What do you think happened to Frodo after Gray Havens..........

[Birdland]

Leaving aside the specific examples of Tolkien or Frodo, I do not believe it is possible for anyone to leave behind their origins and move on. Your origins are with you every day and every moment, whether you like it or not.

Very true, Child. (Birdie inches closer to the center of the seesaw.) You and I seem to have a similar background from what you have told me in other posts. We have both made choices concerning our origins and whether we would continue down certain paths or take new roads.

But yes, we all carry the "baggage" of our origins. But when we prepare for our life's journey, what do we carry in that baggage? The very best of our origins, I would hope, the things that we loved and would fit with our own values.

But can you really separate these things, the bitter and the sweet? By choosing only parts, some might feel you are rejecting all. (I speak from experience.)

And the parts left behind? Well, they must be replaced by other things, in order that you can be whole. And thus you create a new reality. A new "you". Voila! Change. [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

As to whether there was a chance that Frodo would not find healing in the West, Tolkien supposedly addressed this very idea. His poem The Sea-Bell has also been called "Frodo's Dreme". (I'm sorry, I don't know if Tolkien did this, or others). It tells of a "seeker" who arrives in a place where he strives for a connection, only to find himself rejected and lost, seeing "through a glass darkly." In the end, he returns to his origins, only to again find himself an outsider, a ghost who wanders unseen by all he had left behind.

To be lost between two worlds; if this really was "written" by The Ringbearer, it should have been titled "Frodo's Nightmare." IMHO, choices must be made. In order for the subject of the poem to find a connection in this new land, the boat must be sunk and the bridges burned.

Remember Frodo's words to Sam: "You cannot be always torn in two".

(OK, I may have crawled back to the end of the seesaw, there.)

Hmmmmm, you're right. We seem to have the field to ourselves, here. Can it be the Downs is in silent awe of our erudite debating skills?...Nah!