A FRIEND asked if I could share solutions for upended vacation plans. I said I would try.
People who know me well know that I live to travel. I live for the next trip. The moment I get back from a trip, I start planning the next one. I’m never home longer than a quarter of a year.
All year, I’m working simultaneously on several destinations—those with definite dates of travel and those I’m still eyeing for future travel. A lot of research goes into all these destinations. But it’s all part of the adventure.
This is why I say I always take two trips—the first I take vicariously from behind my computer screen and the second I take directly from the moment I step off the plane.
But as much as I love travelling, I’m actually surprised to find that I’m quite at peace staying home these days. I never thought I’d say this but I think I might have been killing myself, planning all those trips right down to the last detail and working at the same time.
Planning those trips became almost like a second career to me. I’m actually quite happy to have just one now. Well, ok, not exactly. Let’s just say, I’m happy to have one less career, at the moment. Because, let’s face it—I will always have multiple roles and responsibilities.
To not have to plan for another trip is actually a welcome respite. I mean, no doubt, when everything blows over, I’ll probably be flying off to another destination but today, I’m actually at this unexpected place of peace and contentment—at home.
And I want to cherish these moments.
I’m not really sure what’s happening. I’ve always had itinerant feet. Maybe they’re tired. Maybe, they need rest too. But I’m enjoying this break. This time of no planning for new destinations and trips and not looking beyond the next few weeks.
It’s a time of uncertainty and yet, ironically, my inability to plan for the longer term, calms me. It frees me from the frantic pace of my brain and furious pounding of my heart. This uncertainty compels me to be nowhere else but here. Now. In the present.
I can tell you it’s immensely liberating not to have 50 tabs open.
Have I carried the responsibility of planning for so long that I never realized how much it consumed my life? I never saw it as a burden. But I guess it must have been. Or why would I feel such relief now that I don’t have to do it? Well, at least, in the travel department.
Think of this pandemic as another trip—except that you can’t make detailed itineraries and you can’t earn any mileage from it. Like all your other trips, it will be full of adventure. And if you manage to stay safe and survive till the very end, one day, you’ll get to tell some of the most spectacular stories about it.
I promised to try to share solutions for upended vacation plans. Well, here’s me—trying.