The Slow Poison of Wanderlust

It's past midnight. 

The grandfather clock in the kitchen rings down its late hours with a calm and steady beat. My temple whirs and spins. Thoughts of the world, the future, God. Wanderlust crawls into my veins and slowly releases its lust for movement. Is it crazy that I feel stagnant even when things are going well? When I've made a niche, and settled in with a steady job and good friends? I long to move forward, outward, and inward a lot of the time, too. It’s been two years since I’ve last felt that rush of travel and I feel pulled to all directions. Portland, California and Arizona to visit old friends. Bali and France for a good time. Even Africa and the Middle East, places I know God will reign supreme. I ask myself, would it be so bad to call a place my home for a bit longer? Would budding romances make me want to stay, or would it not be enough? I guess I have a lot of questions. I take time to breathe, remind myself that there are higher ways above my own and it's not solely up to me to provide the answers.

Sometimes, I smell the rain and it brings me back to a place where I once sat on a window seat and watched it pour for hours over the Tuscan hills, breathing in that fresh and vibrant air.
I have to remind myself some days that all I did for hours upon hours of time was wander through hidden alleys along the Venice rivers and fall in love with doorways. It doesn’t seem real. It seems like fading dreams. Dreams of walking into ancient churches so filled with the spirit and old nonnas bowing their heads. The smell of coffee, pastries and pizza as the sun creeps over the city of Florence that has stood for hundreds of years. France seems a distant memory. I can barely remember the smell of perfume that laid upon my skin as I peeked into stores held aside for the nouveau riche. My feet making pockets in snow that sweet London hadn't seen in years. Is all my travel going to be like this? Distant memories and some old pictures? What about when I am losing my mind in old age, losing time pockets and people? I will remember I went, maybe, but I want more.

I want to so enrich my soul in places that forgetting is impossible. I want places to sink into me and become more myself than my very skin. 

For a long time I’ve wanted to travel with friends. Pack the bus up, lay some blankets as we ride by guitar music over the open plains. Or backpack a country, or three or ten. I mostly desire to travel with my spouse, or heck, even a boyfriend. Somebody that I deeply desire to share every aspect of it with. To giggle and point and cry over the sheer beauty we’re experiencing. To lay in one another’s arms on beaches, in desert sands and shabby hostels. I believe it will come, though it might look very different than I picture it. It could be feeding children in remote cities and handing out clothes to the shamed.

I see pictures of other countries, read stories and this ache in my chest starts building. My breath catches, and this deep ache just keeps rising. Sometimes there are tears, sometimes anger, sometimes there’s just a quiet peace that this story isn’t over, this chapter simply isn’t written for me yet. I know I’m supposed to go. That I’m not meant to sit still in one place for so long. That maybe I’m not even meant to live in America. I get so frustrated that I haven’t figured out how to JUST GO. To leave, for good this time. I’ve packed up my life and ran away twice before and can do it again, but I need more permanence, a way to keep moving. This helps, just getting it out there… but my feet are itching up a storm and I think another adventure is in store.