Monday, September 21, 2009

simply serendipitous.

Despite still having an upcoming trip to the west coast and at least two more visits up to Boston before I leave, the departure date encircled in red still seems close and will continue to draw closer and closer!

Surprisingly I have come to really appreciate Long Island, can you believe it? After high school I couldn't wait to get away and throughout BU I tried my best to maximize my time in Boston. I had anticipated feeling antsy, bored and above all, frustrated that I'd be living at home for 2.5 months. I love my parents, but Long Island? I wasn't expecting to find the place exciting by any means. Turns out, I was wrong.

My typical day over the past few weeks have consisted of bike rides, trail runs, beach days, city days all interspersed with various Asian (including mom's), Indian, Italian, Greek and NY-Jewish foods. Being car-less, I now primarily get around with my bike. Interestingly enough, you end up noticing more about your space while riding one. All the while finding new spots you also discover the ones that you'd been missing all these years because of driving. Meandering around town lately has been exhilarating and comforting. The experience is familiar but the perspective is vastly different.

Leaving here will be difficult - and despite the normally expected nerves, it's also matched with excitement and brilliance.
"We need to travel. If we don’t offer ourselves to the unknown,
our senses dull. Our world becomes small and we lose our sense of wonder. Our
eyes don’t lift to the horizon. Our ears don’t hear the sounds around us. The
edge is off our experience and we pass our days in a routine that is both
comfortable and limiting. We wake up one day and find that we have lost our
dreams in order to protect our days. Don’t let yourself become one of these
people. The fear of the unknown and the lure of comfortable will conspire to
keep you from taking the chances the traveler has to take. But if you take them
you will never regret your choice. To be sure, there will be moments of doubt
when you stand alone on an empty road in an icy rain, or when you are ill with
fever in a rented bed. But as the pains of the moment will come, so too will
they fall away. In the end, you will be so much stronger, so much clearer, so
much happier, and so much a better person that all the risk and the hardship
will seem like nothing compared to the knowledge you have gained."

~Kent Nerburn, Letters to My Son