Save from forgetfulness

new friends

And if travel is like love, it is, in the end, mostly because it’s a heightened state of awareness, in which we are mindful, receptive, undimmed by familiarity and ready to be transformed. That is why the best trips, like the best love affairs, never really end. Pico Iyer

Nevada. Mojave Desert. It got hot. Very hot. One hundred and ten degrees Fahrenheit. At this temperature it is impossible to ride a bike. Although initially I thought it is fairly possible. In fact, if one really insist, it actually is, but then you vomit, feel dizzy, have shivers and generally you don’t feel good.

So I stopped being stubborn and turned to lead nocturnal life. I get up at five, cycle till 10am, then look for some shade, sleep, and after sunset I cycle again till I’m so knackered that I can’t get along any more. The present boils down to a few, rhythmically repeated, atavistic needs. You go ahead, eat and drink, and when you don’t feel like carrying on – you stop, put up your tent and go to sleep.

What a great treasure here is a bit of a shade! You can spread out and get some sleep, wait over the warmest hours. Sometimes someone will stop, leave a bottle of water, chat a little. They say I’m crazy.

Cycling at night, or, walking at night, is a mystical experience. You walk with desert ghosts, it is a nocturnal journey filled with ghosts. Usually I only feel them, but it happens that sometimes I hear them, or even see. They take a variety of forms, less, or more commonly known, whispering different words, not always pleasant, but it’s nice to know that someone crawling alongside.

When I fall asleep, the faces of people that I have seen during the day come to me. I think about them a lot, about the people I meet, about those, who are helping me along the way. Jacob, Martha, Rob, Arjun, Karl, Sandy, Becca, Amie. Why they, and not the others, and why me. Maybe they are a part of me, and I am a part of them and I do not even have to wait for the night to feel that we really are all the same. And if so, you may not need to go anywhere, there is nothing to look for. There is no need to ask questions and look for the answers. Our footprint on the road will save itself from forgetfulness.

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