I haven't been out of the country since I returned home from Chad in northern Central Africa on January 2nd and for myriad reasons, I won't be able to go on my next adventure for a while. As a result, I'm stir crazy, restless, and feel like I'm about to lose it.
I am the first to admit this is about as vacuous, self indulgent, loathsome, and obnoxious a problem as problems can be. It's not even a problem; it's certainly not something I should be complaining about to strangers on the Internet. And yet, here we are.
People like me -- wanderlust-ers -- are, I am pretty sure, addicted to exploring Earth. Wanderlust-nots may pooh-pooh this, but traveling is like our life fuel, and without it, we start breaking down and behaving badly. To wit:
1.All I do is complain about not traveling and how much I want to travel, even though no one cares. Anyone who once maybe cared a little is by now so completely sick of me complaining they no longer care one bit, and yet... I continue complaining, even though I feel abashed and ashamed of myself.
2.Because I can't travel anywhere during the week, I keep hatching extraordinarily unrealistic last-minute travel plans for weekend "jaunts" to far-off places. This week I booked a flight to Sao Paolo to visit friends for two and half days (uh huh... approximately 10 hours each way for two and a half days -- we are talking addiction people), but my plan was foiled when I learned it will take one to two months to obtain a visa (two weeks if I use an expediter). You will find me in the borough of Brooklyn this weekend.
3.I procrastinate doing anything I should be doing by searching online for last-minute deals to anywhere. This article, for example, is taking me forever to write because for every five minutes I spend writing, I spend 10 not. I am truly getting nothing done, efficiently.
4.If I'm not searching airfares, I'm online staring at maps or cruising around Google Earth deciding (fantasizing) where I want to go next, which makes me worry I'm running out of time (like, in life) to get everywhere I want to go.
5.This fills me with a persistent sense of low-level anxiety (like I'm forgetting to do something important) and it's making me exhausted. So in addition to complaining about not traveling, I am simultaneously ceaselessly complaining about being tired. Good times abound for anyone within earshot of me.
6.Suddenly it seems like everyone I know is traveling somewhere fabulous. Everyone. It's like when you break up with your boyfriend and you're sad, and suddenly everyone around you is traveling -- I mean a happy couple.
7.I spend an inordinate amount of time wistfully staring at my own travel photos. On the plus side... traffic on my website is off the charts!
8.Yesterday I saw a cloud formation that I swear looked like exactly like Greenland.
9.I refuse to wear any of my go-to travel clothes (the majority of which are also my normal, wear-every-day clothes) on the off chance one of my harebrained weekend travel plans sticks and I need to hit the airport fast. This is making getting dressed tricky, which given the current state of pretty much every country in the world (not good), is yet another exceedingly stupid non-problem I am (not) having that embarrasses me.
10.I create loads of unnecessary projects and situations while home to keep myself challenged and outside my comfort zone. Now I have a lot of projects I have to finish, and situations to deal with.
Please don't write yelling at me for being a horrible person. I'm not a horrible person, I swear. I'm just wanderlustful. Who's with me?
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