There are many things I wish were possible in this world.

I wish I could get my Master’s at Hogwarts – or another bachelor’s degree. I’m not picky, because then I’d know magic and would easily get any job I wanted. Plus, even if the job was for muggles, Hogwarts would still look good on my resume.

I wish that flip flops would replace high heels as fashionable and that VPL (visible panty line) didn’t exist, that every picture taken turned out great, and that it wouldn’t be the most expensive jeans that make my butt look good.

I wish that cheese was more akin to celery in its caloric properties and metabolic benefits.

I wish that teachers and writers made more money. Heck, I wish they made enough money. Also, I wish money didn’t matter. Or perhaps I wish I could budget.

I prefer not to live in a world of wishes and if-onlys, but every now and then (usually with the purchase of a lotto ticket) I begin to think about what I would do if I could do anything. If I could pay off my student loans; if I could sell my possessions and not worry about having to buy dishes or dressers after having sold the last ones; I would go rogue.

For me, it’s not about disappearing. I don’t idolize Chris McCandless, and I actually think he did some pretty stupid things, the last of which was camping in a VW van in Denali National Park. But I’m sure that by then, he didn’t think it was too smart, either.

I don’t want to abandon my family or blame people or money or the government for my middle class angst, nor do I want to mire myself in mortgages and responsibilities before my time. For, there will be time, but I don’t want to hurry up and wait.

 “What I want” is a hard question to answer. It’s easier to say what I don’t want, and that’s why I’m waiting. I don’t want a dead end – I do want new experiences. I don’t want to commit my life to a job I hate – I do want a profession that challenges and rewards me. What I want is to challenge myself, to test myself. The best way I can find to do this is to go rogue.

In my internet search of Urban Dictionary, I found two seemingly contradictory definitions of the act of going rogue. The first, which states that part of “going rogue” is “lying or acting in order to deceive others” doesn’t fit with my agenda. So I will ignore it. The second asserts that an essential element of going rogue is to “act on one’s own, usually against expectation or instruction. To pursue one’s own interests.”

 
Now it gets confusing. You see, I feel as if I have always followed my own interests (aka I’m selfish) and I routinely try to go against other’s expectation. I’m a late-blooming rebel, but only because I think of wearing my hair half down at work as rebellious when in reality, nobody cares.

I want to go rogue, to take it farther. I want to pack up my backpacking and ski gear and kayak into a truck that constantly breaks down and drivenorth to mountains and wilderness. I think I could make it all the way to Silverton before the Little Red Truck decides that she can’t go any farther. And maybe that’s as far as I need to go.

But what about Patagonia? What about Alaska? And Norway? And the Scottish Highlands? (back to Hogwarts).

Now I’m back to making wishes about money, because money is necessary, even if it’s to pay student loans while living so far away from the beaten path that it looks like a speck on the map. Back to wishing that teaching writing and writing for fun could provide me with the expenses to get out of Dodge.

Going rogue isn’t about physical location, though. It’s not about money, it’s not about risk, it’s about the pursuit of your desires and actively moving toward them. It’s not about leaving, it’s not about arriving, it’s about the journey. It’s about making the most of what time we are given.
 There will be time … but life is short, as I am reminded by the parting of a family friend this week. Death shouldn’t be part of a cautionary tale, but instead help inspire us as to the beauty and fragility of life, to a life lived with passion. May you rest in peace.

– Maggie Casey