It occurred to me today that I prefer things to be stable.

When I was a kid, I remember loving roller coasters…

…once they were underway.

But, before that, there was the worst part of the roller coaster experience: the build-up to the actual start. When I was a kid, you got in the car, and the car took off from the start/finish area (where you got on the ride and then, two minutes later, you got off), only to almost immediately head into the long climb.

This part of the roller coaster experience was just a long, slow climb into the air, up to the top of the tallest part of the roller coaster, the part that led to the first drop that ended up being enough momentum that it would carry you throughout the rest of the entire ride.

I remember being terrified, on numerous occasions, by the click-click-click-click of the cars in the roller coaster as they were pulled, by the cable under the roller coaster, to the top of this enormous hill. I remember looking out either side of the roller coaster and seeing the familiar surroundings fall away as the height got to be higher and higher, until it was only treetops and distant horizons in all directions.

Knowing that the top was coming. Knowing that the fall was coming. Knowing that the excitement was coming, but not until the agonizingly slow climb to the top was completed. I remember the click-click-click-click of the climb turning into a click—-click——–click————click—————-click that signaled that the climb was almost over and that the drop was just a second or two away.

And then –> the drop, and the twisting and turning, and flying and flipping, and the fun of the roller coaster probably lasted half-as-long as the climb to the top of that biggest drop.

* * *

I am a little old these days to be riding on roller coasters, but I still get that same feeling, sometimes.

My family is leaving on vacation tomorrow. We will be gone, to parts unknown by our family, for two weeks. It will include a lot of fun memories and many enjoyable experiences.

But I won’t be happy until we are there.

Which means, between now and Saturday afternoon, when all of the highway driving and all of the significant mileage is complete, I will feel just like I am being towed by a cable, pulling me in my little two-seat cart, to the top of the tallest drop of the roller coaster.

My wife asked me a few minutes ago what was wrong. She could tell that something was up with me. She and I have known each other for so long that we understand when the other one is even just a little bit off. I told her that I was feeling unsettled. When I know that something big is coming, I just want to be on the other side of it. I know that the next forty-eight hours is going to be a transition from where I am used to being, to where I am going to be heading.

Once we get there, and we can get settled and things can return to something that looks more like what my life would normally be like, everything will be fun and fine.

I don’t know why I’m this way, and I don’t know if other people operate in this same manner. I suspect that there are people who can enjoy that long and arduous trip to the top of the first drop of the roller coaster, but those kind of people don’t make sense to me. What is it that they are enjoying? You’ve certainly heard it said –including by me (hypocritically as it turns out) once or twice on this blog– that one should enjoy the journey. But, at this moment, as I am sitting in limbo between where I am about to leave and where I am yet to arrive, it would seem that I am unable to “enjoy the journey”.

It shouldn’t come as a surprise to me that I am goal-oriented. I’ll blame my parents for that one (sorry, Mom, but I think that this is probably well-placed), since my Dad and I had plenty of exchanges while I was growing up that were, shall we say, “goal-focused”. Because of this, I don’t know if I am going to ever be able to just, spontaneously, “journey” or “wander” without a particular destination as the end-goal.

My brother, who died in 2008, was the same way –> there were many famous stories about how my brother would start a home improvement project or a home repair, and he wouldn’t stop until he was done, sometimes going right through the evening and into the night. He once hung a chandelier in his starter home and worked on it until the wee hours of the next morning because he was determined to get it figured out, determined to reach the goal.

I have a goal in front of me, and since we aren’t yet all packed and ready to go, we can’t leave yet. Thus, I am hampered in doing what I have always been trained to do –> attain the goal.

* * *

I think about the adjective, “settled”, and the adjective, “unsettled”, and I am interested in the differences. When I think about settling, I think about settlers. People who were moving from one place to another, in order to “settle” there. Conversely, I guess that someone who is unsettled is not in a place where they feel like they are comfortable or where they feel that they are able to be at peace with their set of circumstances.

It’s during times like these that I feel unsettled.