I have a lot of escapist fantasies that come in handy when my current life feels like a litany of foolish and expensive mistakes. Over the years, I've tried to refine them beyond renting a car and disappearing into the desert because eventually I will have to deal with food, shelter, and massive student loan debt, not to mention who will feed my cat. So now my escapist fantasies sit somewhere on the outermost reach of feasibility (but oh, the moon colony was a sweet one) yet not completely outside the realm of possibility. You know, in case it's time to switch tacks yet again.
(See if you can spot the themes.)
7.) One-way ticket to somewhere tropical that does not have bugs or snakes. Discover some magical power to heal wealthy white women by yelling at them, or innate talent for cooking or writing or, I don't really care what so long as it makes a lot of money for a while and I can return all pseudo-enlightened and sanctimonious and not have to work when I get back.
Look, I know this is like, some weird vengeful anti-Eat Pray Love, but I haven't hashed out the details yet. That's why it's at the end of the list for now. Also because it can only be short-term, like two or three years max. I would just miss my family too much.
6.) Get a job for a travel company that includes weeks and months of going on their vacation packages, so that I can write about them and recommend them accurately.
Similar fantasies include becoming a National Geographic photojournalist, writing silly travelogues on my blog that get picked up and optioned as a series of travel books requiring me to go around having Bridget Jones style adventures all over the world, or I dunno, doing something so meaningful in science that I am asked to constantly fly around consulting on projects. If you just imagined me in a lab coat with a jet pack, then I think we're on the same page.
5.) Buy a pecan farm in Georgia, export pecans to China, and sell homemade pecan pies locally.
I don't know anything about agriculture, but I read an article about the price of pecans skyrocketing because they are quickly becoming a luxury item in high demand in China. I also really like pecan pie.
4.) Move to Iceland, and work as an adventure travel guide for American tourists.
I am perfectly willing to marry a handsome Icelandic man if it would give me appropriate tour guide cred. If I get exhausted with adventure tour guiding, I could also be really happy piecing sweaters in one of those wool factories. This fantasy also applies to Costa Rica, parts of the Amazon, and basically anywhere I've ever traveled.
3.) Discover a country, also preferably Iceland, that has government grants to support artists. Paint all the time, struggle daily to suppress maniacal laughter in public.
The reason why this isn't my #1 fantasy is because I'm too afraid that the possibility actually exists for such a Utopian paradise to be out there in the world, but the thought that I've lived this long without discovering it makes me too sad to go on.
2.) Move to Hawaii and make paintings of flowers for tourists. Make exactly enough money to live comfortably, without worrying about being a "real artist" or not. Have a spectacular tan, but not skin cancer.
I'm not gonna lie, this is my constant Plan B.
1.) Move to Venice, start out running a small antique shop or furniture restoration business. Sell little paintings of my own here and there. Get discovered by some enormously influential German art dealer, who wants to represent me internationally, without me having to leave Venice. Never ask where the money comes from, only worry about rolling around in massive piles of it and occasionally attending galas that I actually enjoy. Spend all my free time sailing and fishing and traveling around the rest of Europe until I get tired of speaking Italian and move back to a house on the Navesink. Continue as in Venice, but with handsome Italian husband and children in tow.
I mean, they're my fantasies, right? Might as well go for it.
Bonus: The Escapist Fantasy That Really Shouldn't Be a Fantasy:
Get a job that comfortably pays my bills, allows generous vacation time, and about which I literally don't care at all.
Show up, put my time in, and don't think about it again until the next time I'm there. If the task is menial, repetitive, and mindless, so much the better. I actually tried to do this for a while when I got a data entry job at a clothing store, but they sucked me in to all these other tasks in the finance office and all these other aspects of the store ranging from inventory and receiving to becoming the head of A/R. Most critical in its flaws was that it didn't come anywhere near covering all of my expenses AND I started to care too much. If I had it to do over again, I'd pretend not to speak English well and insist on getting paid fairly from the start.
I'm willing to accept partial credit if the first two criteria are met but I have to care a little bit. In exchange, I would like a kind and funny husband who loves me for exactly who I am, and I would like us to have children who aren't too sticky or grow up to be jerks.
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