The Call of the Open Road

[image credit: bertvthul on pixabay.com]

 

My lifelong longing for the open road has been suppressed, for a time, as I have enjoyed this period of time in the bucolic lands of the western plains.

But, it is like Rests - the intervals of silence in pieces of music.

This passage from Tolkien's The Lord of The Rings book trilogy, in The Return of The King, came to mind as I wrote the above...

"Frodo began to feel restless, and the old paths seemed too well-trodden. He looked at maps, and wondered what lay beyond their edges: maps made in the Shire showed mostly white spaces beyond its borders. He took to wandering further afield and more often by himself..."

I am bound by contract, by my word, by my honor - to complete the thing I have taken up. When that has been fulfilled, to its uttermost end - I will be free to wander again.

Tonight, I begin to feel the first whispers of tendrils - of a longing for a return to the ocean, to the green forests, to the mountains...to new places, and new roads...

Another quote from Tolkien's work, 

"Not all those who wander are lost"