I just finished watching The Secret Life of Walter Mitty and as most travel movies do, I now want to travel. To see the beauty he hiked and experienced, especially when the weather here is subzero temperatures! I was reflecting on a post I wrote a year and a half ago: http://swzanussi.blogspot.com/2012/07/travelingdenotation-vs-connotation.html
And I thanked myself because I do not feel any differently, in fact I'm reaffirming what I said then. However I do have a new perspective. While I may not have seen as many exotic places recently, I've still grown in many new ways. I'm learning what life with an actual base involves, having regular friends, acquiring furniture and furnishing a place one calls home, and even a relationship. I don't crave wandering like I used to because my family, friends, and life are here now. I'm making a footprint in this community, one that I care about, where I was born. I've learned just as much in launching ComMUSICation and still felt blown away by the beauty of snow, the river, the sunsets here, up north, etc. You don't have to go far to appreciate the world.
But I do still want to conocer el mundo (get to know the world) and that does require more travel. I want to explore regions like southeast Asia I have never been and know little about aside from the stereotypical smiling people, spicy food, and elephant rides. Something in me needs to touch it, smell it, see it, hear it, taste it with my own senses, again reaffirming my sensual nature in the most literal sense of the word. Yet now I want to do it, knowing I am returning to this base, this community, my home. Knowing that my travels are temporary, enriching experiences, and at this stage in life, not my home.
So as I see Walter spotting ghost cats in Afghanistan, trekking the hills of Greenland, and meeting people, my spirit still lusts for those experiences, to adventure; though I'm not sure I can call it wanderlust anymore as it isn't the desire to wander. It's to conocer. To relate, to get to know others more, so I can learn more about others and myself. And that, my friends, cannot be learned from a book or travel documentary. That must be experienced for one's self, to reinvigorate, to spark curiosity, and grow one's self as a human. Unless I am going somewhere for work or to visit family, I am done traveling, etymologically speaking traversing. I am ready for a new type of exploring: to conocer, to understand.
And I thanked myself because I do not feel any differently, in fact I'm reaffirming what I said then. However I do have a new perspective. While I may not have seen as many exotic places recently, I've still grown in many new ways. I'm learning what life with an actual base involves, having regular friends, acquiring furniture and furnishing a place one calls home, and even a relationship. I don't crave wandering like I used to because my family, friends, and life are here now. I'm making a footprint in this community, one that I care about, where I was born. I've learned just as much in launching ComMUSICation and still felt blown away by the beauty of snow, the river, the sunsets here, up north, etc. You don't have to go far to appreciate the world.
But I do still want to conocer el mundo (get to know the world) and that does require more travel. I want to explore regions like southeast Asia I have never been and know little about aside from the stereotypical smiling people, spicy food, and elephant rides. Something in me needs to touch it, smell it, see it, hear it, taste it with my own senses, again reaffirming my sensual nature in the most literal sense of the word. Yet now I want to do it, knowing I am returning to this base, this community, my home. Knowing that my travels are temporary, enriching experiences, and at this stage in life, not my home.
So as I see Walter spotting ghost cats in Afghanistan, trekking the hills of Greenland, and meeting people, my spirit still lusts for those experiences, to adventure; though I'm not sure I can call it wanderlust anymore as it isn't the desire to wander. It's to conocer. To relate, to get to know others more, so I can learn more about others and myself. And that, my friends, cannot be learned from a book or travel documentary. That must be experienced for one's self, to reinvigorate, to spark curiosity, and grow one's self as a human. Unless I am going somewhere for work or to visit family, I am done traveling, etymologically speaking traversing. I am ready for a new type of exploring: to conocer, to understand.
No comments:
Post a Comment