Sunday, February 3, 2008
Agree or Disagree? Why?
Traveling is a fool's paradise. We owe to our first journeys the discovery that place is nothing. At home I dream that at Naples, at Rome, I can be intoxicated with beauty and lose my sadness. I pack my trunk, embrace my friends, embark on the sea and at last wake up in Naples, and there beside me is the stern Fact, and sad self, unrelenting, identical, that I fled from. I seek the Vatican and the palaces. I affect to be intoxicated with sights and suggestions, but I am not intoxicated. My giant goes with me wherever I go.
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Since this has been up for a little bit I'll offer a reply. . .
I would say agree and disagree, but mostly disagree. For me travel has always energised me. And when I was younger there was a lot of travel just for the sake of travel (I'm thinking of a time where a friend and I drove to Niagara Falls and back, through Canada, within 24 hours). But then at the same time I think Emerson's observation rings true, I guess it's really about what you want from it. If you travel to escape your problems, chances are they will come with you (especially if it is inner turmoil, and not the stress caused by a place). But if you are traveling only for the sake of travel, I think it can be a transformative experience.
This is a lovely elaboration of the simple, true, timeless, "No matter where you go, there you are." (I believe Edison said that. Or maybe William James. Or Frederic Myers.)
I hear that Chicago's quite cold, this time of year. Sometimes it's important to force yourself to travel, and sometimes it's important to not leave unless you really want to.
And I am different in each place, I think. The process of the travel then completed has offered a challenge itself. The vehicle by which I've traveled, has offered me some new perspective of the planet, and my paths upon it.
I would say that some core, though, remains the same. And that's unchanging whether from the bucket of a lazy-boy or the seat of my Surly.
You take out what you put in. The question is whether you understand and absorb that. Your time is almost done. Yet, your time is now. Perspective. Experience. That's all there is. Kind of.
THE KING
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