“Travel is love”
The other day in Berkeley, I walked past a travel store. It had this sign out front…

…and this image in the window, a woman holding a heart-shaped–I don’t know, maybe a subway map?–of New York, with the words “Travel is love” above.

I think about travel a lot. About getting “left behind” because there are so many places I want to go but that I don’t want to go to on my own, and time’s a-wastin’.
I haven’t really been on a vacation in a long time. In August of 2010, on my own, in Eat Pray Love mode I guess, I went to New York City.

And I didn’t mind being alone, exactly. I loved being in New York. I loved walking around Manhattan and Brooklyn at my own pace, slowly strolling through the Met, sitting in Central Park, stumbling on beautiful places nestled away throughout the city.






And late at night, in my extremely cramped little Manhattan hotel room…

I loved hearing the city outside, the endless energy of it.
But when I look back on the photos I took of New York, I feel like there was a removed, observational aspect to the whole thing. I was at a bit of a distance, looking but not participating.



A woman may have strength to wait and I have waited a long time and it has not been easy. But I grow tired of waiting. I believe that solitary experience can have a lot of value but I also think that my solitary travels have taught me that I don’t want to travel alone anymore.
Japan might be where I want to go more than anywhere else. I’m fascinated by the juxtaposition of ancient and modern. In January of 2014, from Bangkok, I wrote this post, Rainfall in Tokyo, about traveling alone, being in Bangkok alone, and how I’d passed through the Tokyo airport. That’s still as close as I’ve gotten to visiting Japan. I worry sometimes that I’ll never make it there, or that when I do, I’ll be too old to experience it the way I’ve always wanted to–bars and arcades and nightlife in addition to temples and tranquility.
I was working at a friend’s place last week and she put on a Lianne La Havas record. This song “Tokyo” killed me.
I am neon
Cold neon
Not a mystery
All I’ve every known is
How to be alone
It comes naturally
Oh baby, can I hold you?
Such a cold, cold night
I thought I wouldn’t need to
I’ve got my neon lights
I’m longing just to feel you
To know that it’s alright
Oh baby baby baby baby
I’m out of sight
I’m out of mind
Alone in Tokyo
You’re out of reach
Wrong place, wrong time
Alone in Tokyo
Here I go again
To and fro again
Overnight delivery
Grew a thicker skin
Now it’s growing thin
You can see right into me
And it’s easy for me to imagine being alone in Tokyo. Amidst the cold neon. All I’ve ever known is how to be alone. But when I picture myself in Japan, it’s not alone. It’s with someone I can hold in the window of our hotel room as we look out at the city together. I don’t want to travel alone anymore, but I also don’t want to wait much longer to start traveling again.
You never deny
What you feel inside
I disappear when you’re not here
In my life
I can’t slip away when I see your face
I lose my confusion
Your love is the place where I come from
When I’m on my own I’m lost in space
My freedom’s a delusion
Your love is the place where I come from
My sadness don’t lie
My feelings can’t hide
I just can’t deny
What I feel inside
Travel is love, and I want to travel with someone whose love is the place where I come from.
Notes
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griffinsierra said: Beautiful.
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