Being Bahama

A Fresh Start

I’ve spent these many weeks enjoying my freedom… and frankly, trying to figure out what to do with it all.  It’s been so long since I’ve been so free from responsibility that I was a little lost as to where to begin. 

So I sought the advice of a friend of mine who lives a life free from responsibilities.  Jamaica always managed to escape any attempts to tie her down.  I know, because these past few years I’ve been the one trying to tie her down.

I asked her what she thought I should do with my life now that my responsibilities to Moneta were finished.  She replied, “Go to the beach!”  Despite all the years I’ve known this girl, my first reaction was still to laugh.  She just sat and smiled at me till it dawned on me that she wasn’t joking.  With little else on my agenda, I resigned myself to her very unproductive suggestion and agreed, “Fine. Let’s go to the beach.”

We arrived in her hometown of Kaadara, checked into the hotel and headed straight for the sand. I’d hardly arranged my things on our little plot of beach before she raced off to swim, leaving me sitting there alone.

The scenery was breathtaking and for a moment I understood what compelled her to spend as much time there as she did.  Perhaps it had always been less about running from her responsibilities and more about running to this…

Still, that doesn’t help me.  What should I do now?  I don’t want to simply retire and give up tailoring…  But I don’t want it to consume my life like it did before Moneta either…  perhaps life in the big city of Theed isn’t right for me any longer…But where else would I go? 

With all the thoughts swirling through my head I wasn’t getting much reading done so I opted to take a walk.  I walked a long while, head down, thinking hard.  The groomed public beach came to an end but I continued on, picking up interesting shells and rocks along the way, till I came to grassy spot not far from the water’s edge.  The shade of a tree beckoned me to get out of the sun.  It was the first time I’d looked back on the path I’d traversed.   It was further than I’d realized. How long had I been walking?

Sitting there under the tree, looking out over the beach and the ocean with beauty of Kaadara sitting off in the distance, the thought passed through my head that I could look at that scene every day and not tire of it.  Which then begged the question, why don’t I do just that?

Move here?  Why?… Why not?  It’s got that small town charm but it’s big enough to make a living off of… specially with the tourists…. it could work… But I’m sure there isn’t any real estate availble.  But you won’t know until you try… I suppose I could find out, that would settle it….

And so I walked back to Kaadara making a mental list of what I would need and whom I should speak with.  I didn’t spend the day reading and swimming on the beach, but instead I went house shopping and looking for land on which to build my new life.

I began my search much closer to Kaadara, opposite the ocean.  I figured proximity to the starport would be more important than a beachfront location.  Besides, the beachfront property is surely all taken.  I swung a large arc around trying various locations without success.  The closer I got to the ocean the more concerned I became that this just wasn’t meant to be. 

But as I approached that grassy spot and tree where the thought to move here first entered my mind, there I found a plot of land the perfect size on which to build my new shop… as if fate had reserved it just for me.   This is the view from my front step:

Beautiful, no?

(( For now, I’m playing Bahama on Starsider rather than Ahazi

due to the population issues and my desire for a fresh start. ))