By Indirections Find Direction Out

In Hamlet, Shakespeare´s Polonius gives hearty advice to his college-leaving son Laertes. "Gather thy friends with hoops of steel" and "Neither a borrower nor a lender be" are two famous admonitions and they apply to are group. As the Literary Vagabond, my favorite quote of his, though, has got to be this one: "By indirections find directions out." In other words, getting lost might be getting found. Dana Fors knows this well. Her first night in London she gathered Kristin Bohannon, Maddy DeWitt-Hoeger, and Alicia Mooradian for a mad dash to the London Eye--the giant ferris wheel on the Thames. After three bus exchanges, each taking them further away from their destination, they made it--but two minutes after the last ride. Anyway, they were the only ones to take the famous red double-decker buses, which are disappearing little by little each year. In Paris, her train ride to Versaille with Andrea Ingrassia, Keli Kadota, Kelley Tran, Laura Chalfin and Caitlyn Penny ended in equal amusement. They took the 40 minute ride the wrong way and knew it on the last stop--a garbage strewn wasteland. Was this what the Sun King´s sumptuous abode had become? Fast thinkers, they: in reversing their direction, they finally made it, laughing all the way. All said it was their most fun so far.

The indirection quote applies to Remy Rope, too. Today, on another bike ride, this time to Sound of Music sights in Salzberg, she lost her group, turning left instead of right. She found herself weaving through off-road mountain trails and swatting gigantic insects only to reappear in front a magic chicken kabob stand, which tasted as good as anything on the whole trip so far. The newfound sustanence lead her back to the city with stories to tell her friends.

Truly but wryly,
LV