If you could be someone else for a day, who would you be, and why?
My instant response was – I would be a billionaire, names don’t matter, then transfer a couple of million to myself, then back out of the alternate persona for another day, and there I would be – rich and happy, my old self once more. Then I started thinking – ‘billionaires don’t do things like that’ – then I really started thinking. How much of my alternate persona would I take over? Would I be myself in another body? Or would I be that person, privileged, hard, caring only for myself and my fortune, sparing nobody as I strove for my ultimate desire, the Noah’s Ark of a bunker that would protect me from the oncoming disaster that I was myself encouraging to happen? Enough, I said to myself. That’s not for me.
I thought about it during the night, in those elusive moments between waking and sleeping, that half-sleep contained in the Spanish duermivela. And then the light bulb flashed and I knew who I would be.
I have always wanted to visit Australia. The cost, the length of the flight, the rigors of the journey, the fear of DVT, have all prevented me from making that voyage – quite simply a flight too far. But what if I could be my cousin Frances, in Sydney, for a day? I have never met most of her family, and this would be a wonderful chance for me to do so. I would see her husband, George, in close-up. Also her four children, two of whom I have never seen except in photos. I could also meet their partners, and the grand-children, and all of that merely by waking up in another body on another continent. If I timed it right, I might even manage to visit the Sydney Opera House and see the harbour bridge, or catch a test match, or a rugby international – the red lights are flashing – overload – overload – overload -!!! Too much – too greedy – KISS – Keep It Simple Stupid – !!!
Seeing the family, experiencing her daily life, looking at her garden, so beautiful in the photos, maybe even sinking my fingers into that rich earth, that would be more than enough. Ayer’s Rock – Uruburu – Alice Springs, the Fremantle Doctor, my cousins in Perth and Bundaburg, they will have to wait. Sydney and my closest family, that will be more than enough.
But how much will I retain upon my return? How much will I remember? And what will happen to Frances? Will she become me and be forced to suffer our Canadian winter, for a day, while I rejoice in her Australian summer? So many questions.
Too many questions. Maybe I’ll just be myself, after all, as Oscar Wilde says “Be yourself. Everybody else is taken.” I’ll just be myself and to the above offer I will reply: “Thanks, but no thanks. I just want to be me.”