Westward Ho!

I can’t help the fact that I love you. And I need to leave you.

I can’t help the fact that I need to leave this place behind. I need to lace up my boots and walk toward the setting Sun, knowing full well that when I am settled I will see it rise again. In this journey, I need to feel the Sun on my back as the chilly morning air is warmed, and feel it on my face as the crisp night air surrenders to the evening sky.

I want to live simply, with the mountains under my feet and their people by my side. I want to close my eyes and feel the power of their grace as the thin air cleans out my tired soul. I want to know the fullness of nature as She brings me home, and takes me to untold discovery.

I want to bring you there, my little ones. I want you to feel the holy union of man to his Mother, of the soul to its Creator. I want you to learn to follow a different compass, to find your own true north through eyes not tainted by my ideas but trained by the lost art of self-discovery. I want you to write your own stories in your own way using whatever tools you wish to use. I want you free, guided by your own set of truths, by the words already written deep within you.

I will help you find those words, my loves, but it is you who must read them.

My days by the ocean I love are numbered, but it lets me go knowing what is best for me. To the altitude I will go, to the snow-covered peaks and happy valleys, to a place where the climb is upward and the run is downward. To a place where the rocks glisten with the rising Sun, and the hills cry out to a Moon they have always known.

That’s where my heart dreams, and my soul finds its Earthly home. There, the loner in me can find his solitude as the lover in me burns his relinquished veil. There, the artist in me can sing his hallowed song while the man in me curses the blisters born upon his feet. There I can feel a hand on my back and a rhythm in each and every footfall.

In my mind, I am there. Soon, my body will follow. Westward ho I go!