FAITH?
T o B e H appy
T
he body hurts at this stage of
life and much more travelling
by motorcycle.
Mine is a used body;
bruised and repaired. It is
not in an unfortunate condi-
tion as in many other cases, but quite
worn and mistreated. I'm lucky, I’ve
only had a broken wrist caused by a
fall on the first day … and the last …
when it occurred to me, on a winter’s
morning, to put on skates and go
glide on the ice.
I also suffered fractures to a pair
of vertebrae, a bludgeon that hit me
when I was young and rebellious.
The body hurts when it gets up, it
hurts when bending, it hurts when
walking, it hurts always. The muscle
and bone machine wears out and
begins to loosen. You get to a point
when the ailments remind you that
despite your mental age, in my case I
feel thirty-five years old, that perhaps
you can’t go on. Quite a disconcerting
situation.
TRAVERSE 65
The fact that I have not taken
notice that I’m already at an age at
which there are things that I should
not be doing is surprising. I guess
the day when I discovered my 'real'
age, I will be scared, and I will give
up everything I'm doing today as the
thirty-five years old that I think I am.
Among the things that are needed
to ride a motorcycle, to master it, car-
ry the luggage, assemble the tent and
travel impossible distances makes me
feel alive and I am happy to do so, but
much more without ever remember-
ing the truth. My age!
Yes. All those years that have
already passed by, the ones that give
the solidity of the experience, but
above all, the power to do what I
want, the way I want, and how I want.
Of course, it’s not easy. The sacrifice
of abandoning love with a partner and
living a somewhat solitary lifestyle,
leaving home, not having a house or
p lace where to belong, is supposed to
be a very serious decision, but to be-