published December 29, 2011
in the Stockton Sentinel
Stockton, Kansas
Several
weeks ago, I made a quick afternoon trip to Mankato to surprise a friend at her
retirement reception. Since I was traveling alone, I had three new Christmas
CDs and had the music cranked up loud, so the miles passed quickly. The
surprise worked perfectly, and it was wonderful to visit with friends I hadn’t
seen for a long time. The weather was mild, but looming to the northwest was
the dark blue bank of an approaching cold front, which was in the forecast for
the following day.
Traveling
toward Mankato, I passed a guy walking along the highway, pushing a
three-wheeled cart like a parent would use to take a young child along for a
walk or jog. The guy was wearing a bright vest and was certainly outfitted
appropriately for walking along the highway.
He was heading west, a few miles east of Smith Center. I wondered if he
was walking far, but thought it was a strange time of year to be on a journey
by foot.
On my
return home, I again passed the man, this time a few miles west of Smith
Center. By then the temperature was
dropping considerably, the further west I went. I said a prayer for the fellow,
realizing that he had not just been walking into Smith Center but was, indeed,
on a trek of some sort.
Two weeks later, a picture of the man appeared in The Norton Telegram with a short story
about him. His name is Chris Allen, age 26, and he is from Sandwich, Mass.
According to his account in the Telegram,
he set out on a journey to walk across America, leaving from Cape Cod, Mass.
with $1,800 in his pocket, and headed for the west coast. When the picture was
taken for the paper, he had passed through Norton on Monday, the 5th of
December, which was five days after I passed him on the highway. In those five
days, the cold front had dropped us into frigid temperatures, certainly too
cold to be out for a long period of time. The story said his motivation is
simple: “This is a now or never sort of thing. I’m not doing this to prove a
point. I’m doing it just because. It just felt so right and compelling; it was
a no-brainer,” said Allen. He has no time frame to reach the west coast. “My
only plan is to make no plans,” he said.
That last
comment is one that has stuck in my mind; it’s a concept that is so far-fetched
from my own lifestyle that I can’t even imagine it. But I have a certain
fascination with the man and his no-plan plan. I think about the things he will
see, the people he will meet, the experiences he will have along the way. He
will probably write a book when he’s done, and the book will become a movie,
and he will be worth millions. Or not. Perhaps he will simply be awed by the
journey and leave it at that.
I’m going
to take that no-plan plan thought into the new year, although I’m realistic enough
to know my life won’t change much because of it. So don’t worry; I’m not going
to strike out on a pilgrimage, or chase after the guy on the highway. But I
know that my structured, schedule-oriented, calendar-driven personality causes
me to miss a lot of once-in-a-lifetime opportunities along the way.
That famous
author, Anonymous, said, “Too often we are so preoccupied with the destination,
we forget the journey.” With the picture in my mind of the guy who has no plans
but to walk the next mile, I’ve got my New Year’s Resolution nailed down. My
only plan is to make no plans, and my only resolution is to make no
resolutions.
"My only plan is to make no plans," he said.
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