Have you ever been on a long, serious quest?

[Rabrrrrrr]

I started by thinking of the Lord of the Rings quest, and I'm sure no one here, or anywhere, actually, has ever been on a quest like that.

But I got to thinking about quests - and I think there are, indeed, some quests that have been undergone.

The quest to find the Titanic is one that came immediately to mind. And I'm sure there are some medical quests, I know there have been some botanical and biological quests searching for a rare specimen, archeological/historical quests, etc.

Have you been on a quest? And by quest, I mean something that you were doing full time for at least a year, probably more, obsessed with a specific goal?

I have not. I can't think of anything that would really count as a quest for me, though I have long searched for the one restaurant and/or bar that, once the waitstaff and maitre'de and bartender etc. get to know me, doesn't fold up a week later.

[Roland99]

1. I was sent on a quest once. To find a....

shrubbery!!

[Rabrrrrrr]

2. Oh, you were not!

I don't believe you. Though I wouldn't be surprised if you DID just go around saying "ni" to old ladies, ya bastard.

[Roland99]

7. Well, you see, this m00se b!t my s!ster....

[TallahasseeGrannie]

3. I've been on a number

One was to write a novel. Finished it. Wrote two more.

One was to recover from depression and panic disorder. Did it. Hard.

One was to research my family tree as far back as I could: got 800 names.

[Name removed]

4. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[khashka]

12. If you need a map

email me :)

It ain't that elusive.


Khash.

[-..__...]

24. I suck at map reading...

all guys do (but we very rarely admit it).

How about pictures? Pics will do just fine!

:smoke:

[Deja Q]

5. This is beggin' for a copycat thread...

Sadly, it'd probably get locked all too quickly... :yoiks:


My long, serious quest is loving a long life with that special someone, who must be as tangle as that oasis I saw three miles back... :evilgrin:

[DS1]

6. There was this long deadly series 4 year quest to

get my ass out the Marine Corps

[Redstone]

9. Hey, at least you undertook a quest with an achievable goal.

That's an important component of any quest.

And you reached that goal, didn't you?

Redstone

[DS1]

16. It would appear so, yes!

:hi:

[Redstone]

19. Unless you're hiding something from us, and yelling

Hoo-rah when we're not paying attention, and stuff like that.

Redstone

[DS1]

20. haha!

Not likely ;-)

I was faking that stuff all along in the first place

[Redstone]

8. Yes, actually, I did. Started thinking about it in 1966, and

untertook it in 1972. No movie-type ending there; it ended up being no more than a short saga of surrealistic confusion and pain, with the goal still unattained and finally deemed impossible and ultimately inconsequential (except to me).

Amazingly enough, though, it came to an end in a bolt-from-the blue email in the year 2001, which led to me finally, and easily, finding the irrefutable truth, which it turned out to be that what I had been told in 1966 was indeed the case after all, so the quest was entirely, and irredeemably, for naught.

The moral, I suppose, is that quests ain't what they're cracked up to be. At least mine wasn't.

And I wish I hadn't started thinking about it again. No criticism of you for raising the subject, though.

Redstone

[existentialist]

10. Yes

I have gone on a long serious quest.

[WCGreen]

11. Life is a quest......

If you let it be....

Or you can exists......

And let it happen....

I have been on several quests, all of which involve things of great importance to me.....

It's like the ring, an insignificant object, being the fulcrum for a life's journey.... Finding fulfillment within... Doing something because it is the right thing to do....

These are the quest, whether philosophical in nature or personal in scope, that give us that spark of greatness.....

[khashka]

14. Damn it, Chris!

You stold my post right out from under me!

Anyway.... what he said!


Khash.

[WCGreen]

18. Great Minds think a like.....

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

13. Yes, I am on one now

But, I don't think I should talk about it yet.

[anarch]

15. No, but I have been on a short, sarcastic quest

Where I didn't really believe I would find anything of importance, despite my commitment to going through with it. I wound up being rather surprised. The whole thing only lasted maybe 4 months, though, and I was hardly obsessed with any specific object...just wanted to get away from it all. I guess that's the opposite of a quest, even if it did include travel, hardship, and adventure. I dunno, n/m.

[StellaBlue]

17. Funny you should ask

I am on a quest now.

My previous life was, against my wishes, ended and taken away from me. I am now in another, almost 'foreign' country (though I am American!), have no job, no car, no place of my own, and all my possessions fit in the backseat of a mid-size family sedan.

So far I have been on this quest for about three and a half months. My goal is to use this turmoiled time as an opportunity to change the trajectory of my life (I was on a rat-race-career track and in a typical, stifling hetero-oppressive relationship that drained me of all energy for life, politics, art, wine, everything good and worthwhile in the universe). I want to break free of the live-to-work, live-to-spend cycle and carve out a meaningful future for myself, where *I* am REALLY in charge. Which I think most people aren't.

[WCGreen]

30. Good Luck Stella...

Circumstance changed drastically for me last year....

I am now in a totally different place....

[StellaBlue]

35. I assume you mean a transformatively better place...

I hope so!

:)

[WCGreen]

36. My life has changed.... I was a type A type....

Always had to be in on everything....

And then, just like that, it was over......

I am much humbler now, more attuned to my body and respect, no defer to those around me.....

[StellaBlue]

37. Cool...

:hi:

I hope I can say that in another 8.5 moons! :)

[WCGreen]

39. Congrats......

That'll change you.....

[pitohui]

21. yes

i don't know if i want to write abt it tho, the quest was successful but it took many yrs & then i was so over it

i have a new quest but i feel i am making v. little progress after approx. 2 yrs

but the old quest was like that, the first 4 yrs or so was flatline, w. little observable progress, the next 4 yrs was boom!

[hermetic]

22. Gee, yeah

my whole life has been quests. Just started a new one today, on my birthday. usually I relax on my birthday. But this year seemed to call for a quest. Good luck with yours!

[chaska]

23. Every year 2-3 thousand set off on the Appalachian trail in Ga., searching

for Maine. Maybe a tenth find it 4-6 months later.

Not quite what you're talking about but it is a life changing experience. I highly recommend it.

[pitohui]

25. i like yr quest better than my quest

in fact i'm toying w. the idea of putting it next on the list

[hermetic]

26. litsts are highly advisable

on a quest

[swimboy]

27. Yes, I tried to find a way as a penniless graduate student to find a

particular mountain in Wales and spend the night alone on the summit after I read about the spot in a book of Welsh folklore. And I did it.

[Ksec]

28. Yes. My quest was a noble one. Ive been searching for the meaning

of life.

Ive been looking for nearly 50 years . I have searched many lands. I have met many people.


I finally found a reasonable answer to my question. Ive have finally discovered the true meaning of our existence.

Im getting sleepy. Ill get back to this post another time.

[Tafiti]

29. I was on a quest for about 5 years...

...though I didn't know it. I was searching for something, but only subconsciously. I had read many books, and had many stimulating converstaions about anything and everything, but something was still missing. Then it found me. I found it. Then I knew that that's what I was searching for, and the quest was over. Now I know.

[swimboy]

32. Can you say what it was? What it is?

[Tafiti]

45. It was a book.

After I finished it, I thought, "Wow, that's the book I've been waiting to read my whole life." It was like everything in the book were semi-conscious thought that someone was able to put into a singular coherent account. It doesn't make me special, I've had other people tell me the same thing about the book. It just makes that much sense.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

31. I looked for the Richard Matheson book 'I Am Legend' for years.

It was out of print. It's a vampire tale, from which the film "The Omega Man" came as I understand it. Stephen King touted it in his book "Danse Macabre" and I always wanted to read it.

Of course this was not a full time vocation, there was school, work, etc. that happened during those years, I just always looked for that book anytime I was in any bookstore of significance. I looked for it at The Strand in N.Y.C., at City Lights in S.F., at any scifi/fantasy oriented bookstore I was ever in.

Of course this quest started long before the era of amazon.com and ebay.

Finally I found it, several years ago at a sci fi bookstore in the San Diego area. Started reading it. Story didn't really grab me.

I've still never finished the book.

[spacelady]

38. Sometime the nature of a quest is not its original goal, but a direction.

[NNadir]

33. Yes, but I'm too busy questing to tell you about it.

[spacelady]

34. The one common denominator I have found to be true for a quest is

Timing Is Everything.

[RevCheesehead]

40. Well, there was the year dad piled us into the family wagon...

and we set off, cross country.

[spacelady]

42. Yeah, I remember that smell...

[HEyHEY]

41. Yeah, the quest to get the fuck back to Vancouver

[mwdem]

44. Man, I'm sorry you want to go back..

I told you I was there a year ago, and loved the city. Went on the Rocky Mtnr. train to Calvary. Loved VC, what little I say of it. I was hoping you'd be happy where you are now. Hey, now I'm in Texas, so there.

[Gregorian]

43. Yes. For the last fifteen years.

I am completely obsessed.

If I posted it here, people would think I'm selfish. It's something that only a few people have.

But the search was for beauty. My own "world". Some would say I have it. I don't. I saw it when I first started. I tried. And it got further away. Now I stand in it's doorway. But still it's far away. Two days ago I was nearly suicidal over it. After all of these years of work and frustration, there are things that can trigger the desperation to that degree of severity. It has been almost every waking breath. Every step I take. I search almost endlessly. Day after day, I look. I have a list of what it is that is important. And I check off what can't be. What is contradictory. What no longer can be. Then I roll the dice, and hope. And there is disappointment. But there is good, also. Then a darkness suddenly comes and kills it. And the search begins with a new intensity. The risks are taken. The work is performed. The change takes place.

But I am waiting. I'm hoping. I'm trying to find optimism. But it's thinning. Time is running out. I seek new avenues to help the dream come to fruition. Those inevitibly fail. And I keep trying.

Depending on how I look at it, it's been a colorful journey. But it's also a tiresome drag that I would have prefered ended without so much effort. Sometimes I feel like Job. Sometimes I'm ashamed that what appears successful is actually so dreadful.

Maybe this year I'll find it.