The Need To Travel ...

So I was driving to work today thinking about colors and environments ... and states and the places we've experienced.  

This chain of thoughts was triggered by a field of corn ... with its glossy leaves shining in the morning sunlight.  The green was so ... green.   And right above that field was the bright blue of an Illinois sky with a few scattered fluffy clouds floating by.  For a brief moment, it really did look like something out of a jigsaw puzzle ... or one of those landscape photos that people use as computer wallpaper.

So from that wispy thought ... "it's so green" ... I thought about Ireland.  I've never been but people who have traveled there talk about how the countryside is a green like you've never seen.  I wondered if that was true ... if Ireland's fields were a brighter green or a deeper green ... or if it was just the concentration of green ... an abundance of green.

From there I thought about New York ... and the lack of green.  When I vacationed in Manhattan, I left Illinois fully expecting to move.  I accepted that I was going to cross the Brooklyn Bridge and have some kind of Woody Allen, sepia-tinged moment where I heard a distant clarinet playing and would be compelled to immediately procure a job and a third-floor walk-up. 

But that didn't happen ... to say the very least.  I hated Manhattan.  If you've never been, you can't imagine the grey.  I don't even know if I can adequately describe it.  It's just miles and miles and miles of never ending concrete.  Sure, there's Central Park ... but that's one splash of green in a landscape of grey.   You can't even see blue ... because the buildings block out the sky.

From those thoughts ... "you could barely see the sky" ... I drifted to Washington, D.C.   Unlike NewYork, there's plenty of green in Washington.  It's designed to have plenty of green.  The parking is sparse but the monuments are beautiful.  Even the National Mall was impressive ... despite smelling like a sewer in the heat of August.

But the trees.  The trees are tall.  That sounds odd, I know.  But when you're driving in some areas, it's like there are walls of trees on either side of the road.  So you see the road ... and trees ... and sky ... but nothing beyond.  I couldn't figure out why I felt so claustrophobic until I got home to Illinois.  I looked around at the corn and soybean fields and saw all that wide-open space ... the kind of wide-open space that those tall trees don't allow.

In any case ... I'm driving into work and thinking about all these things ... and I'm a little jealous.  Stoney has traveled a lot for his work ... from Maine to Seattle ... from Alaska to Texas.   Sure, Stoney and I have both seen the deserts of Nevada and we've both seen the beaches of Key West ... but I'm thinking about the colors and the environments that he's seen that I haven't. 

My conclusion for today?  We need to travel more ...

Roam if you want to
Roam around the world
Roam if you want to
Without wings, without wheels
Roam if you want to
Roam around the world
Roam if you want to
Without anything but the love we feel

B52's - Roam