To be truly challenging, a voyage,
like a life, must rest on a firm foundation of financial unrest. Otherwise, you are doomed to
a routine traverse, the kind known to yachtsmen who play with
their boats at sea... "cruising" it is called. Voyaging
belongs to seamen, and to the wanderers of the world who cannot,
or will not, fit in. If you are contemplating a voyage and you
have the means, abandon the venture until your fortunes change.
Only then will you know what the sea is all about.
"I've always wanted to sail
to the South Seas, but I can't afford it."
What these men can't afford is not to go. They are enmeshed in
the cancerous discipline of "security." And in the worship
of security we fling our lives beneath the wheels of routine
- and before we know it our lives are gone.
What does a man need - really
need? A few pounds of food each day, heat and shelter, six feet
to lie down in - and some form of working activity that will
yield a sense of accomplishment. That's all - in the material
sense, and we know it. But we are brainwashed by our economic
system until we end up in a tomb beneath a pyramid of time payments,
mortgages, preposterous gadgetry, playthings that divert our
attention for the sheer idiocy of the charade.
The years thunder by. The dreams
of youth grow dim where they lie caked in dust on the shelves
of patience. Before we know it, the tomb is sealed.
Where, then, lies the answer?
In choice. Which shall it be: bankruptcy of purse or bankruptcy
of life?
- Sterling Hayden (Wanderer, 1973)
As quoted by Stuart Kiehl
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