
THEY CALL ME A TRAVELLER or why I can’t stay back home longer
After years of travelling I divided my life in two halves. Life on the road and “normal life”
I think it’s pretty easy to imagine that part on the road. It’s living for the moment, full of adventures, new people, new places and different cultures. Full of adrenaline and happiness.
On the other side, when I am back in my hometown, everything is quite different. And it’s not because I don’t like my life there. I love my city, my job, my family and friends my neighborhood and view from my window…. It’s mainly because all of this is always dragging me into the toxic swirl of stereotype. And that is for traveler – the worst.
They say if you start travelling, there is no way back.
You will never be completely at home again, because part of your heart always will be elsewhere. That is the price you pay for the richness of loving and knowing people in more than one place.”
-Miriam Adeney
I completely agree.
And I am pretty sure you also know some people who just came back from their travels and they are planning a new trip immediately. It’s because “we” can’t really fit to the normal form of living anymore.
Most of my friends have stable jobs, serious relationships, they are starting to have families, taking a mortgage, building homes. And most of them are happy.
I am happy when I am waking up in the desert, exploring hidden caves, walking in the mountains with the mountain goats, trying weird local specialties, helping at the farm in the middle of nowhere only for food and bed, communicating with locals even if I don’t speak the language. I am happy when everything I need is in my one backpack and I don’t know where will I be tomorrow. I am happy when every day is the beginning of new a adventure.
So basically when I am meeting my old friends, even the very best ones, each of us is elsewhere and the relationships itself becomes a little bit shallow.
I think that’s the most common problem for travelers, because everybody needs some progress in life. And everybody has it’s own way how to do it. So if we ( speaking for travelers in general) can’t find some progress back home ( or in any place where we might feel a little bit stuck) we keep coming “on the road” because we know it will always give us new experience, skills and points of view. Simply say: we can grow.
Also when you travel so often, people just get used to it. So the regular question when someone meets you is “Oh you are here?”
Yes I am for now. But I don’t know for how long because probably I’ ll get bored here. I don’t feel like I belong here anymore.
“Well, what do you expect if you are always somewhere else?”
Fair enough. But I am going away mainly because I am not happy here. I am growing in a certain way, other than yours and so I am creating bigger and bigger distance between me and the world back home. It’s living in a circle. To travel- Get home-Get bored-To travel.
Maybe in this point you are asking, why I keep coming back. It’s a good question indeed, but I haven’t found an answer yet. I think it’s a question of courage- to leave your past behind. Because it’s very hard to say goodbye to the place where you grew up and which is your only connection with the world of “normal life”
So yes, I keep staying in my loop of two lives but I guess the question is for how much longer…?
And what about you? Do you have the same problem or did you solve it already?
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