The Curse of the True Romantics

It is the curse of the romantics that leads a man to follow his heart's desire, and makes him pay for it.

A romance can be born by a chance meeting, a wrong turn taken, or by hearing that inner voice that whispers, "go".

My first encounter with romance was as a boy. At that point my parents had bought into a new subdivision, and there was plenty of space to roam. And we did. And I did.

Sometimes I would play with friends in the many vacant lots. Sometimes I went out to those lots on my own.

That was the tall grass. Remnants of prairie grass and stray stalks reminded you that the land had a history. At one time, much of the Midwest was covered by tall blue-stem grasses. It was an inward sea of grass, with storms and dangers much like the liquid kind. The grass grew to heights of 12 feet or more, and the lone corn stalk, left over from another era, wouldn't produce any ears, being it was sterile. Rocks piled up served as natural forts, along with the concrete aggregate tossed over from the new construction.

This was the romance that showed me that there is more than city block and shopping strips.

It has never gone away. I chase this romance from time to time, but not enough.

Sometimes romantics acting on what they hear end up in the history books, and sometimes they end up dead, because of it. That's the chance they take leaving the safety of the subdivision. One romantic, Amelia Earhart, disappeared in the South Pacific, in 1938, in an attempt to fly around the world. Another, Richard Halliburton, a now forgotten travel and adventure writer, disappeared in that same Pacific Ocean a year later, caught in a typhoon. Steve Fossett, a modern name, disappeared in the desert of the United States. All three had nothing to prove. Earhart was already famous when she took out over the ocean in a two engined plane. Richard Halliburton could have written many more books right in the comfort of his study, as he had already been to so many places. Steve Fossett was a millionaire. He got the nickname of being a "ballon-i-tic" by sailing an eighteenth century invention around the world, when planes could do it so much easier.

The average romantic can be one and never leave home.

It's a state of mind, a feeling, that insists that things are possible, doable. And trying it is important. They know that it's not so much the destination, but what you do along the way and what you see and what you experience.

Countries as well as people can be romantics. The United States is a romantic country. Dreams can come true here. At least you are rarely stopped from trying, even in todays nanny state, politically correct world. England has some of the romance left in it. Australia as well. Sometimes, as with people who are romantics, they get together to fight off those who want to kill all romance, and live in the tidy subdivisions, smothered over with perfectly cut lawns.

Romantics are usually cursed though, because, like the countries, they rarely get together. It's not often when the same desires and goals meet up.

When you do meet another romantic, though, you don't have to wear a badge, you just know it.

Like the friendly countries, unfortunately, they are scattered far and wide.

So often the payment a person gets for being a romantic is having to go it alone. Countries are cursed that way too.