Peregrinacion

Curled up in a comfy sweater and overstuffed chair with a soy chai and a copy of Coehlo's The Pilgrimage, I am transported back to one year ago, walking half my normal pace through crowded streets, dodging tourists, dog excrement, old gypsy women handing out sprigs of rosemary and pickpockets. It occurs to me: I must go to Pamplona, just south of the Pyrenees. I've never been there, and until that moment, in a backdrop of snow, the desire to become a pilgrim had never been so strong since I was in Granada:
- No te vayas (Don't go)
-Volvere, no te preocupes (I'll come back, don't worry)
-Siempre dicen eso. Nunca pasa. (They always say they'll return. They never do.)
-Te prometo. Volvere (I promise. I will return)
But I realize now that the desire to return, to go back to a place in my mind that is the resonating home of my heart, is really just a desire to dig deeper into this world and what little time I may have left. My promise to return was not a physical promise, although I would love to return to that city some day. It was more of a spiritual promise: I will return to be reborn again, to bury myself in the dirt of life, to sleep on cliffs and be covered in my fears. To live off of only what I can carry and the kindness of others. I will return meant that this journey I started one year ago would not be over, simply postponed to finish out my duties as a suburban college girl.
Once again, I have found the desire to be struck in the face by the odd coincidences in life, the meaningless yet beautiful way our lives are woven together and torn apart to create intricate knots and patterns that, if they carry any meaning at all, it is a meaning we haven't the capacity to understand. Like an untranslatable phrase, or an emotion that has no name.
I don't know what is the cause, but I'm craving that enchanting magnetism of uncertainty. And in a way I feel like I have failed to transmit that magnetism into life here at school, that shocking pulse which revives us from the cold and emotionless drone of our daily lives. I wanted to be a vessel of this love, I don't know what else to call it, to share the ecstatic nature of life that was once shared with me. But perhaps I'm not ready yet. I've already forgotten how it feels, I only have my words- words which only grant the surface of my intended message...