On a journey the face of reality changes with the mountains and rivers, with the architecture of the buildings, the layout of the gardens, with the language, the skin colour. And yesterday’s reality burns on in the pain of parting; the day before yesterday’s is a finished episode, never to return; what happened a month ago is a dream, a past life. And at last you realize that the course of a life contains nothing but a limited number of such ‘episodes’, that a thousand and one accidents determine where we can build our house at last – but the peace of our poor minds is a precious good freedom that you should not chase, not haggle over, nor should you bargain for it with the dictators who can set fire to our houses, trample our fields and spread cholera overnight.Appalling uncertainty…? Appalling only when we fail to look it in the eyes. But the journey that many may take for an airy dream, an enticing game, liberation from daily routine, freedom as such, is in reality merciless, a school that accustoms us to the inevitable course of events, to encounters and losses, blow upon blow.
Annemarie Schwarzenbach, All the Roads Are Open: The Afghan Journey
journeys, reality