Jumping Feet First To Land Running

It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done.

-A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens


I wake every morning in the same bed I’ve slept in for over four years. Tomorrow, there are good odds I will wake up there again. There are good odds I’ll wake up in it a year from now. I take showers in the same shower, dry with the same towel, and put on mostly the same clothes. Clothes are one of the few things that change with time, and even then it happens in phases. I leave my house and greet my same friends. I can go days without seeing them, for we are a family all our own, but we do always end up seeing each other. I do meet new people, but it’s rarely the same: I doubt I’ll ever find friends I will bond with like these now, even though the gaping maw of my future path is open wide and grinning. I meet women, but even then it becomes the same routine over time. The easiest way to mix it up is to not think at all, simply act and react, but this has its drawbacks, most of which are painful and memorable.

I need to get out of here.

I love my friends, I love my bed, I love my clothes, and I love the women I meet, but in the end, it all seems like ashes when thought about into oblivion. I sit and think far too much than is healthy about life and the future, and all I do is terrify and excite myself. There are two given solutions to such a life and living it: I can stop thinking, or I can run. I can either ignore the feelings in my chest and the thoughts in my head, and instead live vicariously through my actions, or I can run into these thoughts head on, and I hope I break them before they break me.

After more thinking, which, understandably, put in the decision making situation in the first place, I’ve decided to run. Just for a while, just long enough to see what it is I’m thinking about, but it’s a decision nonetheless. After this semester, I’ll be heading north for about a week or two. I’m saving money up now, and I know of a few places I can sleep at. The plan is to take a train north and find my way back down. I know it sounds stupid and dangerous, but if I don’t, my brain will become stupid and dangerous. It seems like a fair exchange, but maybe that’s only because my brain is already partially stupid and dangerous.

The reason I’m posting this on blogger is because this is definitely going to be a religious trip. I plan on speaking with some religious official in every city I get to, regardless of affiliation. Actually, I’m hoping to meet more Islamic teachers than I am priests. That’s where most of my thoughts end up, so a journey to understand religion outside of a textbook seems appropriate.

I’ll be accepting reasons not to go, but I’ll accept donations more readily.

Wish me luck.

Macbeth.