Why Travel?
M just got back from NYC and I got a bit jealous hearing her stories. It was a good form of jealousy – the travel bug that I have just kicked into overdrive and I started thinking about how soon I could go back to New York and hang out.
Most of my travel is not escapism (Travel channel fantasies notwithstanding) – it has more to do with exploration. My parents used to be annoyed with my need to wander the streets of Nairobi; they thought I’d be considered homeless or mentally not right. I guess they didn’t have the wander bug that I did. But I liked walking around and finding things… I ran into homeless kids in an abandoned house, saw a riot in one of the slums (from the safety of a bus upon which I was the only occupant, praying for my life), and tracked “The River” (a sewer river near my house) for a few miles.
Southern California was built for the Lucky Wander Boy like me. Instead of walking, however, it usually meant driving around. Up to Pasadena, over to Hollywood, down to Laguna… the best thing about it was in any of those places there was a coffee house or bookstore – a safe “chill” spot to relax and take it in.
More recently I’ve discovered that many people don’t like to travel. It isn’t just the Dakotas that make me think this; I have good friends in Southern California for whom a trip to L.A. is anathema without good reason. Some people are content to never lift their eyes upon a different horizon1.
Why is this?
For the travelers who are escape artists, there is something to learn here about peace and contentment. For the explorers there is the lesson that sometimes reuse is more virtuous than the new; instead of buying a new water bottle each time you’re thirsty, refill an old one that you emptied. Build depth, not breadth.
But I can’t help but feel a sense of loss when a person I meet doesn’t want to go anywhere. I can’t help feeling a bit of elation when I’m talking to a fellow traveler. It’s one of those basic assumptions you wonder about when you meet someone different. I’m sure some people can never figure out, say, why I’d love to go to Ireland.
Why or why not travel?
1Norris has an interesting take on farmers who don't travel. In her book she talks about how they refer sometimes to their land as themselves: "I'm dry right now... ". If land cannot travel how can a person who is that land go without it?
6:46:30 AM 
|
