A Lusty Wanderer?

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People change, or so they say. But, the more things change, the more they stay the same, right?…

T-2 weeks from now, I will leave my country of birth, traveling for several months with no final destination. This might sound like a nightmare or a dream come true, but for me it is the only option. After exiting the Ivory Tower to take on the Real World, I decided that the best way to find my ideal job would be to go to it. There were many other reasons, including an instilled desire to perpetually move and meet people meaningfully different from me. But what clinched the decision to go was a watershed moment commuting home.

I was thinking about this round-the-world ticket I had purchased. It was cheap but had no return flight. I had always known that soon after graduating I would look for a job “in the field”, but I had absolutely no conception of how that would work. As my heart started to beat rapidly, eyes watering, and breath shuddering, I smiled. I knew that I had to go.

Lately, though, I’ve been having cold feet. It’s not that I don’t want to go. It’s that I want to go so badly, it hurts to know that I’m putting myself before everything else I love and want in my life. And while people tell me, “Now is the time to do it. You’re only young once!”, I have a hard time imagining them leaving everything they’ve ever known because they started tearing up on a train.

My point is more prosaic: change is hard. Really hard. And actually changing- your location, your job, your state of mind,  yourself- is harder still. I find it difficult to fathom that I may have changed, that my desire to explore and live unfettered has lessened. Am I still the same wanderlusting traveler excited by every plane ticket purchase, or have I matured into a rooted young adult excited by symphony tickets and trips to the vineyard?

I think I’m probably all of these things, and I think that’s probably OK. Right now, I know I’m leaving, and that’s what makes the leaving so hard. The present is far more challenging to live in than the past or future, and my life to come is just that. So when I’m sitting on my home-bound train, tearing up because I feel selfish for leaving, I think about the person I am becoming. No matter how much or little I value being a nomad, I will always strive to live passionately. I owe that to myself and those I love. Because in our short lives, what is it worth to sit when you could stride, or complete when you could create?

(Answer to come)

A Good Bye

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NYC_Central Park

“I don’t belong anywhere. I belong where I want to go .”

This weekend, I was in NYC to see a fellow traveler and friend whom I hadn’t seen in two years. When he said the quotation above, we were talking about being able to move our lives with ease, and how it felt to leave one place for another. We both expressed our deeply-bound need to explore the new. We agreed it was not something we could ignore, but rather a core foundation of our character. When it comes to relationships, then (both platonic and romantic), things get a bit tricky. How do you explain to those you care about that traveling is more important to you than they are? It’s just not that easy.

My patient friends have often heard me say that I don’t miss people after moving, which is pretty much a lie. I do miss them, but I would never want to give up a chance to see new places and meet new people, just to stay in the same place as loved ones. And of course everyone experiences something like this during a lifetime. But it’s struck me as particularly odd that once I arrive at Destination X, it’s all about me at Destination X. My friends are “back there” and I am here. So,

How do you live your life as a traveler, feeling compelled to keep moving when you also find it incredibly difficult to leave behind your friends and family?

There is no one answer, I suppose. My answer is a common one. I keep in touch with those that I love, and try to see them when possible. The hardest moment is the actual leaving. What I mourn is the fact that things will never be the same. In that moment, I know I’m leaving and I know that when I see them in the future, it will be in a different place, with different people, with different feelings towards each other. So, to those whom I’m leaving soon, I will miss you. And if when I cry, I’m mourning the loss of the way things are.

But who’s to say the future doesn’t hold better things for us? ❤

Rose_MOMA

 

Bluegrass Dragon

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When you grow up in a musical family*, you are so surrounded by music that you see little need to seek it out. I saw little need to seek out new sounds until not so long ago. And then began my bluegrass affair.

On a recent Wednesday, my roommate, his girlfriend, and I packed up a U-HAUL bigger than our kitchen and drove West. Actually, my roommate did most of the packing, but regardless, we all ended up at Grey Fox Bluegrass Festival in upstate New York. I confess. I had never been to a music festival before, and as an extremely amateur musician, I saw this as a failing. Remedy: Grey Fox!

With our mansion popped up, it was time to head down the hill and check out the music. I could write a detailed analysis of the many bands’ musical stylings, but you wouldn’t give two hoots. So listen for youself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1BrFbvOnUVc

I also took a pretty sweet shot of someone hula hooping.
P1020197

Over the next few days, I heard many more gifted artists, and some damn fine tunes. But I also had a hard time letting myself slip into the relaxing bliss that is vacation. Part of me felt that I should be listening to as many new bands as possible.

We could clearly hear the bands on the main stage from our tents, so I ended up staying at our campsite reading for much of the time. And then I realized. That was OK! I didn’t have to get up, walk down the hill, and sit in a plastic chair to experience the festival. I could do it while reading about dragons, the Starks, and an Iron Throne. I just needed to sit back and enjoy the music.

In case you’re wondering, dragons and bluegrass do mix well together.

*Your extended family is basically an orchestra.

“Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity!”

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Why should we live with such hurry and waste of life? We are determined to be starved before we are hungry. Men say that a stitch in time saves nine, and so they take a thousand stitches today to save nine tomorrow.

~Walden, Henry David Thoreau

Before you roll your eyes and stop reading for fear of moralizing aphorisms, fear not! I will talk about a trip, not on a road less travelled, but down the Minuteman Bikeway.

The Minuteman trail starts just beyond where I live, and goes all the way to Concord, Massachusetts. I biked through both Lexington and Concord, those cities we first learned about in US History that witnessed the beginning of our Revolutionary War. I rode through forests and marshes, down dirt paths and paved ones. I saw other bikers, dogs, even endangered species!*  When I reached Concord, I went straight to Walden Pond.**

I sat in the sand to read, enjoying the sun, breeze, and pine-scented air.

Walden Pond, Concord

I then returned to Concord, and strolled along its main streets. I found lots of cute, Massachusetts-based shops selling local goods. I also missed my chance to try cheese, which was a serious disappointment. But at least I got this picture 🙂Cheese Shop, Concord

Next time!

I got another scoop of ice cream, this time ginger and vanilla with oreo, because why not?*** I then biked home at warp speed, having found that sweet spot between physical comfort and awareness of surroundings.

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