Tuesday, August 22, 2006

Adventure - an advent

I'm reading William Least Heat-Moon's book "Blue Highways: A journey into America". (It dawned on me the other night that it's a 1980s travel blog.) He said something that struck a cord when I read the words last night. In this entry he talked about traveling from New Tazewell to Morristown TN where he hit road construction through the Clinch Mountains. It must have been quite a harrowing trip.
The crossing became a grim misadventure, and I wasn't prepared for it. I tried to think of other things. Helen Keller, who never drove the Clinch Mountains, said life is a daring adventure or it is nothing. Adventure - an advent. But no coming without a going. Death and rebirth. Antithetical notions lying next to each other, as on a globe the three-hundred-sixtieth degree does to the first. Past and future. (p. 37)
I'm wondering if sometimes roads we travel are under construction and quite treacherous, but nonetheless it's the way out. Death and rebirth. Adventure - an advent. It speaks hope to me.

1 comment:

Beth said...

spoke to me, too...thanks...