It's Christmas time again, the end of the year, and with that we always get a very interesting letter from one of our neighbors telling us all the things the family has done the past 12 months. The one I just received is little different from the ones before: there are several trips abroad, some to exotic places like the Galapagos; there are grandchildren born and hikes in the Appalachians and canoe trips in the Boundary Waters; there are meetings with friends and parties in odd places, snowshoeing in the Minnesota wilds, a river trip in the Peruvian Amazon, and more - lots more. Me, I could write about plowing the driveway in last year's blizzard, or building a woodshed in the UP, or making a batch of Scottish Ale. Oh, there's other stuff, but nothing more exciting. That's it for us.
I have no idea how I came to be a fuddy-duddy, but that's what's looking back in the mirror. Having just read the letter, I kind of resent it, too. Heck, you only live once!
It is not that I am exactly green with envy, although maybe a little pale yellow, but such tales of adventure bring a sense of longing - of a need to fulfill life. The problem is certainly not a new one, and there are many old tales from fuddy-duddys like me that speak of the wisdom of place. The book I recently read, Cathar's "Shadows on a Rock," depicts the way of life of 17th century French Canadians, where most resisted any change in life whatsoever. What they had was "them" and all was right with the world just as it was. A book by Thomas Merton on the desert fathers - those early Christians who lived severe lives in the deserts of Arabia and Egypt- contains a quote from a wise man saying that no one should go more than a few leagues, or some odd measurement, from his abode - ever. Dorthy of the Wizard of OZ learns, as we all know, that there is no place like home. Closer to my own home, when I was a child and used to beg my father to take me or us on camping trips or hikes or any kind of adventure whatsoever, he would reply, "I have worked hard to have the place and bed I want. Why would I give it up for another place or a sleeping bag?" I can see me gritting my teeth even now.
But of what interest are people of place? Robert Luis Stevenson would have died a pauper had he written about a young Scottish lad who was born into a poor house, stayed in that poor house, and then died. No - he wrote that the young fellow fell in with pirates, escaped, and came to have all their treasure, to return to his poor home a rich man. It was then, I suppose, that he settled down, but nowadays, he probably wouldn't. He would continue to jet-set to the Seychelles Islands or whatever place was hip for the well-heeled and continue to have adventures until his mysterious and portentous death. He would be, as the commercial goes, "The most interesting man in the world."
We read that the already wise eschew travel; they are content with place, for to them, one place is no less or more interesting or fulfilling than another. And so we read of tales where the pilgrim goes round the world to find a dragon, only to discover after returning tired and disappointed that his house was built on an ancient mound depiction of a dragon - he had had his heart's desire there at home all along. And so, I suppose, it is with us. On my greatest adventure, my fieldwork with the Amazon Indians, I had been looking for a dragon of sorts, a way of life that could tell me life's secrets. What I found was not worthless, for in another way of life we can see an aspect of the whole that we did not know before, but I did not find the whole. I know now that I would not find it in India either, or in the Australian Outback, or wherever. I might find beautiful or inspiring scenery, interesting people or dangerous outings on mountain ridges or wild rivers, but I would be no closer to the whole. The wise men, as always, are correct - the whole is right there with you and around you, the dragon in your very heart.
But most of us aren't wise. If we have given up looking for Truth in the outside, then we continue to go out for diversion. We sleep in beds that are not our own and jiggle uncomfortably in old buses for adventure, for something to tell us that we are alive and not wasting our limited time. My experience has shown me that if there is no discomfort, then it is not an adventure; and that if there is discomfort, I cannot enjoy the experience until I have returned safely to home, to tell my friends and myself about it. There is something perverse in that, this need, but there it is, this yellow envy and sense of in-completion, of losing the limited time that I have left.
In truth, the most notable experiences have come from the interior - the realization, that is, that we are set in a vast and intelligent universe, in a far stranger and more wonderful land than we could ever find on this earth or even this galaxy. But the desire, the need continues, as do all other needs, basic or otherwise. A trip or two might be as simple as a need to recharge after long hours at a tough job, but the need could also come from the urge to discover the dragon. For me, that is what it is. I know where the dragon is, but I would rather the fantasy of Treasure Island over the reality of hard interior work; the fantasy of the returning hero rather than the reality of a weak self that ages, fears and dies. Wealth and the leisure travel it can bring would then be the curse that the wise often say it is. Ah, but still - if not the galaxy, why not the Seychelles? Who knows what wonders work there that do not here? As if a dragon were so easy to find, but still, the wander lust calls. FK
I have no idea how I came to be a fuddy-duddy, but that's what's looking back in the mirror. Having just read the letter, I kind of resent it, too. Heck, you only live once!
It is not that I am exactly green with envy, although maybe a little pale yellow, but such tales of adventure bring a sense of longing - of a need to fulfill life. The problem is certainly not a new one, and there are many old tales from fuddy-duddys like me that speak of the wisdom of place. The book I recently read, Cathar's "Shadows on a Rock," depicts the way of life of 17th century French Canadians, where most resisted any change in life whatsoever. What they had was "them" and all was right with the world just as it was. A book by Thomas Merton on the desert fathers - those early Christians who lived severe lives in the deserts of Arabia and Egypt- contains a quote from a wise man saying that no one should go more than a few leagues, or some odd measurement, from his abode - ever. Dorthy of the Wizard of OZ learns, as we all know, that there is no place like home. Closer to my own home, when I was a child and used to beg my father to take me or us on camping trips or hikes or any kind of adventure whatsoever, he would reply, "I have worked hard to have the place and bed I want. Why would I give it up for another place or a sleeping bag?" I can see me gritting my teeth even now.
But of what interest are people of place? Robert Luis Stevenson would have died a pauper had he written about a young Scottish lad who was born into a poor house, stayed in that poor house, and then died. No - he wrote that the young fellow fell in with pirates, escaped, and came to have all their treasure, to return to his poor home a rich man. It was then, I suppose, that he settled down, but nowadays, he probably wouldn't. He would continue to jet-set to the Seychelles Islands or whatever place was hip for the well-heeled and continue to have adventures until his mysterious and portentous death. He would be, as the commercial goes, "The most interesting man in the world."
We read that the already wise eschew travel; they are content with place, for to them, one place is no less or more interesting or fulfilling than another. And so we read of tales where the pilgrim goes round the world to find a dragon, only to discover after returning tired and disappointed that his house was built on an ancient mound depiction of a dragon - he had had his heart's desire there at home all along. And so, I suppose, it is with us. On my greatest adventure, my fieldwork with the Amazon Indians, I had been looking for a dragon of sorts, a way of life that could tell me life's secrets. What I found was not worthless, for in another way of life we can see an aspect of the whole that we did not know before, but I did not find the whole. I know now that I would not find it in India either, or in the Australian Outback, or wherever. I might find beautiful or inspiring scenery, interesting people or dangerous outings on mountain ridges or wild rivers, but I would be no closer to the whole. The wise men, as always, are correct - the whole is right there with you and around you, the dragon in your very heart.
But most of us aren't wise. If we have given up looking for Truth in the outside, then we continue to go out for diversion. We sleep in beds that are not our own and jiggle uncomfortably in old buses for adventure, for something to tell us that we are alive and not wasting our limited time. My experience has shown me that if there is no discomfort, then it is not an adventure; and that if there is discomfort, I cannot enjoy the experience until I have returned safely to home, to tell my friends and myself about it. There is something perverse in that, this need, but there it is, this yellow envy and sense of in-completion, of losing the limited time that I have left.
In truth, the most notable experiences have come from the interior - the realization, that is, that we are set in a vast and intelligent universe, in a far stranger and more wonderful land than we could ever find on this earth or even this galaxy. But the desire, the need continues, as do all other needs, basic or otherwise. A trip or two might be as simple as a need to recharge after long hours at a tough job, but the need could also come from the urge to discover the dragon. For me, that is what it is. I know where the dragon is, but I would rather the fantasy of Treasure Island over the reality of hard interior work; the fantasy of the returning hero rather than the reality of a weak self that ages, fears and dies. Wealth and the leisure travel it can bring would then be the curse that the wise often say it is. Ah, but still - if not the galaxy, why not the Seychelles? Who knows what wonders work there that do not here? As if a dragon were so easy to find, but still, the wander lust calls. FK
RSS Feed