May 16, 2015
Crossroads on the Road Less Traveled
The main highways everywhere I have ever been have, all of them, green signs with white lettering and numbers proclaiming the directions and the next landmark on the way. In cities and towns across North America, there are, signs at the corners of the streets as well. Even in Mexico and Central America the green and white theme persists.
I notice these things, well, you know that now!
Over all these traveling years I have seen many Main Streets, Front Streets, Avenues A, B and C; there are Washington Boulevards in large cities and small bergs. Some places have highway numbers extending from, through and onward. The phenomenon is pervasive and interestingly, there is a quite small collection of names of first choice, maybe no more than 20 altogether. Largest cities have the most different names always added to the small collection of favorites which are presidents, the famous, the local heroes and heroines, the familiar language, numbers and letters. Fascinating.
The crossroad I am at this day shows me on the one fork: Castle Perilous, the place of magical dread, a track winding upward over steep mountainous passes, across narrow swaying bridges, up up to the palace of the Evil Wizard. Here we shudder a little and draw our cloaks closer around our shoulders.
The sign showing the opposite direction is lit by a beam of light streaming through a break in the heavy overcast sky. It says something like: Freedom Town, this way 1000 miles on the way back home.
‘Once there was a way to get back homeward. Once there was a way to get back home.’
So, here I am. It looks like Panama, a richly tropical land, lush and sticky with the sweat made by heat and humidity. I’m not much tropical but the body knows how to sweat without any prompting. Just drink more water, Amraah.
Somehow this Castle Perilous does not seem like an overly savory option so I am walking all around the other sign here called Freedom.
The first freedom I note is the choice I have for freedom. The second freedom is an empowerment already in my 76 year, well aged vintage body ready to be uncorked and imbibed. The wine is strong and very satisfying going down. As it does, filling me with that familiarly enticing sensibility, I once again draw the cloak around my shoulders and I look around me seeking a marked path.
“Onward,” I tell myself is the only direction I would wish to go.
Surely friends, it is trepidatious, there is something now in me calling me to set my feet one and then the next one down in front of me.
Soon I am buoyed above the fears and the nervousness and soon I am striding down an ever extending road without a sign or a landmark. Yet the way is showing itself before me and I can see clearly where I am to go.
I think there is no destination rather it is the journey itself that inspires me, that intrigues me and keeps me going.
I took upon myself the writing of my own story. The story is first for me and only later for you, dear Reader. If the tale is true for you, then I might say to check around for your own crossroad. Read the signs and choose your own path. Castle Perilous is not an option.
Blessed Be, much love, Amraah