Call For Entries
What we're lookin for...
1. Writing, short stories, travel and trail tales, poetry, photography, graphic art, illustration, cartoons, insightful perspectives about our human experience and future...
Email Us your Royalty-Free* creativity as TEXT and or JPEG files to be included in future online editions of Nomadic Times
Copyright of the writing, art or image remains the property of the origional author, artist or photographer. Original work Only, you Must agree to grant Nomadic State of Mind permissions and rights to use the image or writing indefinitely on any page at www.nomadicstate.com or any advertising or printed materials promoting Nomadic State of Mind. Must have sufficient permission of any recognizable persons appearing in the photograph to be able to grant to Nomadic State of Mind the right to display their photographic submission online or in printed material.
Recent Submissions
Recently while in the course of moving, I began surveying my possessions. A pile of clothes hip-high. Enough shoes to fill two laundry baskets. Meaningless decorations purchased from the local Big-Box store. And immediately I was transformed. As my eyes darted back and forth from pile to pile to pile I suddenly felt incredibly disconnected. Disconnected from my "things", and for the first time in my life I viewed them just as things, and not as an attachment to ME. Not part of my identity, not part of my being, not at all part of who I am. And I begain to purge.
I slashed through the pile of clothes until the donation pile was towering over the meager keep pile. I got rid of all my dishes, my extraneous kitchen appliances and utensils, keeping only a bowl and plate and set of bamboo utensils. I pulled my TV off the chest of drawers and piled it next the DVD player and remotes, bound for a future garage sale. I moved through my apartment like a tornado, dismanteling furniture, disabling electronics, and liberating my soul.
While inside I feel I live a rather simple lifestyle, the tangible items I have collected over the years speak of a different tale. They tell of a time when self esteem must have depended on that pair of boots, the ones that I just "had to have." The candles that matched my decor so perfectly, their wicks remaining crisply white, unlit. I had suddenly reached the peak of my consumption, and vowed to kill the ugly beast inside, the one that freely hands my cash to anyone willing to sell me what's new, what's improved, what will "buy me happiness".
As strangers lugged away my old false status symbols, I felt like each was a burdensome weight being lifted off my shoulders. I stood a little higher, breathed a little deeper, knowing that I wasn't being smothered by the weight of my wares. I walked inside, grabbed a marker and a piece of paper, and wrote FOR SALE.I stepped back into the bright summer sun and strode across the driveway. As I opened the door to my car and taped the sign on the inside of the window, I took a deep breath of semi-fresh suburban air and looked back at my pile of drastically reduced "things". The ability to be able to pick up my few possessions and hit the road was as liberating as it gets. To be a nomad, to roam this beautiful earth with no belongings holding me back. Only shelter for my head, clothes for my body, and shoes for my feet. As I looked out across the desert towards the fading horizon, I felt a new life being born inside me at that very moment. And as my only remaining pair! of shoes and I walked back into the empty apartment, my heart swelled with joy, and I knew the pure ecstasy felt with such newfound freedom and inner peace would follow me the rest of my life.
more recent entries coming soon...
[more]
[more]
