Wanderlust

Wander Lust:

A strong, innate impulse to travel the world.

I can't get the thought of travelling the world out of my head. This is why Pinterest is very bad for me, all those beautiful travel brochure-ey pictures of exotic and not so exotic places from around the world. 

I think that it is an almost commonly held desire to travel the world; some of us just feel it more strongly than others. I have been struck with a severe case of wanderlust and truly I want to pack up my things, get on the next plane out of the country and travel the world.

But then I remember, "Oh wait...you have school...and work...and family obligations"

That is a serious buzz kill.

Something I will never understand though, is those people who are willing to settle down into a career, a marriage or just a long term relationship with school, work or a significant other without having traveled first.

I don't know, maybe it was just the way that I was raised, my mother after all traveled through Europe and worked in Las Vegas before she got married so I've always wanted to be able to travel before I settled down. 

Truly I think the best gift anyone could give me is a stamp in my passport. 

I had an interesting conversation with a friend the other night as we were just driving through a snowy night and I told her my desire, my need, to travel the world before settling down and while she respected that desire like any good friend would, she said something that honestly I had never thought of.

She asked why I didn't want to travel with, if I may be so cliche, "the one". Wouldn't it be more fulfilling to be able to engage in my passions with the one that I am passionate about?

It made me realize that "the one" for me will be the man that will put a stamp in my passport.

There's a quote from an old movie that I love, "While You Were Sleeping", that I feel has always kind of described the way I think about this.

The very last line of the movie says:

"Life doesn't always turn out the way you plan. But Jack, Jack gave me the perfect gift: a stamp in my passport. He took me to Florence for our honeymoon. I guess you might say he gave me the world."

That's what a stamp in my passport means to me. It means that I have been given the world.

I opened this blog post with a definition of wanderlust and I want to leave it with my favorite definition of wanderlust:

"An irresistible desire to travel to understand one's very existence."