Many years ago at a Chinese restaurant in some city or another, I acquired a fortune cookie containing a fortune inscribed with the verb "to return". At the time, I was in the midst of a 17-year bout of mad itinerancy that had commenced in 2003, when I had abandoned the United States in favour of darting between countries and fleeing like the plague the notion that I might ever subscribe to a sedentary existence.
The fortune would eventually end up among the heap of belongings I deposited at a friend’s house in the southwestern Turkish city of Fethiye, which, appropriately, would become one of my regular stops as I transited the globe. Sorting through my possessions on each return trip, I’d come across the slip of paper, which provided the requisite amount of consistency to offset my continuous motion.
In 2020, the coronavirus plague put a stop to my returns - and to movement in general. I had travelled in March to the coastal village of Zipolite in the Mexican state of Oaxaca, where I was meant to spend 12 days before dashing off again. Nearly a year later, I’m still here. READ MORE AT MIDDLE EAST EYE.