Coming Home

We get on a plane for home in about 30 hours. We have promised ourselves we will write a few concluding blog posts in the next few days. They will be some feeble attempt to gather our thoughts on the year. We also have received some requests to write down some how-to information for long travel. Between our last few hours in HK, the long plane flight and the first few days at home I hope we get it all written because I have this feeling once we really get back, involved in our lives, blogging will be a thing of the past.

Coming to the end, part 1 (there may or may not be a part 2)

by Kate

We will be home in just a few days (late at night July 12 PST to be specific) and folks have been asking me how I feel about going home; am I ready? That is a complicated question. The quick answer is yes, I am ready to be home now. This is a relief to me. When we left for this adventure I was afraid that I would never feel like coming home. With hindsight I see that fear as a reflection of just how deeply unhappy I was in the years before we left. I had stopped being able to see the parts of home that I loved and nourished me. Instead I was really only able to see the fog of summer in San Francisco and the disappointment I felt in my life. The chance to escape was delicious and I truly feared I would never want to go back. Therefore it was with both relief and joy that I first noticed pangs of homesickness. It started with small things: longing for a familiar bed, tacos. Early in the trip I would get a pang here and a pang there, but it would quickly pass. As time went on the waves would get a bit longer and a bit stronger. Homesickness is different from missing friends and family. In Corsica I missed my friends like crazy, but I never wanted to be home; I just wanted to import them to me. Homesickness, at least as I mean it here, is about missing the details of home, like its familiar smells and predictable pleasures. As our trip got more rough and tumble, my homesickness got more acute. I found myself missing clean bathrooms, clean beds, sidewalks. I also found myself longing for familiarity. It started with silly things: knowing how the shower worked or how to walk to the bus. As the trip progressed I found it harder and harder to remember our room number at hotels. By the time we were in South East Asia my homesickness revolved a lot around sweat and creepy crawlies. Specifically I wanted to be in a place (oh, like the place I am from) where there are not so many bugs and snakes and maniacal monkeys. I also wanted to walk out the front door and not be 100% sure that I was going to sweat completely through my clothes several times that day. I told myself I would know I was ready to be home when I thought longingly of San Francisco in the fog.

Being out of the country and pressing the pause button on life was lovely. I got to opt out of all those things that make me just a bit crazy at home. Think about it: 11 whole months without someone telling me about how far or how fast or how hard they ran that day. Living in San Francisco I count myself lucky if I make it a week between lectures on new running shoe styles or marathon training. Also, for a long time I was able to disconnect from the ups and downs of American politics. “Tea-what? Yes, please, caffeine would be nice.” Budget cuts? Ignored them. Overcrowded jails draining tax payers’ coffers? Not on my agenda today. It was nice. It also can’t last forever. At some point I do want to know what is happening in my country, my state, my city. We are already planning to attend a community meeting with our mayor a week after we get home. I am still not, however, looking forward to returning to the land of excer-talk. I am hoping a switch in my lifestyle will eliminate some of it, but I am also bracing myself for the inevitable moment when I hear someone say, “oh I only went for a 15 mile run this weekend, not very far.” I suspect at that moment I will know I am really home. I can only hope it annoys me less than when I left. That is the goal right? To be more forgiving of the annoyances of home and more appreciative of home’s pleasures.

Traveling is exciting but as a traveler you are always an outsider and never a community member. I could watch the elections in foreign countries with intellectual curiosity rather than passion because I really had no skin in the game. I could notice the strengths and weaknesses of places from a safe disconnected vantage point. It was never my place. It was never my community. It was never my game. Being home will change that. As Andrew says, “I didn’t care if Cape Town beat the Reds at the rugby match, but I will care when Stanford beats USC.”

My hope is that we will be able to bring some of the spirit of exploration and excitement of traveling back with us. The English writer Gilbert K. Chesterton said, “The whole object of travel is not to set foot on foreign land; it is at last to set foot on one's own country as a foreign land.” Will it be possible to see San Francisco with new eyes? I have promised myself we will explore our own city with the same vigor and sense of fun we explored foreign cities. I am also hoping I will be able to cherish the little things about home I have missed: the ferry plaza on a Saturday and our local coffee shop spring to mind. I am also excited to cross streets safely and to eat California food. A wise woman once said, “gratitude is the source of happiness.” I am banking on a newly found gratitude for the life I have while not traveling.

Most importantly, I am looking forward to sharing my life with the people I love. We have missed five weddings this year. We also missed the birth of a few babies, some graduations and a Buddhist confirmation ceremony. Our neighbors upstairs had a new little girl when we left. I am guessing she will be walking soon after we get back. It wasn’t until we opted out for a year that I realized just how much living is crammed in to 365 days (or in our case, 335 days). I have missed the small connections I feel with those I love: a phone call to Chicago or Philly without advanced planning, margarita Sunday, Saturday tea with a friend, chatting with my mom in the late afternoon. Of course, my heart ached when we missed the big connections: giant wedding parties with lots of friends, girls’ weekends, graduations, camping trips and baby showers. The ache got worse when my friends were in need and I was impotent to help: a broken foot here, a pregnancy bed-rest there. Normally, I would, at least, bring food and company, but being so far away I couldn’t even do that. I am ready to reenter my community, to join in on the rituals (and occasionally obligations) that make us human. I think John Burroughs said it best: “Travel and society polish one, but a rolling stone gathers no moss, and a little moss is a good thing on a man.” I think it is time to grow a little moss.