a flight from yourself to yourself

Take a much longer trip with your free time than you have planned to do before you make your time available to anyone else, regardless of the rewards. You're a thinker, awed by wonder, and our instincts for examining the landscapes of our inner selves are always blunted by responsibility and routine. How far away can you go? Can you drive to the north until there is no more tarmac? Can you take buses overland from Puerto Escondido to Belize to a boat that will take you to the port in Gautemala filled with freed black slaves, where they play their fabulous 'punta rock'? How far can you go away from yourself with the time and resources you have, and how can you show somebody like me where you went? I would love to read a blog or buy a tiny book describing your flight away from yourself to yourself, remembering your past, of course, but always trying to devalue it by appreciating your immediate surroundings. By urging you to do this, I put you at risk of writer's block, since I know you have an amazing tale to tell, but your story might be more interesting as you search for its context in a world where everyone's fears are as urgent and alarming as your own. What would you say about your mother in Gaza, I wonder, if you wrote poems to her on the banks of the Ganges?

(from note to Emad F.)