Reading Mark Twain's Life on the River. He describes his life on the Mississippi River. He runs away to become a Pilot. He tells his dream of fortune and fame. He tells of his disappointment, going from boat to boat with no offers of employment. He decides, in Cincinnati, with $30 left, to head south to explore the Amazon River. He gets on a lonely little steamboat for the trip to New Orleans, then suddenly...
"When we presently got under way and went poking down the broad Ohio I became a new being, and the subject of my own admiration. I was a traveler! A word never had tasted so good in my mouth before. I had an exultant sense of being bound for mysterious lands and distant climes which I never had felt in so uplifting a degree since. I was in such a glorified condition that all ignoble feelings departed out of me..."
Oh how I need this paragraph, the idea, the metaphor: Traveler. I am a traveler. You are are a traveler. We travel from acceptance to receiving and beyond, "bound for mysterious lands and distant climes". How far do you have to go to be a traveler?
How far? Not very far. Twain says it happened as soon as they got underway. I got off my pallet this morning (I sleep on the floor. My back likes it!) and I was underway. Where am I going? Mysterious lands and distant climes! Far or near, who knows. I am a traveler. The truth tastes good. I exult, as Twain did, in the "the sense of being bound".
What is that for you?
What is the meaning, deep meaning that you are bound for somewhere today, tomorrow, and every day and moment, with every breath and swallow.
Now what? What will you do with all the wonder of being a new being...a Traveler.
Keep playing in the Key of E. Yesterday while playing, I started working some sweeps in the various chord positions and I am noting different patterns, different patterns, not the same old same old. Travel the neck of the guitar, traveler.
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