Travel makes the spirit take flight
The other day I received an e-mail from New Zealand. It came after an e-mail from Fiji and, if all goes as planned, it will be followed by a note from Bangkok – then maybe one from China and later, a note from Russia.
A friend of mine is traveling around the world, and I squirm and shuffle my feet as I read his tropical e-mails with envy and increasing restlessness.
He just took off. Rented out his house, left his job, booked a ticket and headed out. It seems to be the new hot thing to do.
Standing in line at the post office the other day, my mind wandered.
“It’s been too long since I traveled anywhere,” I thought to myself, fidgeting, a stack of “thank you” notes from my birthday party growing damp in my hand. “When was the last time I seriously went anywhere?”
Reality check: I returned from Lesotho, Africa, about half a year ago, and I’m planning to go home this summer – home as in Denmark. Africa one year, Europe the next, I really don’t have anything to pout about.
I look at the other people in line and wonder if they travel? And I return to the original premise of selling everything and going off the grid in a global sense.
Couples retire that way or get married that way. People sail their own boats, go by train, by plane. Some bike, some hike.
There is nothing that compares to the sense of freedom and exhilaration I have experienced traveling, far away, often alone, into the unknown.
Standing on the top of a mountain in Malealea in Lesotho was the last time I had that reckless feeling of no restraints, no safety net, not knowing what tomorrow is going to bring and embracing it, loving the life out of it.
I’m like that. I’m not someone who can have the same peanut butter sandwich for lunch every day, and see that as an accomplishment.
Predictability is not all it’s cracked up to be, and I’ve found serendipity to be my best friend — especially when it comes to travel.
More than 15 years ago, I was living with my high school sweetheart, but the relationship was nearing the end. At that time, I began dreaming about traveling almost every night.
In my sleep, I paddled the Amazon, lived with indigenous people in Africa, I strolled through crowded Indian markets, my dreams giving me subtle hints that it was time to leave for a bigger adventure.
We broke up – it wasn’t easy – but just eight months later I was living in Maryland, and he was living in Greenland. Thinking of that time always reminds me of what it really means to be stuck together in a relationship.
Anyway, it’s just a pipe dream, isn’t it? I mean, for most people, unless you win the lottery or in some other way are independently wealthy, this notion of leaving it all behind for a great big adventure is nothing but something you read about in glossy magazines.
I’ve only done it once, in ‘91, when I moved to the United States, yet I still prefer to travel the way I’ve done it here: among natives, as a participant – I want to get my hands dirty.
People often ask me why I ran away from home, so to speak, and I never quite know what to say.
Then I came across Rita Golden Gelman’s book, “Tales of the Female Nomad.” In ‘86, Gelman became a backpack traveler and when she left Los Angeles for good, her friends asked her what she was running away from.
“I’m not running away,” she writes, “I’m running toward … toward adventure, toward discovery, toward diversity.” Though I didn’t understand it at the time, I know now that when I left my home country, that’s exactly what I did – and I’ll continue to do so, as long as I can walk aboard a plane.