Ramblin'

I used to travel all the time. There were a couple of years that it was a rare occasion when I didn't have a packed suitcase in my car or a plane ticket in my hand. The first (and only) year I owned my little Lucy- a black Toyota Yaris (shut up, judgers, you didn't know her)- I put almost 34,000 miles on her. Side note: don't buy a brand new car when you're 19. It'll screw you over FOREVER and your mom will have to swoop in and play superhero and replace your windshield and omit the fact that you once hit a bear when she needs to sell it back to the loan company. I love driving through the desert and the mountains, but Kansas can kiss my butt because, seriously, how boring can your state get?! I once flew on the 4th of July and saw the fireworks from above. And it was awesome. If I'm in one spot for too long my feet get itchy. I've gotta go! I've gotta move! There's an adventure to be had and I need to have it!

...not so much anymore.

Maybe it's because I'm in a stable relationship (whoa) and I don't feel like I need to run from anything, or maybe I've just pushed my desire to go go go to the back of my mind, or maybe I actually like living in Upper Michigan and don't feel the need to go anywhere else, OR maybe it's because plane tickets out of here are like $10,989,976 plus your first born child PLUS you have to ride in a rinky dink plane with like 15 other people that totally reek of BO. Seriously, it's not fun. If it weren't only an hour-ish flight to Detroit, where I'll either have to haul ass through the airport to a terminal at the opposite end of the building because I've got 15 minutes between flights or I'll have a 6 hour layover, so I'll get drunk and make some new friends that I'll only remember talking to when I flip through my camera and see the pictures of us doing shots of what has to be Jager while an airport security guard looks on suspiciously in the background, I'd pop a tylenol or two to knock myself out. I'm a medication lightweight.

I may have developed a slight fear of flying. Gulp.

When did this happen?! When I went back to San Diego last fall for a friend's wedding I almost missed my flight out of here because I couldn't find my St. Christopher medal. I'm not even religious, I just need to chew on it during take off or the plane will skid off the runway in flames. I even have St. Christopher tattooed on my arm, but I will not set foot on an airplane or train or boat or zeppelin or hot air balloon or bicycle without that medal. It sounds silly when I say it. I can't fly without that medal, Roan! Now help me look for it or I'm not going! Or I will go without it and you'll feel really bad that you didn't help me look for it when you're at my FUNERAL! So for the next month, that medal does not leave my neck. I have a ticket to Boston to see my friends there for the first time in two years and I refuse to let myself reach critical bat shit crazy levels about the flights there and back. I'm focusing on my time there.

These are the people that welcomed me to a city I moved to on a whim, where I knew not a single soul. They made my time there hilarious and unforgettable and full of music and laughter and love and flaming bowls of 10 kinds of booze (omg Chinatown!) and $10 manicures and they made me feel at home in a city where the walls of the people are hard to get through. People like them are the reason I started traveling in the first place. I won't let a stupid fear of a stupid airplane falling out of the stupid sky ruin this for me. I won't I won't I won't. So move over, future new best friend at the airport bar, the first round is on me. I've got a long flight.