The turnstile clicks behind you, and for a moment, there is only the soft, rhythmic hum of a machine powering down. The neon lights of the midway fade into a gentle, velvet black as the world goes quiet. Your heart takes its final beat, your eyes drift shut, and the heavy coat of your memories suddenly feels weightless. You are gone. But then, you open your eyes and find yourself standing on a weathered wooden boardwalk that smells of salt air and popcorn. Before you is a small, glass-fronted ticket booth. Behind the glass sits an operator with a quiet smile and eyes that have seen every era of human history.

“How was it?” he asks, holding a fresh roll of tickets in his hand. You tell him the truth: it went by too fast. He nods, as if he’s heard it a billion times before. He taps the counter and explains that you have a choice. Most people get comfortable; they like the routine of the Dodgems, the familiar bumps, and the predictable turns. They ask to go again, returning to the same town, the same grade school, and the same steady path through high school until they are on their own. It is a good ride, but it is a loop—a routine detached from the last life but identical in every way.

You look back at the silhouette of that old life, and you realize you don’t want the Dodgems anymore. You tell him you want the Cyclone. You want a ride without a fixed track. If you could buy a new ticket, you wouldn’t spend it building walls or worrying about a career that keeps you anchored to one spot on the map. You would trade that security for the horizon. You’d choose a life that was truly mobile, moving with the seasons rather than the clock.

In this new version of the story, you’d find yourself in the mountains of Montana during the height of the ski season. You wouldn’t need much, just a room small enough to sleep in and enough work at the lodge to pay for your bread and your bed. You’d spend your days where the air is thin, and the peaks are white, and when the snow finally melted, you’d move on. You’d migrate to the Florida Keys to work as a bartender on the beach, trading stories for tips and watching the sun sink into the Gulf every single night. You’d realize then that the “stability” of your past life was just a cage with a view.

The journey wouldn’t stop there. You’d find yourself at the Grand Canyon, leading a string of donkeys down into the red-rock heart of the earth, or perhaps traveling across Europe on foot or by bike. You’d never worry about having more money or food than you actually need, just enough to eat and a place to rest your head. You’d see the world and all it has to offer, refusing to ride the same ride twice when the park is this vast. Mortality, you realize, is the ultimate curator. The tragedy isn’t that the heart stops; it’s the fear that we might spend our only ticket on a ride we’ve already finished, simply because we’re afraid of the height of a new one. This life is going by too fast, and I think for the next one, I’ll try a few more rides.

Maybe I will just be back home in Brazil.

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