In which Our Hero plants a seed so grass may grow.
For the last 7 years, I’ve known my next destination only upon leaving my current one. The farthest ahead of time that I bought a plane ticket was one month, and I ended up changing that flight. More often, I’m choosing the next place less than a week ahead of time.
In many ways, it’s magical:
- Carrying everything I need on my back gives me complete self-sufficiency. Like a human turtle.
- Traveling light became a necessity. A dear friend has a tattoo that says “Travel light.” A good policy.
- I’ve learned to make friends quickly. When lost, I talk to strangers. When found, I do the same.
- I’ve shared small moments that mattered: teaching a baby to use an airplane tray table; splitting mangosteen with a man in Laos.
- Surprising reconnections: three people I knew in high school, all in northern Thailand. A man I met in Indonesia who later booked a room in my flat at clown school.
- Humans are the same everywhere. Then again, culture is real.
In others, it’s tough:
- Feeling unrooted. I’ve sacrificed depth for breadth. (Depth within breadth is its own type of depth. But it only goes so far.)
- Insufficient community. The people you see every day or week are the people you build strong bonds with.
- Lack of habit. I used to be a habitual person. Moving into a van really changes things. Selling the van without a new place to live changes things even more. It’s hard to eat your normal daily breakfast when the monastery you’re visiting fasts until noon.
Today I received the final document for my apartment purchase. I’d like to live there for a long time. I’d enjoy tacking my kids’ heights on the doorjamb until they eventually leave to find their own Laotian mangosteen.
The deal isn’t done yet, and then there’s still renovations, so I’m hesitant to get too excited.
But the yearning for stability is strong in me.
Julian Wise 