Sometimes Travel
Requires a Donkey
And here we awake in the wee hours of the morning to a cup
of tea or a pot of coffee safe in the knowledge that no one yet knows us as we
ascribe to the ritual that got us out of bed in the first place. We are, social
beings but not yet- not yet. Here it is assumed that this tidbit of time will
forever place us on the proper course and help us to dictate how to approach
the motions of the new day with grace and poise. It is here, at that moment
that we should ask the donkey how he feels about our life. Don’t have a donkey
you say. That’s okay; you can buy one for about three fifty-seven on Amazon. Of
course it won’t be a real donkey but I guarantee a read that may change your morning
ritual if even just a tad so that not only are your senses soothed, but that
ever present notion that spurs you to do something more is met as well.
Robert Lewis Stevenson drank coffee from the cup of the same
dregs that we all do, tea from a broken pot and smoked a pipe that was adrift
in memories nine times ten all the while dreaming of a well known scheme that
he eventually put into practice if only to show the rest of us that it could be
done. Stevenson drove a donkey into the Italian countryside and found himself
in the process. Here it is that his coffee tasted better for one, yes. And yet
it was his mornings that for the first time discovered became the pivot of a
true and better life and allowed him to become something more than he had
become. For once he had become human and in this newfound glory he finally
found himself alive. The book is “Stevenson’s travels with a Donkey,” and the
better part of his valor is ensconced in the value of the animal with which he
chose to travel.
I only suggest that you read the book, not buy a donkey.
Italy is but a stones throw by air I know but it is not necessary to wind up on
her shores to find the essence of what he did. Still, the reality is as
poignant as his need to discover something above and out of ourselves while
there is still time. Time to converse without looking for an answer, time to
see the form of a person while that person lives and breathes in our world,
even a time to love another simply because they are.
Hardly the things of the present moment in which we live and
moreover not the things we generally speak of over morning coffee but these
things should be spoken nonetheless and at every given moment that time
pursues. Should it take a donkey to get us there then that is what we buy as the
element of a donkey in the Alps lends itself to a wider vision than what we
normally see on the road these days. I’m thinking of truck-wide RV’s the length
of a little league field and filled with television, microwaves and showers
with or without potty’s. I must admit, as a writer, none of those sound
appealing to either myself or the Alps. They and I deserve better, we clamor
for the poetic and if either one of us were to take the high road here I
believe we would choose the donkey. Robert did it in simpler times and maybe it
is up to us to simplify the times. Maybe that donkey can save our lives. Either
way, its just a walk in the park.
No comments:
Post a Comment