You go on a mystic quest. Now, this term is controversial according to both philosophers and theologians. They argue with you about its meaning and its reality. They call it flippant. It is an overstatement. It is an understatement. Thisandsuch philosophers define it, and contain it, and explain it as perhaps a) a personal journey — and that’s all, b) a search for purpose in community while in a liminal reality, c) a solely internal journey in which one experiences purgation of the self, illumination of the true reality, and union with the absolute. But you do not care. You go on one anyway.

            You fly to a different country. You are American so you can’t actually speak anything but English. If you do speak another language, you sort of only half know it, or one or both of your parents was European/Latino. That’s pretty lucky. You can be whatever you want. It’s quite helpful to speak another language. But, if you want to be authentic to American culture, consider knowing only English.

            You land in Madrid or Luzerne or Rome. If you are adventurous, you land in Rishikesh. You sling your backpack over your shoulder, filled with some clothes, a toothbrush, and energy bars. You have a map stuck in a side-pocket. You take a bus to your start destination. You observe the misty/dusty/unpopulated/trash-laden country-side. You hear pop-music on the radio. It is American pop-music.

            You start in the mountains, walk over the mountains, meet a stranger with a kind smile or a stranger with a long beard and you talk about how hard it is to get up a mountain even though you don’t both speak English. Or, he/she does speak English. If it is a woman, consider losing the beard. If it is a man, make it a magically long beard that he tucks into his shorts.

            Make it up the mountain. Day 1 of the journey. The stranger shakes your hand, and disappears into a crowd at the mountain-top inn. You order a croissant or a sweet and a coffee. You munch or nibble or pick. You rest, or read. You walk on.

            Through mountains and valleys, forests, gardens, hot paved cities, trash-heaps, festivals, crowds of people, empty space you walk silently. Except for the talks alongside strangers with kind smiles, long beards, all is stillness. You eat alone at restaurants. Yogurt, little bottles of Coke, a cigarette. Sometimes you eat with someone new. You have met them along the way. You are always hungry. If you walk your pilgrimage by foot – the longest way, but arguably the most interesting – you can choose to walk four hours a day or eight hours a day. You will never stop being hungry, either way. Wake up with the sunrise and it’s sure that you’ll land a spot in a hostel or host-home on the way. Wake up later, and consider walking very fast all day, booking a hotel, or sleeping in a field. If you’re in Rishikesh, good luck.

            You can choose to eat at big places with expensive menus, or you can pick up stuff at the store. Consider sharing a big salad with the young Dannish boy who seems to know everything about the world.

            Sometimes you walk for days with a new person, eat with them, talk with them or gesticulate at them in a rather silly manner to tell whatever story you want to share. Consider telling a story about the way girls act in America, or about what breakfast is like there. If you don’t like to tell stories, listen to the stories of others, or simply bask in the stillness of another person’s presence. You will find that silence is all around you, always.

             Sometimes you part ways with the other pilgrims. Sometimes you fall in love with one of those strangers, carry them with you. But this is not necessary. In fact, sometimes you don’t fall in love with any specific person. Sometimes you fall in love with the landscape – green and wet and cold, hot and dry and colored in a thousand folds of blue/green/pink, rustic or falling to pieces or carefully tended. You fall in love with the bustling, busty, fat ladies walking through the towns and with the little kids kicking soccer balls along grimy city streets and you fall in love with the bakery that sells nothing but pounds of cookies made with lavender, rosemary, lemon. Maybe you just fall in love with the cookies. Consider the possibility of becoming a baker when you get home. Also, consider the possibility of never coming home.

            The cities are full of moving people, but people who look past you like you are just part of the brick and mortar. This is true of all cities. City-people aren’t on the journey with you. They can’t even see you. Towns are different. But cities are awful in this same way. Grime and gray. Cities loud, pointed, silver knives. They cut the path sharp. And they’re no good for the knees. Concrete is awful for the joints. You ache through the cities, and ache after. But there are always beautiful lights in cities, and funny coincidences. Keep an eye out for them, and for familiar faces.

            Three weeks into this pilgrimage, and consider converting to Catholicism/Hinduism/Buddhism. Consider becoming an atheist. Consider nature worship. There are a lot of good herbalist schools in America, a nice local tells you. And many here, he drops in passing. You grew up in Catholicism/Hinduism/Buddhism/Atheism/Nature Worship, and are so disillusioned with the downloaded tradition. You are young and your parents’ way of thinking is is so over. You are old, so your generation’s way of thinking is so outdated. You can be either one, but it’s all the same. Something of that old connection remains, however. If you convert change your name to John-Paul/Indra/Mahatma. When you get home, you can explain to your mother why you are going by this new name, and she will be confused but will still love you no matter what. Mom’s are pretty great that way. But don’t tell her about the tattoo.

            As you walk, perhaps notice the tracks you lay and the empty road before you, walked a thousand times. Whatever your name is, your only purpose in life is to create tracks that will be washed away and to move forward into the infinitely washed path. You are on a mystic quest, and (you realize it now) you never needed to leave America. It’s as if the path is all one path, whether it’s from the mailbox to the front door or from Dublin to Florence. Plod plod plod. You ask yourself if you are even going anywhere. You should decide that soon. Only you can figure that out, as you walk, though. The great pie in the sky, some sort of religious union with the path of love/the path of light/the path of work/the path of delight is just coming to know that all of it is born, lives, and passes away. There is no turmoil, just action. You have embarked on a journey that we all make in our hearts. But, ah, joy. Come to know that you cannot know a single thing, and judge nothing, and walk on. For that is your way, pilgrim.

            Week five. Reach the destination. Wide eyes, open heart, body strong and feet patched for blisters. You are thinner, and older, and know a little bit more of the native language. You make offerings to the holy city’s great temple, great rock, or great spaghetti monster. You chant, dance, sing, or fold your body into silent prayer. You know nothing, have learned that at least. You order a croissant/sweet and a coffee. You gesticulate to the first bearded stranger you met on the journey, who here wears your same mind-bust-wide-open smile. You nod at each other, see each other in each others eyes, and recognize the happy futility of it all. You cry some, and laugh a lot more than that.

            You board a plane, return home, and open your mouth to tell the story: the whole things pours out like sand. Consider that at home, they cannot understand.