Where The Blue Begins

Just to be clear... Kukla and I are back in Cincinnati. We arrived late Sunday night after an eleven hour drive from Somewhere, Illinois. Somewhere is not far from Chester, Illinois, the erstwhile home of Popeye the Sailor Man, whom we had tried (unsuccessfully) to visit on Saturday night. Neighbors had no memory of him, of Olive Oyl, Swee'Pea, Wimpy, or any others in Popeye's entourage of once- upon-a-time friends and enemies. "He's pictured on the sign there." I said. "And there's a statue of him in town."

"I wouldn't know about that. You some relation a' his?"

"No, just passing through."

"Huh... Well, you could go ask Jim, down to the Dollar General store, I guess."

We didn't ask Jim. Especially since we had seen all the Dollar General Stores we ever needed to see, and then some, since the outset of our journey. At last count there were at least 14,000 of them in the United States as of last month. We took a room at an "Americas Best" (sic) motel and set out early the next morning in search of a coffee shop that hadn't yet gone out of business. Some two hours later we ended up at a Panera cafe in Somewhere.

Of the sixteen Panera customers, excluding myself, only two were talking to each other. The other fourteen were deeply entranced by their smartphones, although they were sitting together at the same table. After half an hour or so, this scenario hadn't changed. As I passed the two friends who were still enjoying a real Kaffeeklatsch together I found a nice new dollar bill in my pocket and put it on their table. "Congratulations!" I said. "You have been selected to be the winners of this dollar prize, meager though it is, as being the only people here who are actually conversing instead of looking at your phones."

"Oh, my!" said the lady.

"Well, ain't that something?" exclaimed the gentleman.

And they both laughed and laughed, and the lady said, "Well, that's just one for the books!" Which is what my grandmother used to say when something pleased her in a surprising way.

A silver dollar would have been better, I suppose.

***

Now we have been back on Bouton Street for the past 4, 5, or 6 days. And it sometimes seems that we never really went anywhere at all, but I only dreamed that we did. Dreamed the mountains and the sea, dreamed the naiads, all and some... And we did not discover the Lost Worlds (but for traces and subtleties) or the place "Where the Blue Begins" (which is also the title of a very strange and worthwhile book by Christopher Morley). But these and more may yet be revisited and found, even of what has apparently vanished (and yes, there are naiads). The stuff of further journeys, so I hope.

In the meantime, I want to remember and thank the friends met along the way and those among my family, neighbors, and all the other wayside philosophers and fellow travelers who wished me well on this excursion - sometimes even reading these reflections of mine posted here over the past three months and 8,000 miles or more of wandering.

I have already been asked, by one or three, if I am "glad to be home".  And here I have to defer to Hesse in replying that, insofar as a sense of home is experienced "where paths of affinity intersect", then yes, I am always glad for such moments. And, as Novalis asked (and answered) "Where are we really going? Always Home!" That journey and return still await discovery.

Paths of Affinity Revisited

If driving along Route 50 through Kansas had been something of an endurance test on the westward trip, by the time I was midway along the eastbound return, I began wishing that a strong wind might carry Kukla and me off to somewhere in the vicinity of Oz for awhile. After all, Kukla had never met a wingèd monkey or a wizard before... and other such daydreaming notions as that. Besides, I was getting hungry for something more healthy than the Fritters n' Groundhog menu special that I didn't eat at the roadside diner which shall remain anonymous. Would it do, I wondered, to sit by the side of a silo and wait, like the man in the tale of The Food of Paradise* until some celestial morsel should just come my way?

But as you may already know, thoughts do have wings - and consequences. And sometimes the light or the atmospheric pressure, or whatever it is that gives rise to moments of synchronicity do seem to cause a celestial penny or two to drop. By such means beyond my comprehension I very soon found myself whizzing past a sign that read "Nature's Paradise". "What's this?" I asked aloud. "Make a U-turn!" said the GPS Lady who wasn't there. So, I did. And, sure enough, there it was: a little store in the middle of The Land of Silos offering the very food of Paradise I  had been dreaming on. So, in I went. Wouldn't you?

I know that somewhere in amongst the many words I've posted here I shared one of my favorite quotes from the writings of Hermann Hesse - this one from the story, Demian:

"Wo befreundete Wege zusammenlaufen, da sieht die ganze Welt für eine Stunde wie Heimat aus." 

(Where paths of affinity intersect, there the whole world can seem like home for a time.)

And this was so for me in the light of a moment in which I knew I had met a kindred spirit, a fellow traveler. Not a tourist, mind you, but a traveler with a true Gypsy Soul. When one meets such people there can be something like an immediate recognition and understanding... the language of affinity. But the remarkable thing was also that I had, earlier that day, been thinking about the travels of my youth, the travels of so many of my generation... Rumi's "wanderers, worshipers, lovers of leaving" who had - perhaps without ever having read Jung - were taking his advice to bid farewell to their libraries and "wander with human heart through the world". And I was thinking it rather a pity that so few young people today have known the joys and sorrows, the learning that comes of setting out into the Unbekannte alone or with "Birds of a Feather" towards some distant Conference of  the Birds. Yet here was one such a one who had journeyed as I had - as we had -  nearly half a century ago, in a world and time governed by an entirely different Zeitgeist. One who had crossed boundaries of  both Time and Place. And in this chance (?) meeting I suddenly felt hopeful for a whole generation. And it is a very good thing to feel hope in these times.

"To know there is someone, here or there, with whom you can feel there is understanding in spite of distances, or thoughts unexpressed - that can make this life a garden."
                                                                                                                       ____ Goethe


* A story from the collection, Tales of the Dervishes, by Idries Shah

"That is a Beautiful Tardigrade You Have There..."

An interesting observation of social interactions that I forgot to mention was common in the Santa Fe Plaza. The first time I brought Kukla to the Plaza with me, we found a sunny bench and sat down in our respective places to "watch the world go by". Within minutes, five at the most, some lady and/or gentleman would stop and exclaim, "What a beautiful dog you have! Oh, isn't she gorgeous?!?" or an equally enthusiastic variation on this, sometimes followed with the question, "Does she bite?" Which is a sensible thing to ask before putting a hand in her mouth. But, by then the meeting is already being played out to everyone's happy expectations - providing no dog "smaller than a breadbox" (the kind Kukla does bite) is also present.

Almost as soon as her first admirers had gone along their way and I was looking elsewhere or finding again the passage I had recently left off reading in A Guide to the Successful Raising and Training of the North American Tardigrade, another admirer would come along to ask Kukla's name, praise her beauty, and comment on her outstanding canine qualities - while all the while Kukla blushed deeply and wagged her tail in appreciation of all this heartfelt adoration. Once, too, I thought I even saw her bow and curtsy like a doggy diva.

These "Love at First Sight" visitations took place at the rate of between 12-15 per hour and on each of the three days we sat in the Plaza together. But here is the interesting thing that I noted and much wondered about. After an hour or so we would walk back to the car where Kukla would take a lunch and siesta while I returned to the Plaza and my favorite cafe for a meal. During those solitary walks through the Plaza, or while sitting alone on a bench, not one passerby stopped to tell me what they thought of me (for better or for worse) nor to inquire of my illustrious ancestry or if I might be the famous operatic singer lately performing in "Die Missgeschicke von Hopalong Cassidy". And of the various people I made it a point of asking whether strangers often (or ever) approached them with the same enthusiastic admiration so spontaneously and generously lavished upon this or that dog on their path - the answer was always and ever only a variant of No. 

No, people do not say (at least not within earshot) such things as, "Now there is an elegant and lovely lady of impeccable style and charming demeanor!" Or, "See how this distinguished geezer comports himself with such a cheerful dignity, though rigor mortis must surely be near." Is this not a curious thing, that we should reserve these attentions and commentaries only for one another's dogs?

Next year, when I have carefully studied all seven volumes of the title referenced above, I will bring my beautiful Tardigrade to the Santa Fe Plaza in order to better acquaint her with the ways of human society. I hope her admirers will have much to say.

A Tardigrade 

(Milnesium tardigradum)

Farewell to the West

Somewhere Along Route 64

That Explains Why I Couldn't Hear It...

I had breakfast at a little cafe in southern Colorado this morning. As I was ordering at the counter I suddenly realized that something was out of the ordinary... It was quiet! No music! I was elated, and I went on and on telling the waitress how wonderful it was to just enjoy a good cup of coffee without having to hear the usual dreck.

"Thank you so much for creating this rare ambiance!"

"Oh that's okay," she replied. "We usually got country music goin', but the radio's been busted for about a week now."

Saint Francis and the Wolf of Gubbio

There is a story here...

Enough is Enough: The Long Return

Somewhere along Route 84 South to Santa Fe I realized that although I had already come more than far enough in these past two months of travel, I still had to make the long and tiresome drive back through the Horse Latitudes, the Straits of Diminishing Returns, and the Dismal Plains before arriving back in From-Whence-I-Came, Ohio and wondering whether this entire journey had been "but a dream". As I recall, this moment of insight coincided with the point where Route 84 changed rather abruptly from being a truly Scenic Route through snowy mountain passes, still verdant pasture land for horses, elk and gazelles, and ancient mesas fashioned by millions upon millions of years of weather to yet another divided four lane highway dotted with those ubiquitous roadside franchises as-seen-on-tv and almost every town on the American map, including (so I hereby predict) the Moon.

Along this raceway, cars, trucks, motor homes and motor cycles were speeding northbound, as fast as possible, out and away from Santa Fe while in the opposite, southbound, lanes as many vehicles sped into Santa Fe. Signs warning of Wildlife Crossing notwithstanding, the race was on... to Wendy's! To Arby's! To the Dollar General! Macy's! Or, as a taxi driver expressed it (in the classic Christmas movie, The Bishop's Wife) "Nobody really knows where they're going, but they're all in a hurry to get there!" Carried along in this torrent of Speedomania I arrived in Santa Fe at least a day and a night sooner than I had planned.

The Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis here features a bronze sculpture of St. Francis and the Wolf of Gubbio. Thinking that Kukla would appreciate meeting the wolf, I walked her into the adjacent garden and park. A sign said, "No Dogs!" We went in anyway. At that point I was more than a little ready to argue with any city officer that, after all, St. Francis was the patron saint of animals. Kukla is an animal, etc.,etc. The wolf and Kukla regarded one another in canine camaraderie and the good saint smiled in accord. 

Later, as I was sitting quietly on a bench in the Plaza and enjoying the warmth of an early afternoon sun with Kukla by my side, I suddenly had the sense that the entire Plaza was actually the grounds of a lunatic asylum, and that I and everyone else there were patients of the asylum. The shops situated around the square were seen as children's play stores, or like Hollywood sets, intended only to provide some amusement and diversion for us inmates. All an illusion. Who, so I wondered, are our Keepers?

The Survey Lady came along with her notebook and her sunny disposition. She asked us questions and wrote in her notebook.

Next week I will begin the drive back East. I am dreading all the simulacra of a Faux Noel.