Birds migrate for warmth and breeding. Vast herds cross snow, ice and rivers across whole continents in time with seasons. Human beings have inhabited the whole Earth but we are not naturally a migratory species. We can make almost any place an all-year-round home. Yet in the past there have been huge tribal migrations as geneticists have begun to see, though the reasons are unclear. Probably the same causes as those we do know about in recent history such as invasion and loss of habitat.
We do love to move. We love to travel. Though many human beings are stay-at-home, not-too-bothered about seeing the world types. They have hit their comfort zone. And I don’t suppose they even migrate the way other people do in the modern world – in their minds.
All my friends and I myself am an exemplar of this, spend a good deal of fantasy time somewhere else. Our minds wandering from the hum-drum of the everyday, or looking to the next peak in our every climbing idea of where our life should ‘go’. We are never still. Our imaginations cross other worlds. We carry with us all manner of things, all manner of people, but most of all these dreams, these targets, carry with them our idea of ourself.
We don’t wait for the seasons to migrate, we don’t even need to be awake.