The Ordinary Adventurer:

Foreword

 

It starts as an uneasy sleep, a deep restlessness. That’s how it began for me. Perhaps for you, too.

Underneath the slick, secure, same surfaces of daily life, “things” begin to stir. Soft whispers are heard, faintly, in the heart; mute rumbles pulse in the solar plexus. These stirrings, easy to ignore at first, remain as tenderly persistent as a plant pushing through asphalt. The restlessness seems like the enemy within, threatening to blow up the status quo. And, of course, it will. That’s the news I want to convey.

But it is no enemy. It is, in fact, the very best friend you have.

Initially, resistance is steadfast. You remain a rock. Uncertainty and risk, after all, are unwelcome. In the domain of the map-wielders, there is always certainty; “X” always marks the spot. Best to stay safe, stay put, you think. No logical reason to break routine.

Yet resistance, as they say, is futile. Part of you knows this. Opposition crumbles steadily, helpless as granite decomposing before the elements. The restlessness will have its way.

At some point, you surrender logic. You see that the same ancient pulse that sends birds and butterflies north or south, that moves herds of wildebeest, humans, lemmings and more over the miles and the millennia, still throbs inside us today, in the twenty-first century.

When this force makes itself known, it may come unbidden, but you ignore it at your peril.

Congratulations. You have been warned.