[This was a work in progress, tweaked slightly by Cookie for sharing here]
Random, randomer, randomest
An enthusiastic reader asks: “Just how random are these notes, anyway.” Clearly, pretty much! This is not at all a travel blog: “Yesterday we went here and did this; today we went there and did that.” The notes are more stream-of-conscious reflections on assorted discoveries, sights, flavors, wonders and experiences, that don’t happen until they happen.
Travel vs. Touring
Coming onto 3 years since Cookie and I launched our adventures in Europe, I see big differences between touring and travelling. Thought I’d gather some perspective before trying to describe how they appear at this point.
Touring is an activity, a pastime, maybe a temporary diversion from life as usual. Travel can be an ongoing adventure, an opportunity to live a life that’s personally interesting, distinguished from boredom: a slow death via unkind cuts.
Travelling, for however long, is anything from a hobby to a way of life. Touring is observing something. Travelling is soaking it in, making the taste and texture a part of your life. Touring is checking out cool new cars. Travelling is long, luxurious test drives. Like the difference between a diet and a real, permanent change in how you choose to eat. A new everyday life vs. a short break from your old everyday life. And it’s as permanent as you choose to make it. Travel offers pacing versus scheduling. A chance to take it all in in deep, deep breaths. If this is Tuesday, it must be Tuesday.
Roman memory
As we have gone absolutely nowhere and done absolutely nothing recently, I wanted to relive this oddity that somehow missed an earlier edition.
Returning to our airbnb, after a fabulous dinner in Rome, late one evening, an unusual apparition floated ahead in the fog. An ominously glaring neon sign read ASS19. What on earth, we giggled, do they sell at anASS19 store? (Full disclosure: we had certainly polished off a bottle of red over dinner.) (It was a big bottle!) What an odd riddle to cap the evening. A last backward glance into the misty shroud showed ass19 to be missing. In it’s place lurked a suspicious looking neon sign promoting PIZZA [Laughed our ass19s off all the way home.]
Not why we came here
We left California to see Europe, not to spend months hunkered down in an apartment. It’s a great living space with a wonderful ocean view, but it’s not why we’re here. Still, there are worse things than gazing at the ocean in a soft breeze on a sunny day. Even if you aren’t going anywhere for a while.
Sadly our fluid, freely traversed world may become a thing of the past. Will it be because behaving responsibly in a pandemic is boring?