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PSYCHOLOGY | IDENTITIES | NOMADISM
Expat. Nomad. Seagull. Rootless tree.
(yes, this is about most of us)
I met with a friend the other day and walking with this friend through the galleries of the British Museum, and later, strolling on Russell Square and having a coffee in the Tropea garden cafe, I became aware of how our minds can be in many places at the same time, and how our emotions sometimes really take over the very fibers of the rational self. Violently. Belligerently. Mercilessly. Propulsive.
Both of us are people of multiple homesteads, always wide-legged, open, crossing boundaries, carrying loads and backpacks with cultural mentifacts from one culture into another, which makes us a bit forlorn, and having a heart going boom, incessantly, because one sometimes feels that having so many homes also means there is no home left to feel home in.
We are members of a majority.
We are seagulls.
We are trees, uprooted, hanging on to dear life, while the lesser birds build their petty nests in our crowns, and soil our branches with their droppings.
Life is a journey. Life is an experiment made for travelers.
We are of a kind that tends to love a good rainstorm rolling over the sea. Heading in our…