Some Pre-Flight Notes

  
Three weeks before my departure, my brain is whirring and cluttered, a jumble of thoughts on things that need to be done or obtained or otherwise checked off of lists before I go. I have been putting together the pieces of the actual trip for some months now, booking accommodations, reading up on local customs and culture, getting poked in the arm so as not to contract polio or Japanese encephalitis, and purchasing fancy camera batteries and outlet adapters. But in these last few weeks, there are more personal things I am trying to do, loose ends to tie up, friends and family to see one more time before saying goodbye for the rest of the year. In the next 20 days, I'll move out of my apartment, figure out exactly what I am taking with me, make at least one trip to REI, work ten more days at the credit union, get two more shots and make sure my travel prescriptions are filled, finish the painting that's been sitting on my easel mostly done for several months so I can finally sell it to the person who commissioned it, spend a little time with my mom, and throw myself a going-away party. The brain is busy.

As excited as I am to traipse around feeding Irish piglets and helping third-world orphans with their idioms, I do have mixed feelings about actually leaving. It's not that I'm nervous about this trip; people keep asking if I am, and perhaps I should be, but I'm not. Maybe that will happen mid-July, when the time comes to fly from Ireland--a western nation I've visited before, where everyone speaks English (more or less) and it's perfectly safe for me to eat raw produce--to rural Nepal, an utterly foreign place where I will have to relinquish nearly all control over my situation, from food and lodging to communication and toilet facilities. This will be a challenge for me; I am a born planner. A list-maker, a logical thinker-ahead, always more comfortable knowing what to expect. Even if it means expecting something unpleasant, at least I can see it coming. I understand I cannot count on this level of control in Nepal.

And I guess there's some trepidation about being on my own for such a long period. As much fun as I had on my last solo trip two years ago, by the time it was over, I was ready to go home. I felt like I'd been away for ages--and that was only four weeks!

I am also a little sorry to be going away at this particular time. There are relationships--both personal and professional--that I find myself reluctant to walk away from. Of course I will miss my family and longtime friends, but there are also a few people I have only recently had the privilege of getting to know who may have moved on, one way or another, by the time I return. Six months ago, this was not the case, and I would only have been too happy to jet away from the impending Seattle winter (mild as it turned out to be, all said,) but now, with spring's sweetness in the air and the promise of long summer days just around the corner, I am saddened a little that I have chosen to spend all that time away from everyone I know, in Galway's drizzle and Pokhara's monsoon, only to return home just as another winter throws its dark, blustery cloak over the city.

So I'm a little sad and probably a little anxious and I don't know how I'm going to go more than a month without seeing my brother, but at the end of the day, it is excitement I feel most. Ever since returning from my last adventure, I have had daily daydreams about all the interesting places I would like to go, all the great characters I could meet and the grand adventures I could have. A few months of those daydreams and I couldn't bear it much longer. I just had to pick one I could make a reality, make a couple of contacts and book some flights. So here I am, preparing for my biggest plunge yet.  And I guess when I take a step back from the shots and the fear of homesickness and the unquenchable desire to know exactly what to expect from the second portion of the trip, it's just a big swell of joyful anticipation.