No one will map for you the path by which you must cross the wilderness of your own life — not your parents or your teachers, not your heroes or your lovers, not the self-help books or Shakespeare’s sonnets. Some may give you signposts, some may become turning points, but it is a path you ultimately make by walking. Along the way, you mistake dreams and desires for destinations, only to find that they have been way-stations — as soon as you attain them, you begin longing for something else. This Möbius strip of longing is the root of everything we suffer in the fangs of the Wanting Monster, but it is also the root of our creative vitality: the restless urge to make, to leave a mark that says “I AM,” a monument to having been. It is our incompleteness that maps the territory of the possible in us. Mario Benedetti (September 14, 1920–May 17, 2009) captures this paradox, with subtlety that doesn’t offer an answer but whispers the living question back to you, in an unedited poem found among his papers after his death, beautifully read in the original Spanish by my Patagonian friend Manuel Gutiérrez — a communicator of wonder through theater, music, and humor, whose hospitality made the serpentine birdworlds possible and who is always teaching me how to navigate the terrain of life with an open heart for a compass. Music: “Sun Will Set” by Zoë Keating, with the artist’s permission; image: my father walking through the sunflower fields of Bulgaria, under an image by the Vera Rubin Observatory.RUTAMario BenedettiLa encontré en mi bolsillo / era una rutano sabía hasta dónde me llevabapero igual la seguí en un merodeocon todas mis nostalgias en la manoera un atlas del alma / la concienciade lo que cometí y lo que me esperaen el suelo vi huellas que eran propiasasí que era una senda ya corridael piélago de antes ya no estabatodo era más fuerte más segurode pronto me encontré con la riberade ese río que siempre fue mi anhelosólo entonces me aconsejé a mí mismoen el bolsillo volví a poner la rutay allí quedó esperandootro mañanaROADMAPby Mario Benedetti translated by Maria PopovaI found it in my pocket / it was a roadmapI knew not where it ledbut I followed it anyway in aimless wanderlustwith all my nostalgias in handit was an atlas of the soul / of consciousnessof what I have committed and what awaits meon the ground I saw footprints that were my ownand so it was a path already troddenthe vastness of before had vanishedeverything was stronger, surersuddenly I landed on the riverbankthe river that had always been my longingonly then did I heed my own adviceI tucked the path into my pocket once moreand there it remained, awaitinganother tomorrowCouple with Benedetti’s clarion call to stop waiting and start living, then revisit C.S. Lewis on what we long for in our existential longings.donating = lovingFor seventeen years, I have been spending hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars each month composing The Marginalian (which bore the outgrown name Brain Pickings for its first fifteen years). It has remained free and ad-free and alive thanks to patronage from readers. I have no staff, no interns, no assistant — a thoroughly one-woman labor of love that is also my life and my livelihood. If this labor makes your own life more livable in any way, please consider lending a helping hand with a donation. Your support makes all the difference.newsletterThe Marginalian has a free weekly newsletter. It comes out on Sundays and offers the week’s most inspiring reading. Here’s what to expect. Like? Sign up.