This, the Moment Before the First Step

You must know that old phrase, a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step? Well, this is the moment before that step. The moment when everything is in place and all you can do is wait, and contemplate the vast distance you are about to cross. And I do mean metaphorical, emotional, and personal distance as well as physical. I find myself wondering how Miss Rumphius felt, 38 hours before setting off to travel the world.

If you do not know who Miss Rumphius is, then you must find your way to the nearest library or bookstore and head down into the children's section. Miss Rumphius, or the Lupine Lady, is a 1982 story by Barbara Cooney. In it, our eponymous character grows up listening to her grandfather tell her stories of his world travels. She vows that she, too, will travel to faraway places when she grows up and then she will return home and live by the sea, and he makes her promise to do one more thing: she must do something to make the world more beautiful. So, up she grows, and she travels the world, and eventually she slips a disk getting off a camel, and she decides to retire to the sea. She achieves Crazy Old Lady status and spends her time sowing lupine seeds, which, come Spring, do in fact make the fields more beautiful.

As a child, I wanted to be Miss Rumphius. Her life seemed exciting and full and glorious. Now I am older, and about to set forth on my own world travels. Now, I have a few more questions for Miss Rumphius. Was she ever lonely? Did she leave anyone behind when she set off for tropical climes? Did she ever wish for more in her life? At the story's end, she is a Great-Aunt, but she, herself, seems to be alone. In many ways, I think I do not want to be Miss Rumphius. But perhaps I can have my cake and eat it, too.

Miss Rumphius seems to live in the days before air travel: certainly in the days before internet. But I can email and phone and video chat with home instantaneously. Even the post can make the 8,000 mile trip in just two weeks. In an emergency, 19 hours of flight time could get me home. Even this blog is a way to stay connected: one long, rambling letter to my friends and family and the world at large. And I am only going for a year, which though it seems a bit like forever, is really not so long at all.

So I take will take Miss Rumphius with me, in my heart (and in my suitcase: along with Blueberries for Sal and One Morning in Maine). As I wait, and finish packing, and try to envision what my life will be like next week (to travel to Mars could not be less alien), I will try to remember the second thing Miss Rumphius did: she came home and told stories. Travel is a form of personal growth, a way to enrich the soul and help us better understand the world we live in. This world we live in is already beautiful in so many ways, but hopefully, if we can better understand the people with whom we share it, we can make it even more beautiful.

This will not be an easy journey. I have already had doubts, and second thoughts, and emotional crises that have left me awake in the dark, paralyzed with uncertainty. I have doubted my reasons for going, my own desire to go, my motivations, my own confidence in my ability to endure the hardships. Rene Descartes said, 'If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things." I have faith in my decision to go. To me, faith is not belief without question, but belief because there are questions. This is going to be hard, but it is also going to be amazing. There's a lot I don't know, and a lot I am going to learn. And, you'll be with me the entire time, so really, there's no reason to be afraid.