any place. I have always wandered. I have been wandering for a very long time. J.R.R. Tolkien says, “Not all those who wander are lost.”

Perhaps I am not. But I continue to aspire to find my true north because I know this is how I will get home.

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