When we first seriously started talking about doing this trip, Colleen would always say “you never regret the things you do, only the things you wish you did”. Well, here I am in Vermont, poorer, older, jobless and with nothing to my name except the clothes in my pack and a few books in a storage locker in Philadelphia. Colleen was right, I regret nothing. As a matter of fact I would say that our trip is the second greatest thing I’ve ever done (the first was tricking Colleen into being my wife). What a year. I’ve seen the sun set over the Serengeti and rise over the Himalayas, swam with dolphins in New Zealand, and sharks in Tahiti, seen the Pyramids, the Taj Mahal and Uluru, and swam in the Zambezi at the edge of Victoria Falls.
When I look back on it though, the best part of this trip was directed inwards rather than outwards. Don’t get me wrong, all the things we saw and did were incredible and I will cherish their memory forever, but often they left me feeling a little empty and unsatisfied. To my surprise, my greatest fulfillment this year came from moments of quiet introspection, long talks with colleen, interactions with people we met along the way, and assimilating all the new ideas we were exposed to. It’s funny, but I guess I set out on this trip not really knowing what I was looking for. The beautiful thing about travel is that, if you let it, it will give you what you need, and it did just that. For me, the true gift of the trip was not thousands of pictures or stamps in a passport. It was new ideas, a modicum of self-awareness, a better understanding of our world, and a greater appreciation for Colleen. If that is all this year gave me, I consider it time well spent.
As for lessons learned, there were many, but they were always difficult, never absolute and certainly don’t lend themselves to a short synopsis. The world is a complicated place. Two very simple ideals have been reinforced in me this past year though: there is nothing more important that family and friends, and that doing your best to be a good person should be one’s highest goal. They may sound trite, but in a year of searching, I’ve found nothing to supersede them. If anything concrete has come out of this trip for me it is to follow these ideals to the best of my ability.
So that’s it, a year spent on a journey inward. Not what I planned or expected, but I guess just what I needed. If the outward benefits of travel were not as important as the inward, was the trip worth it you might ask. Surely many of the things I’ve mentioned could be accomplished closer to home with far less hassle and expense. Possibly, but what would be the fun in that? A girl we met in Kathmandu passed along a quote from a book she had read that stuck with me. I’ll have to paraphrase as she was conveying the quote from memory and translating it from French, not to mention the fact that our conversation was almost a year ago and I never wrote it down, but it went something like “Travelling and seeing the world is unimportant, what is important, what really matters, is always right in front of you. However, it is sometimes necessary to first travel around the world to come to this conclusion.” Truer words were never said.
Finally, I would like to thank everyone who has read any of the things I have written. When I started writing this blog, my only intent was to keep people informed about our travels. It quickly became much more though. I feel as though I’ve found a creative outlet that I never knew existed. Writing about our travels has been one of the true joys of this trip, and I very much appreciate your bearing with me and all the kind words people sent us.
I will leave you with a quote from my brother as written in our wedding guestbook. It was difficult to read as he wrote it at 4 am and was incredibly inebriated when he did. It was meant as advice to newlyweds, but I think it sums up everything we learned on our trip around the world nicely.
“Don’t freak out – PAX”
Michael
Montpelier
Vermont, USA
When I look back on it though, the best part of this trip was directed inwards rather than outwards. Don’t get me wrong, all the things we saw and did were incredible and I will cherish their memory forever, but often they left me feeling a little empty and unsatisfied. To my surprise, my greatest fulfillment this year came from moments of quiet introspection, long talks with colleen, interactions with people we met along the way, and assimilating all the new ideas we were exposed to. It’s funny, but I guess I set out on this trip not really knowing what I was looking for. The beautiful thing about travel is that, if you let it, it will give you what you need, and it did just that. For me, the true gift of the trip was not thousands of pictures or stamps in a passport. It was new ideas, a modicum of self-awareness, a better understanding of our world, and a greater appreciation for Colleen. If that is all this year gave me, I consider it time well spent.
As for lessons learned, there were many, but they were always difficult, never absolute and certainly don’t lend themselves to a short synopsis. The world is a complicated place. Two very simple ideals have been reinforced in me this past year though: there is nothing more important that family and friends, and that doing your best to be a good person should be one’s highest goal. They may sound trite, but in a year of searching, I’ve found nothing to supersede them. If anything concrete has come out of this trip for me it is to follow these ideals to the best of my ability.
So that’s it, a year spent on a journey inward. Not what I planned or expected, but I guess just what I needed. If the outward benefits of travel were not as important as the inward, was the trip worth it you might ask. Surely many of the things I’ve mentioned could be accomplished closer to home with far less hassle and expense. Possibly, but what would be the fun in that? A girl we met in Kathmandu passed along a quote from a book she had read that stuck with me. I’ll have to paraphrase as she was conveying the quote from memory and translating it from French, not to mention the fact that our conversation was almost a year ago and I never wrote it down, but it went something like “Travelling and seeing the world is unimportant, what is important, what really matters, is always right in front of you. However, it is sometimes necessary to first travel around the world to come to this conclusion.” Truer words were never said.
Finally, I would like to thank everyone who has read any of the things I have written. When I started writing this blog, my only intent was to keep people informed about our travels. It quickly became much more though. I feel as though I’ve found a creative outlet that I never knew existed. Writing about our travels has been one of the true joys of this trip, and I very much appreciate your bearing with me and all the kind words people sent us.
I will leave you with a quote from my brother as written in our wedding guestbook. It was difficult to read as he wrote it at 4 am and was incredibly inebriated when he did. It was meant as advice to newlyweds, but I think it sums up everything we learned on our trip around the world nicely.
“Don’t freak out – PAX”
Michael
Montpelier
Vermont, USA
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| thank you |
