When Jep was young – and that really is a long time ago – he always cycled through town to school.

“I don’t belong here,” he thought one day, “I don’t belong among these stones, these buildings, this asphalt, these people.”

He thought it was too crowded then, too much traffic, too little nature. Too far from his nature.

But Jep went to school and did what was expected of him. Like a chameleon, he adapted to his environment. He did well, and it made his environment happy, so what more could he wish for.

And yet it kept coming back.

“This is not right. I don’t belong here. ”

Would there be others who felt the same way? It didn’t look like that, he never heard anyone about it. Could it be that he wasn’t normal? Would he be crazy?

He decided to pretend he belonged here and adjusted. Usually he forgot all about it and thought that this was his life. That this was okay, because it seemed to be right for everyone else.

And somewhere in that ordinary, adapted life, he read a poem. And another poem.

And that made all the difference. In the end.

Sometimes you have to get old and gray (well, not so old and gray) before you know what is important and what is your destiny in life.