Thoughts of Traveling
Yesterday my interested in going back to Colorado and Kansas for a visit quickly rushed back after being suppressed due to financial restraints. I have this desire to revisit places I’ve left. I don’t know what it is. Perhaps it’s a longing to travel into the past, or the quest to know that where I’ve been still exists. Perhaps it’s about control, the ability to travel freely and visit places of the past. Revisiting the places where I served as a missionary is certainly about control. To be able to be in those places, completely free from the limitations of travel or action imposed on missionaries, will be satisfying.Another reason to visit is because I feel I owe it to people there who helped me in so many ways. To have made the effort to visit those people and personally thanked them for what they did for me is something I’ve wanted to do. To some, I promised I’d take them out to dinner. I have every intention of doing so; however, first I need to get there.
The cost of the trip is more than $650. This includes the round-trip air fare and a car for my entire stay, as I plan to be driving quite a bit as I venture from Colorado Springs to Kansas, and perhaps a trip to Salt Lake City. Though I’ll likely have a place to stay, the trip could easily total $1,000. That’s quite a lot of money. Though I have the funds to do it, thanks to extra funds from my student loans and a little from my savings account, I’m not sure if it would be wise to spend them this way. On the other hand, as a friend told me today, “Joel, you’re 22, this is something you’ve been wanting to do, and now you can. You should go before you have more reasons to not be able to.” I can’t help but to think my friend is right.
Thinking about this trip, which I’ve mentally slotted from October 13th to the 22nd, has allowed me to fall into a state of melancholy wistfulness. To be back in those places and to take in the sights and sounds would be great. I loved the places I served. They were absolutely beautiful. To be able to freely travel about them would be wonderful. Colorado Springs is a place that I could see myself living at someday. The beauty of the ever present mountains, the briskness of the winter air, the softness of the gentle snow, are all things I miss.
How could one not miss the landscape which inspired “America the Beautiful”?
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