In general, losing one’s way is considered an undesirable event. However, I feel that the opportunities of getting lost are widely underestimated. For instance, I took up riding the bike. For weeks I had been suffering from a backache that was due to too little exercise and too much hanging around. Thinking that if hanging around gives me a backache and puts me in a bad mood, I should maybe start getting some exercise.
I hate exercise. I hate jogging. I detest running the same streets every goddamn morning as if chased by a pack of wolves. Man made the effort of exterminating them more than a hundred years ago – at least in this part of the world. No need to re-capture the feelings of our ancestors in this respect. Considering this, I decided the national masochistic pastime no. 1 was not for me.
Riding the bike sounded a tad more acceptable, if only for the fact that it can be actually to go places that are too far away to go there on foot. Much to my dismay, I found that I had nowhere to go – else I wouldn’t have been hanging around so much in the first place. So I thought that maybe I could go explore unknown parts of the city. Although
At first, it was pretty boring. I knew where I was, I knew what I would be seeing once I turned round this or that corner, I knew what kinds of people lived there. Then, however, I rode further than I’d ever been by either tram or car. Nothing exceptional there, though, so further and further I went. Houses, blocks of flats, shopping centres… After half an hour or so – I hadn’t realized I was going for so long already – I thought it time to head back. Since I didn’t want to take the same way I’d come, I decided to stray from my thus far straight route and turn left, and then right, and left again. I went straight on, then took another turn left. Thought I was heading back. Thought the direction was right. As it turned out a few kilometres further on, I was wrong.
I had no idea where the hell I was. Then, however, I found something real nice: an old village - right in the middle of the city. A few farm houses, a barn, a field, then a shopping centre with lots of small shops and boutiques. Suddenly I didn’t care where I was or that I wanted to be home by now, I just rode on. Past a pond, an old factory building, some neat and new semi-detached houses, through a little park surrounded by sixteen-storey blocks of flats… From road to road, the sights, smells, noises changed. The newness of things enchanted me – scents I hadn’t smelled since I was a child brought back memories long forgotten. It wasn’t about getting exercise of riding the bike anymore – it was about seeing how people live, about the snails on the road that I was trying to avoid, about everything but my legs that started to hurt. I didn’t even realize they did until I came across the route of tram no. 2 whose tracks led me back into known territory. As I reached home, I felt elated and somehow very calm – and quite hungry, too.
This was a few days ago, and since then I make a point of getting lost at least once per day. I don’t do it deliberately, for that obviously doesn’t work. I just ride on, and then – I can never exactly remember when – it happens.
When I was a child, getting lost was a lot easier. It was enough to just turn a few corners without paying attention to my surroundings and suddenly nothing looked familiar anymore. I knew I had strayed only a few metres from my usual route, but I couldn’t remember in which direction it lay. I felt a mixture of fear and curiosity, the latter usually gaining the upper hand. And thus the unknown slowly became part of my territory; it grew part of my inner map and was unknown no more. My world grew with every day and every time I got lost. Had I stayed within the boundaries, had I never left familiar grounds, I’d still be where I was when I was a five-year-old.
One can get lost in many ways. One can simply lose one’s way – and by chance come a across a bakery in a little frequented side street that sells the most gorgeous bread one ever ate. One can make the wrong decision, out of accident enrol for a seminar one doesn’t have to attend and find it relates to a topic one never found access to – and thus be able to hand in a good and insightful piece of work instead of one badly written. One can get lost in one’s thoughts when one should be mulling over a difficult question – and then find an unexpected answer to a problem long unsolved.
Chance has never been where I would’ve expected it – that is why it’s called chance. Maybe getting lost once in a while turns out a healthy experience – if only for the satisfaction of being able to find my way back. I am in favour of getting lost. I am in favour of going places that I haven’t been to before. Often enough they are literally just around the corner.
The ants got lost, too. After I demolished their trail by wiping the floor with vinegar, they ran around our kitchen in utter confusion. By now, they decided they had better stay where they were: outside and in our cellar. The kitchen seems to have become forbidden territory – except for under the sink, where I still come across the occasional ant trying to escape with a breadcrumb. They’re strong little buggers, they are. I guess they can have the crumbs as long as they stay out of the rest of the kitchen – at least until I’ve found a way to eliminate them all. Sometimes I feel like Sisyphus...
