Wednesday, December 03, 2014

The Long Journey of Nevertheless





We can only speculate how long was the astronomers’ journey. It could have been up to two years.

Take a measuring rod and stretch it back about two years. Mark the day. Seven, or even eight hundred day-steps into the past, no need to haggle over it.

Two years, plus or minus, is a long journey. Do you remember 2012? Followed by 2013?!!! And here we are, at the end of 2014!

For me, some of those day-steps felt like a thousand-year leaps. Some, exactly the same, except in the opposite direction. I also had days when my lead-laden legs were barely moving, treading murky waters, no solid ground underneath, no rock, no pebble, no measurable progress. Then I would let myself sink from sheer exhaustion only to discover that I don't have to keep my head up all the time...My head's under water but I'm breathing fine...

Two years is a long time.  Enough time to cradle a birth and casket a death.  Time to say our vows in marriage. Time to heart-break our promises in divorce. Time to lose friends and make new friends. Time to succeed.  Time to fail.

No matter how comfortable your transportation is, two years is long enough time to give us all saddle-blisters.

Are we there yet?

Are you sure we are not lost? I’d thought we’d already be done with this trip by now…

All the virgin-journey excitement, the starter thrill of novelty evaporates into fumes after two years. The weariness settles like dust on the shoes… on the soul.

We really don’t know the details of the astronomers road trip. All we know is that they pushed through - and kept pushing through - whatever attacked them from the outside and from the inside. The fear, the doubt, discouragement, setbacks, fatigue. The relentless extremes of desert.

Once they left their home, everywhere they went, they were foreigners. Foreign was their language and foreign were their ways.

They fought back the lapping tongues of skeptics that eventually caught up with them and the raging rivers of tears they left behind... and they kept going… and going… and going… Until they finally arrived!

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