just go

If you were to look at the boards on my Pinterest account you would find among them a collection of pictures of places I someday want to find myself. You would also probably notice that a vast majority of those pictures are places in Italy.

I have always wanted to travel. I was born with a need to see the world. Traveling is the only thing you purchase that makes you richer. When I was little our family would always go on vacation in the summer. We would see the Redwoods, the Grand Canyon, Arches and Zion, Yellowstone, Mt Rushmore, etc. Whatever Dad felt like exposing us to next we packed up and went. We rarely stayed in hotels, but instead traveled with our '93 GMC pickup and a travel trailer. It was glorious and from a young age I knew I wanted to explore the world in which I lived.

Once I found out that my family's heritage was mostly German and Irish, I quickly became obsessed with everything German. I learned the language like it was nobody's business and spend just over two weeks traveling around the southern part of Germany after I graduated high school. All that exposure to my favorite European country just furthered my unrelenting need to see new places.

I have traveled to Mexico, Germany, Honduras, and quite a few of the states in the USA. My grandma called it gypsy blood and the rest of the world calls it wanderlust. Whatever it is, I have it. I've always had it. I was born with it.

My wont for seeing Italy started in the art room. There is so much history the hails from Italy on top of the beauty in the land there. The lovely country sides, the colorful villages, the romantic language. When I started student teaching, one of the art teachers spoke very fondly of the times that he spent in Italy. It just made me ache for the experience even more.

And then there's TheBoy, who talks about living there someday. After my visit to Germany I knew I wanted to move to Europe in the future. I don't know when and I don't know how I'll get there, but I know that it's something I am going to do. It's something I have to do.

If I stay in one place too long I get restless. I get moody and irritable. I get frustrated with the routine of everyday life, stuck settled down in one place. The monotony of everything that happens day in and day out. And that's when I know it's time to take a trip. But my trips always seem too short. Eight days in Honduras is not long enough.

And I could have spent way more than two weeks in Germany, honestly.

I can't begin to explain the feeling I get when I'm in a new place, or possibly only a different than usual place, even if I've been there before. There's just something about being in a different country, surrounded by a different culture, with people who are just like you are even though you don't speak the same language.

We don't realize it, at least I didn't until I left the US, but people are people no matter where you go. I tend to get caught up in my everyday life, bills, quarrels with family, routines, barbecues, summers spent at the lake, work, friends, mundane things that take up my time. There are people all over the world who live a life similar to mine. Get up, go to work, take a walk, love their family, paint a picture, whatever whatever. Their language is different, but their dreams are the same. Their hopes are the same.

And I think that's part of what is so fascinating about traveling, about getting outside of your own stupid life and seeing what else is out there. It might be better and it might be worse but it is always worth it. Always.