Saturday, January 22, 2005
The Undiscovered Country
The Undiscovered CountryI realized the other day that the explanation for the quote on my Bio wasn't there anymore. I'm not sure why I took it off, or when, but I figured I would add a bit here. It's actually a funny story. One of those high school moments that grabs you by the shoulders and changes your life.
I was 17. My friends and I thought we were "intellectuals" of some sort and would hang out at the local Village Inn drinking coffee. Who knows how many hours we spent there, in our booths, discussing who knows what. I remember a few of the conversations, but not many. I do remember that life was a constant drama back then, always filled with some sort of angst, hormones and challenges.
There was this guy. He was fulfilling my secret dream. Keith was studying for his PhD in English. He was to become a professor. I was totally infatuated with him. The very idea that he was doing what I wanted to do...well I was 17. I am sure you can imagine how I felt.
I would try to talk to him. I would ask him about the books he was reading, about what classes he was taking. He would smoke his cigarettes, look impossibly sexy and intelligent with his greasy hair and smudged glasses and would talk to me with a certain level of disdain. I thought he was wonderful.
One night he descended from his haughty height long enough to actually hold a conversation with me. What he talked to me about I can hardly remember. With the exception of one part, he talked to me about the "Undiscovered Country." I had no clue what he was talking about, and being 17 and afraid that he already thought me elementary I didn't ask. The conversation struck me though, and stuck with me.
Later that year we studied Shakespeare's Hamlet in English class. There it was. In the middle of the famous "To be or not to be" speech. There was the undiscovered country I was looking for. We had to memorize lines for class, I choose this:
Who would fardels bear? To sweat and grunt under a weary life, but that the threat of something after death, the undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveler returns, makes us rather bear those ills we have than fly to others we know not of? Thus conscience doth make cowards of us all, and thus the native hue of resolution is sicklied over with the pale cast of thought, and enterprises of great pith and movement with this regard their currents turn awry and lose the name of action. (Hamlet, Act 3 Scene 1)
Ever since that fateful day when I sat across from Keith I have thought about the undiscovered country. I have always had this quote nearby, ever since I found it. I have printed copies everywhere. I have one hanging in my bathroom this very minute. I still have the entire thing memorized. When I am lost, when I am unsure of my path, when I don't know which way to turn, I read this quote and I think, is this me? Would I rather bear the ills I know than fly to others? Sometimes the answer is yes. Most of the time the answer is no. I am an adventurer at heart. The undiscovered country is mine to explore.
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As you wake in the morning
What do you feel?
Does a rush of happiness
wash over you when,
Suddenly, you realize you are alive?
