feet to tappin'

“When I was very young and the urge to be someplace else was on me, I was assured by mature people that maturity would cure this itch. When years described me as mature, the remedy prescribed was middle age.  
In middle age I was assured greater age would calm my fever and now that I am fifty-eight perhaps senility will do the job. Nothing has worked. Four hoarse blasts of a ships's whistle still raise the hair on my neck 
and set my feet to tapping. The sound of a jet, an engine warming up, even the clopping of shod hooves on pavement brings on the ancient shudder, the dry mouth and vacant eye, the hot palms and the churn of stomach high up under the rib cage. In other words, once a bum always a bum. 
I fear this disease incurable. I set this matter down not to instruct others but to inform myself....A journey is a person in itself; no two are alike. And all plans, safeguards, policing, and coercion are fruitless. We find after years of struggle that we not take a trip; a trip takes us.” 
― John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley: In Search of America


'tis been a wee while since i've had a road trip
with my faithful and trusty mila rubie..
(see post june 25 2011 mila rubie)
emaho! has it been that long?
the prius of the century and a divine traveling companion..
even tho' she is a car ~

her tires are rotated..she loves that!
kinda like new shoes for imelda -
oil changed..all fluids topped off..
freshly washed..well, she will be..
loaded with traveling cookies, maps and toothpicks..

we are heading south to california..
saying ciao! to a life lived in seattle for a year,
long loved students of yoga, new loved practicing ones,
family, friends..the snowy mountains..
the rain will follow us, i wager..
& we be a' wandering into new adventures..
some skylarking, no doubt..
another chapter, another escapade..

a journey keeps the palm open..
and of course, the heart..
offers a new presence to emerge..
there is a pristine freshness to the each and every..
this certainly can happen while one stays happily at home..
if we be awake, 
alive, 
intentional, 
whole- hearted, 
engaged...(marry me?) 

ah! there is nothing like staying at home for real comfort..
                 ~ jane austen

there it is, that must be it..
that the edges are strectched ..
the comfort moves into 
tighter spaces...
vaster places..
(whichever gives comfort a run for her money)

recently i've been dubbed a cliff-dweller..
when i tilted my head quizzically..
it was explained to me that i live on the edge..
ha! all this time i thought i was practicing 
the middle way..
perhaps they come down to the same thing..
the middle way of centering into the present..
the middle of not knowing..the edge..
(does anybody really know?)
a journey sends one down the road of insecurity..
the wisdom of insecurity..a.watts

when a great ship is in the harbor and moored, 
it is safe -
but that is not what great ships are built for ~
          clarissa pinkola estes

a cliff dwelling big ship ..
okay - i'll take it..
setting sail..
light a candle for me?