Tipping the Balance

Just finished The Motorcycle Diaries (this is probably my last post on the subject, for now). I didn't want to finish the book. I loved it. Particularly for the insight to the young man Ernesto Guevara (or Ernie Lynch). I liked this person. I don't know what the older man was really like but I intend finding out.

It was like meeting a young person at club, going on a journey of discovery with them and then meeting them years later. You want to know what they have become. I see the iconic image of Che Guevara and wonder how far away from the young man he was he ventured.

I look at myself and see the young person I was...reminded of my time hitching through Spain and getting a lift from a guy on a motorcycle (it was probably a moped!) and hopping on with my rucksack only to tip the bike back to land on my rear, partially cushioned by the rucksack on my back.

I wonder how much I have changed in 20 years. I can't think that I have and that I haven't in some ways. I am me and all that has changed about me is everything but incrementally over time and not all at once...there seems to be always a constant theme though, like a theme song in a movie. I can't hear it - but on days like the day that I struggled to keep balanced on the motorbike for a few miles towards a church where I planned to meet my parents, I could hear a faint tune which I couldn't make out clearly, but knew was there.

I try to find that song.
Some days other music drowns it out.
Some days noise pollution makes it impossible.
Some days I forget its there.
Some days I have to try really hard to remember what it sounds like.
And some days I could just as well be riding that motorbike in Spain...struggling to keep balanced but enjoying the sun on my face and the cliched wind in my hair, exhilarated with life and looking forward to a bright future...with my theme tune playing in the background.

'Wish I knew my theme tune - if i did I'd play it all the time. Do you know yours?