Contemplating the World

Sue and I had a quiet Sunday making lists and last-minute appointments before we leave for our Last Big Trip next Tuesday. It has been 7 years since our next-to-last Big Trip to the UK in 2015. 

This one is less distant and for fewer days, but exciting for many reasons that may become apparent in our journals while we’re there. It will definitely be a different palette of colors. It will smell, taste, and sound as different from Portland as anywhere we can imagine. 

We think it will be our Last Big Trip because (a) the climate catastrophe continues, (b) my savings account will be exhausted after this and everything costs double what it did before Covid, (c) traveling becomes more fraught as we age. But for one last great gasp of change, of the unfamiliar, of the long-dreamed-of, this. Coming soon.

We have been assembling maps, plans, lists, and lists of lists. We have done the homework, read the books, looked at the Youtubes, and studied photographs and paintings made by famous artists as well as those who remain anonymous or unappreciated. We have promised each other not to push, not to strain, not to feel we must see every sight, visit every museum, or stop at every roadside attraction. Meanwhile we are still here in Portland. Being here. Among the great trees and the strangely hot days of October. Sunday at the Grotto, in the meditation chapel and then strolling among trees suffering from heat exhaustion (the trees, not us). Little butterflies of excitement keep fluttering in our bellies. Tiny horses pound their hooves across our chests. One. More. Big. Trip. Soon.