Why Do We Wander?
Noel Coward pondered: What explains this mass mania to leave Pennsylvania? And clack around like flocks of geese. Demanding dry martinis on the isles of Greece.
Although said in fun, I guess there is some room for discussion here. Why do we leave home? Dorthy made it pretty clear “there’s no place like home,” didn’t she? So why do we wander to what lies yonder?
I imagine it’s not any one thing, but a collection of reasons.
Wander For A Change of the Ordinary.
Sometimes we need a change of scenery. Just as our feet need a new pair of shoes on them after a long day, our eyes need to see a different view. Our eyes wander constantly.
Wander for Knowledge.
Or we can call it just plain old curiosity. What’s behind door number two? What’s inside the box? Is there something down this street? Where would we be if Chris Columbus had no sense of adventure? Right side or left side of the brain, it needs some stimulation. It needs to wander.
In 1869, Mark Twain commented that “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts.” It’s always gratifying when a guest tells me they have a new understanding or appreciation for a place or people.
Wander For Self Worth.
Over the years, we have had some interesting characters as passengers on cruises. There is a group I like to call the collectors. They collect ports and countries. I have had a few guests walk to the end of the gangway, step onto the pier. Pivot, and walk back onto the ship saying. OK, I can mark this place off my list.
One lady would wait for the local authorities to come on board. She would get her passport from the purser and insist they stamp it. Then she would give it back to the purser, and she went to breakfast. Never leaving the ship but with written proof, she had “visited” these places.
And then there is the lady on the world cruise who rents a private plane to visit a nearby country. So she could get a stamp in her passport. It was several hours flight each way. She was on the ground at the destination, no more than 5 minutes before flying back to the ship. I don’t remember the exact cost, but there were five numbers to the left of the decimal point.
I like to have at least one experience in a location before I say I have “been there”. Even better if I have time to wander. It just keeps coming back to collecting experiences.
Officially, I guess all the people above have “been to” these places. I am not going to get into a discussion on what constitutes a visit. Just don’t let the pride get to the bragging/one-upmanship level. That would be a sin.
Appreciation.
I often get the question, “If you could live anywhere, where would it be”? And I always disappoint them by saying “Right where I live now.”
“Ohhh, don’t you want to live in Paris?” No, I don’t. Visit it any chance I get, yes. But if I lived there, I wouldn’t be sightseeing and playing. I would be doing laundry and washing dishes and paying bills.
When I did live in New York City, I rarely saw Broadway Theater. I had no time for the Metropolitan Museum, and I only saw the Statue of Liberty on postcards. There was very little time to wander.
At the other end of the spectrum, I have been to places where “homes” were nothing more than boxes. Cardboard and scrap pieces of corrugated metal. Electricity is available only during certain hours. And a meal is whatever they can catch, often with their bare hands.
Both types of places make me very happy with my own home. Every time I return to the U.S.A., I am grateful to be home. Even with all our problems, it’s not a bad place to live. There sure are a lot of areas that are worse.
What a blessing it is when you get to wander. To the park, the pier, or to paradise. Don’t waste the opportunity.