If you are like me you can't help but choke with excitement every time the shire scenes come up in the Lord of the Rings movies. Ever since I was a kid my heart and mind would be filled with happiness just from listening to the Sound of the Shire--I mean to this day I'm incapable of holding back a smile. For the simplicity of the life in there amazes me in many ways, living with no worries, besides what's gonna be for breakfast, lunch and dinner, all seven of them.
You see, the hobbits are very interesting creatures, just like Gandalf said: "You can learn all that there is to know about their ways in a month, and yet after a hundred years they can still surprise you at a pinch.” They live the same way they have always done, change doesn't strike the shire very often--if it ever does. A Baggins has always lived in the shire and one will always will. Because who can possibly blame them, why would anyone leave a place like that; fresh veggies growing in the garden, feasting every night on homemade meals, growing old and fat, living a simple and mellow life with your kin and your best mates. It's what most people hope for.
But it isn't until opportunity knocks on one's front door and offers an escape from a paradise of that sort, that we learn what fear of the unknown really is. For the many other encounters with it offered a safe return. We could walk out from our house and go on "adventures" knowing that we'd come back. Nothing but foolish and crooked thoughts that let us believe we were actually venturing. When in reality the mere thought of getting our feet wet is enough to cripple us from the will to keep pushing. I'm not sure how stupid/childish it is of me to take life lessons from "fantasy" books and movies and to be honest, it's those kinds of things that make me wonder if I'm ever going to actually grow up. But I can't help to wonder how much it could be real. What if this stories about the wonders of venturing on great quests are actually true?
Those thoughts run through my head on a daily basis, because if that is the case it would be foolish of me to stay put. If that is the case the road is the only place where I can find my adventure. If that is the case I have no choice but to greet the lonely path with a smile.
For me life is on the road, out there somewhere waiting to happen, and while I've been blessed by being able to travel as much as I have, I have also paid the consequences of it. I've lived plenty of painful and plenty of joyful experiences since I started traveling, and luckily I've learned that the latter can make the bad ones seem necessary.
Now, the thing that I struggle the most with is this episode between journeys that always seem to take a toll on me, mentally and emotionally. Whether is a heavy semester, a vacation stuck on a job, or even a random break that is not long enough to travel or do anything, I find myself dreading the next morning, trapped inside a clock waiting until I'm done so I can go home and do basically nothing. You may laugh at this but is in times like this when something as simple as actually believing in Bilbo Baggin's story can put a smile on my face, take me out of that state of mind and get me through the days until my next adventure.
Which will come, of that, I'm very sure.