Long before the crack of dawn this morning, I dropped my daughter off somewhere and stood there, alone in the parking lot under the pull, pull, pull of the heavy full moon.
And I felt it happening again, this yearning, pulling inside that I thought was gone from my life for good somehow all these past years with kids and schools and places to be. Now, slowly, it has crept back, a longing for places I
want to visit one day, other places where this full moon hangs heavy in the sky, pulling moisture up through crops I don't yet know and lighting the way for people I have yet to meet.
Yes, all other garden bugs aside, I have been officially bitten by the Travel Bug again.
And it has bit with a vengeance. I find myself doing something I hadn't done since I was 16 or so--making a collage of photos from magazines of places I'd like to go (I seem to be leaning toward walking trips of places like Slovenia). But this time, I'd like to go there "on assignment," not as a tourist. I'd like to live and learn and write about whom I meet and what I experience.
Oh, I don't see this happening tomorrow. I have years left before the kids are off on their own, and we have many bridges to cross (although the four of us have often talked about taking a year or a summer and heading off on a quirky excursion--I've had several "concepts" but none have gained traction just yet. I thought the karate-across-the-USA idea was pretty good--I called it
Getting Our Kicks on Route 66 --but I got a lot of groans on that one).
Yet the important part is that I now
see it, this vagabond future that takes me a bit where the wind blows me and brings me home with stories and change that can only enliven a marriage based on mutual admiration for each other's independence. I see it, and suddenly I have a direction. I find myself folding laundry and questioning whether the item in my hands is "world worthy."
Is it packable?
Can I dress it up and down?
Can I see myself strolling down a cobble-stoned side-street in Prague wearing it? I also find myself rejecting much that makes up the conversation of suburban life (not necessarily a new development, but a
renewed one).
New ceramic tiles for the bathroom? Gag me.
A second home on the lake? Stick pins in my eyeballs now, please. I can barely take care of
this house (and, yes, the lawn needs mowing yet again).
The latest sale at the latest store at the latest mall? P-lease. No more clutter. No more
stuff. There is no place in my small carry-on or the closet of my
life for things like that.
I am alone, lost in my thoughts of my excursions, gazing out the window of today to the horizon of tomorrow. I am eating peasant food and meeting simple people and walking dusty roads, from Australia to Andalucia, New Zealand to Newfoundland. And perhaps, one day, Slovenia.
I read once that the sensation of pleasure is comprised of anticipation, experience and memory, and that brain scans show that anticipation stimulates the pleasure center of the brain the most out of the three.
And so, therefore, it doesn't even really matter if I end up doing these things or not. Imagining them as possibilities is joy enough.
I see my daughters meeting me at strange ports, walking arm-in-arm with me down ancient city streets, eating grains from a bowl with villagers around a fire deep into the night. I see my candle-lit hut as I write love letters to my husband and plan our rendezvous on distance shores. I see a wedding party parading through a town square and myself joining in, swept up by the festivity. I see elderly hands mixing a traditional dough passed down generation to generation and placing my hands on the dough to feel the warm pulse of humanity as well. I see myself tired and spent and happy.
And so, as the
FoodShed Planet Summer Reading Pick of the Week, I invite you to join me on the revery and curl up on a picnic blanket or a pool chair or a hammock with an issue of
National Geographic Traveler, a magazine that I just started reading a few months ago that showcases places around the world with the same evocative photography as its sister publication,
National Geographic.
Just be sure to wear your walking shoes. Because there's no telling where reading something like this might lead.
Long before the crack of dawn this morning, I dropped my daughter off somewhere and stood there, alone in the parking lot under the pull, pull, pull of the heavy full moon.
And I felt it happening again, this yearning, pulling inside that I thought was gone from my life for good somehow all these past years with kids and schools and places to be. Now, slowly, it has crept back, a longing for places I want to visit one day, other places where this full moon hangs heavy in the sky, pulling moisture up through crops I don't yet know and lighting the way for people I have yet to meet.
Yes, all other garden bugs aside, I have been officially bitten by the Travel Bug again.
And it has bit with a vengeance. I find myself doing something I hadn't done since I was 16 or so--making a collage of photos from magazines of places I'd like to go (I seem to be leaning toward walking trips of places like Slovenia). But this time, I'd like to go there "on assignment," not as a tourist. I'd like to live and learn and write about whom I meet and what I experience.
Oh, I don't see this happening tomorrow. I have years left before the kids are off on their own, and we have many bridges to cross (although the four of us have often talked about taking a year or a summer and heading off on a quirky excursion--I've had several "concepts" but none have gained traction just yet. I thought the karate-across-the-USA idea was pretty good--I called it Getting Our Kicks on Route 66 --but I got a lot of groans on that one).
Yet the important part is that I now see it, this vagabond future that takes me a bit where the wind blows me and brings me home with stories and change that can only enliven a marriage based on mutual admiration for each other's independence. I see it, and suddenly I have a direction. I find myself folding laundry and questioning whether the item in my hands is "world worthy."
Is it packable?
Can I dress it up and down?
Can I see myself strolling down a cobble-stoned side-street in Prague wearing it?
I also find myself rejecting much that makes up the conversation of suburban life (not necessarily a new development, but a renewed one).
New ceramic tiles for the bathroom? Gag me.
A second home on the lake? Stick pins in my eyeballs now, please. I can barely take care of this house (and, yes, the lawn needs mowing yet again).
The latest sale at the latest store at the latest mall? P-lease. No more clutter. No more stuff. There is no place in my small carry-on or the closet of my life for things like that.
I am alone, lost in my thoughts of my excursions, gazing out the window of today to the horizon of tomorrow. I am eating peasant food and meeting simple people and walking dusty roads, from Australia to Andalucia, New Zealand to Newfoundland. And perhaps, one day, Slovenia.
And so, therefore, it doesn't even really matter if I end up doing these things or not. Imagining them as possibilities is joy enough.
I see my daughters meeting me at strange ports, walking arm-in-arm with me down ancient city streets, eating grains from a bowl with villagers around a fire deep into the night. I see my candle-lit hut as I write love letters to my husband and plan our rendezvous on distance shores. I see a wedding party parading through a town square and myself joining in, swept up by the festivity. I see elderly hands mixing a traditional dough passed down generation to generation and placing my hands on the dough to feel the warm pulse of humanity as well. I see myself tired and spent and happy.
And so, as the FoodShed Planet Summer Reading Pick of the Week, I invite you to join me on the revery and curl up on a picnic blanket or a pool chair or a hammock with an issue of National Geographic Traveler, a magazine that I just started reading a few months ago that showcases places around the world with the same evocative photography as its sister publication, National Geographic.
Just be sure to wear your walking shoes. Because there's no telling where reading something like this might lead.