Directions [by Joseph Stroud]

Anyone who knows me knows that I have an affinity for moleskine journals.  Sparked my junior year of college, I have since started a mini collection of unfinished yet severely tarnished journals.  In the spirit of this trip, I bought a new one: unscathed; unmarked that is until I went on a search for the perfect words to grace the first page.  Rifling through "Good Poems," a so-called textbook from my poetry class, I knew Garrison Keillor would come through for me with this compilation.  And he did, of course.  In the section entitled Trips was this poem by Joseph Stroud:

Directions

How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable

Seem to me all the uses of this world

Take a plane to London.

From King's Cross take the direct train to York.

Rent a car and drive across the vale to Ripon,

then into the dales toward the valley of the Nidd,

a narrow road with high stone walls on each side,

and soon you'll be on the moors.  There's a pub,

The Drovers, where it's warm inside, a tiny room,

You can stand at the counter and drink a pint of Old Peculiar.

For a moment everything will be all right.  You're back

at a beginning.  Soon you'll walk into Yorkshire Country,

into dells, farms, into blackberry and cloud country.

You'll walk for hours.  You'll walk the freshness

back into your life.  This is true.  You can do this.

Even now, sitting at your desk, worrying, troubled,

you can gaze across Middlesmoor to Ramsgill,

the copses, the abbeys of slanting light, the fells,

you can look down on that figure walking toward Scar House,

cheeks flushed, curfews rising in front of him, walking,

making his way, working his life, step by step, into grace.

peace to you,

liz

In Preparation

I've been a little overwhelmed these past few days.  Actually, I have been "a lot" overwhelmed.  Thursday night I was unable to fall asleep until 3 in the morning or later.  Friday, I spent the day running errands, picking up paychecks, depositing paychecks, eating dinner, and... packing.  I am just one small percentage of the whole of women who believe that in order to travel, and travel well, we must pack everything we have ever bought.  Combing through my bathroom that evening, I found myself gazing longingly at a bottle of hand lotion I bought sophomore year that's still full, thinking, "I need hand lotion for my trip."  I picked it up, looked at it for a second before my mind snapped to and yelled, "Down, Liz!  Put the hand lotion back in the basket."

I was convinced I needed all my jeans (which would seem like a good idea if I owned two pairs.  But, as my friend Neil--who owns one pair--now knows after a recent conversation about denim, I own close to 10 pairs of jeans).  Deciding which to bring and which to leave home has been a source of contention for me.  I'm still wrestling over that, as well as how many sweaters, thermal tees, socks, and pairs of underwear should join me across the pond.  I want, I need, all my clothes to see England... don't they deserve it after hanging from my closet or being stuffed in drawers for so long?

I had another close-to-sleepless night on Friday.  Had my alarm not woken me up at 8:30am, I do believe I could have slept at least until 10am.  But alas, my last shift at Talbots was waiting for me--four hours that I aimlessly walked through with my mind half asleep, my body on the brink of drunkenness as I drove home to, once again, devote hours to packing.

I finally reached a point close to 10 last night where I could fit everything in my suitcase and maybe try to cram more.  I crawled into bed shortly after, experiencing 9 hours of uninterrupted sleep that was so deep I dreamt my family was going to spend two weeks on vacation in Vietnam after a short trip to Hong Kong and before that: Australia.  I attribute these destinations to two things: my friend Seth's trip around southeast Asia, and the many chapters devoted to the Vietnam War in Tom Brokaw's "Boom!  Talking About the Sixties," my latest finished read.  I woke myself up after expressing concern to my father that the Vietnamese don't like Americans and we could be killed.  Lovely, I tell you.  Just lovely.

I couldn't fall back asleep because I realized I forgot to pack my converter, and my flat iron.  My nicely packed suitcase now needed room for two more bulky items, and I crawled out of bed to check the size of my converter case.  Only the case didn't hold a converter--at least not the kind of converter I needed.  Instead, it was a converter for internet access.  Not hair dryer access--internet!  As I perused the internet, trying to find a store that would sell what I needed I became increasingly frustrated as I realized society's obsession with interconnectedness and lack of concern for basic beauty survival like blow drying and styling hair.  I think I may just make a trip to Boots upon landing in London and buy a flat iron that fits British outlets.  

So I hate packing.  And I hate preparing for trips because I inevitably forget something.  Tuesday evening can't get here fast enough, yet I think I'd like to hold off on boarding the plane until everything is settled, which I fear would take much longer than two-and-a-half days.  Oh goodness. 

Giving Up and Letting Go

Never do I feel more like a control freak than when I plan a trip.  Phone numbers and addresses and tickets suddenly pile up in my head, and before I know it I have clicked on a word document, my fingers typing out an itinerary that begins with the first hour of the first date that I leave.  Every minute detail I could ever need is saved and printed, filed away in a folder that will accompany me on whatever journey it is I will be taking.  

My planning style, unfortunately, always consists of tension between concentration and procrastination.  While I can't survive without an itinerary, I hardly ever create it until two or three days before my departure.  I inevitably forget to print out reservations after I made them months earlier, resigned to call the airlines or hotel in order to reconfirm my original confirmation number.  I put off asking friends if I can stay with them until the last possible moment before I hit sheer panic.  I'm always late and hardly ever early.  I am a self-professed traveling contradiction.

Most, excuse me, I mean all of my solo trips have taken place stateside.  Since having declared a year and a half ago that I would be going to England sometime within the year after I graduated college, I've had several sleepless nights in which I try to convince myself to make reservations at L'Abri and order plane tickets and search for a railcard.  Reservations were made this past summer, tickets purchased in the fall, and I just finished that hunt for a railcard yesterday only to realize I can't get it until I land at Gatwick Aiport (grr).  I still need to complete my itinerary, discuss whether my mom or I will buy tickets for the London Eye and Vinopolis and the Roman baths/costume museum in Bath.  Dad and I still need to decide when he flies to London, when we fly to Italy, and how we'll be getting back.  All in a week, I keep telling myself, all in a week.

With my heart beating a little faster these days, my mind racing as if completing a 200 yard dash to the finish line, I'm trying to remember what it really means to travel.  That beyond itineraries and tickets and reservations are experiences that I could never really plan.  Getting lost and missing connections and learning new transportation systems are all part of the adventure, the stories I'll tell when I get back.  No one will care that I paid way too much money to go on a wine tour--they'll care that I got lost trying to find it, or dropped my wine goblet (like some people I know), or tried the best wine I've ever had.  

I'm nervous to travel alone in a foreign country, but I think I'll take to it just as I have flying alone and driving alone.  No one tells you that some of your best reflections take place behind the windows of a plane, a car, a train.  You just have to know that they do; you have to believe they will because they always have.  I'm trying give up my need for control (but never the itinerary), and let go of my fear and expectations.  I'm trying, I really am, and I think that when I get back my trip will feel more like a hundred experiences, like footprints that created new paths in snow rather than walking along a pre-existing plowed road.  At least, that's what I'm hoping for.