I had the privilege, once again, of partaking in a trip to the United Kingdom. And amidst the sorrowful business of terminating such a wonderful interval outside the ordinary routine, I was invited, somewhere deep in my consciousness, to consider the purpose and value of traveling.
This came to me because the meaning commonly attributed to travel seems to be that of leisure and escapism, or, at times, vainglory. I could not justify myself under those terms without some pain. Thankfully, the answer now seems rather clear to me, and I shall attempt to explain why.
Figure 1: Me on my seersucker suit in Bath, Somerset.
The question that makes me most pensive is invariably the one in which I must explain the reason for my actions. After all, the mere idea of pursuing things in life without a purpose is ghastly to every soul whose identity rests upon being reasonable. And among such questions, there is certainly the why of a trip.I try not to be so prepotent as to interrogate the motives of people in an airport, nor do I advocate some frigid calculus of efficient resource allocation. Entertainment is a blessing to be cherished, but always in good measure, lest it become a sour prelude to a life in bondage to the senses. But can entertainment alone be the good to be cherished in a trip? If one merely looks around, it often appears so.
When Jesus takes his disciples away to the beautiful ancient city of Caesarea Philippi, the purpose is not merely to appreciate its beauty, although perhaps that too, nor its quietude, nor even its waters. Most certainly, something more is taking place. They have come to the heartland of worldly power and false gods, to a place altogether unlike Galilee.
There, the scenery itself seems to furnish the lesson. We may speak of the conflict between eternal beauty and imperial worship; of the silence of divine authority before the clamor of the gods; and, of course, of the entrance to the underworld of Hades, which tradition associated with the waters before them.
Perhaps, then, we ought to treat with greater care that faint desire, so easily indulged, to be elsewhere for a few days of the year. The unfamiliar need not merely entertain us. It may confront us, and in that confrontation, the mind finds occasion to expand. A very different concept from that of being by the beach with a straw in a coconut.
In other words, a journey ought to become justified in one's own telling. The directive that one should have a story to call one's own, in which a character is shamelessly impersonated by one's own deeds, is a large topic we shall leave for another time. Yet it offers a golden rule by which to arbitrate one's trajectory through life without denying what one could have been. Observe what you can do, and it will likely bear some relation to what you should do.
Figure 2: Me posing at Magdalen College in Oxford, where C. S. Lewis lectured for years.
In my own very case, an uncanny description of my task lies in the idea of imitating the monastic life. Just as the Benedictines helped build Europe through their monastic rule, so I too ought to attempt something analogous with computing.
The image goes something like this: the barbarians have crossed the borders. They come to plunder Rome, and Rome has no loyal legions left. My task is to preserve the books and, perhaps, to evangelize the barbarians out of Arianism.
As for you, what is your story?