What makes me tick?


Fishing around on my friend Pier-Andrea's blog the other day I found his visual DNA - a collection of images hes selected, which strung together represent his take on life. Its an interesting concept and if you scroll down past the labels and links you'll find my cluttered collection of x&y chromosomes represented in picture form. The whole thing got me thinking though about if I had to represent myself (not the me that goes to work every morning or the me that goes out with friends or curls up with a book but the real 'me') which images would I choose? And so my reflexions started.

This all kind of links in nicely with the fact that since i'm back from that little Irish jaunt i've had this niggling, gnawing feeling that something is missing, and after a weeks deliberation I think i've identified it. I'm craving the open road.

Let me be a little more precise. Its not just the road i'm craving, but the car, and the driving; the feeling of liberty and the spontaneity that comes with 4 wheels and a full tanks of fuel. Something that has been all too absent in my life the last couple of years.



I grew up in an area where a car was essential. From the aged of 7 I was saving frantically for my first car and have always loved driving, yet I haven't owned a car for the last 12 or 13 years and I now climb into a plane more often than I get into a car, let alone drive.

Driving and the open roads are however not the only thing that makes me 'me'. If I could choose where i'd want to be whenever I have time it would definitely be up a mountain.

I've been lucky enough to trek and hike in many beautiful places, two of which i've found truly awesome. Awesome in the true sense of the world in that i'm left dumb by the impact of the scenery; the vastness and strength of it. Trekking in the Annapurna region first did this to me in Nepal in 2000. I remember waking up early one morning, climbing on to the roof of my hut and watching Annapurna's silhouette slowly turn pink as the sun rose.



At that moment in time I left so small, so insignificant, and yet at the same time so young. Young because unlike us adults who simply recognise the environment around us and take little notice of the details I felt more like a child watching the world for the first time; noticing leaves, stones, wildlife and seeing how it all knitted together.
El Chalten in Argentina had the same effect on me. Faced with one of the most stunning vistas i've ever seen I took literally hundreds of photos of the same view, realising now that I wasn't trying to capture the image I saw but more the emotions I was feeling sat before that image.



Looking at the photos now its difficult to conjure up those same emotions, whats not difficult to materialise is the craving to relive those same or similar moments.

There is one other activity that I think totally liberates 'me' and gives me a similar childlike sensation and one that again I find myself doing very rarely; flying my kite.
I remember my first kite. I remember failed attempts at making kites during school holidays and I remember the sting and burn as the rope has run across the folds of my fingers on countless occasions but what I remember most of all is how I feel when I fly my kite. The Australian cartoonist 'Leunig' sums it up best...




Why does kite flying do this to me? Maybe because being able to fly properly involves being out in the country or on the coast, preferably without too many people around. Perhaps its because being up high helps where the wind is stronger and more fickle in its currents. I guess there are all kinds of analogies that could be drawn but honestly the reason is not important, its the sensation and emotion that counts for me, and hence kite flying is an integral part of who I am, even if I dont get to do it that often.

The psychologists and therapists amongst you are now probably all brimming with theories and facts that will enable you to compartmentalise me into one of your little boxes but although the images of my visual DNA described above may differ from those on the VisualDNA website i'll stick with their definition of my character type thanks.

If you get a chance do check out their site and do the test yourself. If you feel like sharing drop the code for your DNA or the images you'd choose to represent yourself into a comment. Lets see what makes everyone else out there tick.