Skip to main content

Traveler's Limbo

Traveling can put you in limbo. It’s in between places, destinations, cities, country sides. It’s blurred pictures, scenary, suns, moon, clouds. It’s changing time zones, ecology, climates, and soils. It’s full of anticipation of the next destination, the next adventures, and the strangers who will intrigue you with new conversations and points of view. It’s also feeling sadness of leaving the last place, the understanding of that place that you worked to build, and the companions that you made.

Traveling from one place to another can feel like floating in thin air or on open water—completely free—or it can feel suffocating tight with anxiety of just wanting to be there.

These emotions can easily pull you from the present. They can mute your senses of what’s around you at that moment, at that space in time, at that second of your life that you’ll never get back.

I know lots of people (me included sometimes) who take sleeping pills or other drugs/alcohol to numb these feelings. This isn’t bad by any means because sometimes it is necessary to maintain sanity. But there’s also something beautiful about allowing those raw emotions that traveling brings about to circulate through you. They can take you on a journey through yourself and how you view the world around you.

On this impromptu trip home where everything came together in one hour—from me thinking I wouldn’t be home until August to me calling my family and saying I’d be home in FOUR DAYS—my excitement level is 460% over the top. No waiting or countdown necessary; my 4 day journey began 12 hours after purchasing the flight. It would be an understatement to say that after 2.25 years of imagining this moment, I’m in shock.

Let me backtrack a second though- an easy coping mechanism for whenever I felt homesick during my time on the African continent was to tuck away those places, people, happy memories, and comforts of home in a little protected place inside me. I always have them with me, but I don’t let them come out to play with my imagination. But now that the plane ticket is in my inbox, I’ve unlocked that overflowing file labeled as “My Life in America.” My heart and mind are flooded with emotions that keep flowing out of me—keeping my mind and heart racing to try to keep up with this great onset of everything. My whole body and spirit is consumed with trying to process and control, or at least organize, these emotions.


At this moment though, as I watch the crescent shaped, rippling sand dunes fly past me outside the window, I don’t want to think or process it all. I’m challenging myself to return to the present. I’m in flux, moving, traveling, seeing, and experiencing, right now. I can be excited to return home, but still allow myself  This is life; life does not start when that plane touches the runway in America or I run into the arms of my awaiting loved ones. It’s here now and everywhere.

Popular posts from this blog

"Bland" American Food

Here in Liberia, more than I've ever experienced, people talk about America. The linked history these two nations share creates an intriguing dynamic. Many people go to America to study, to buy a house, to find a job, to visit family, or simply to see the place. And this is normal. Now, across the globe everyone eats right? Food brings us all together across cultural, socioeconomic, and geographical barriers. I often get the question from people curious about America and wanting to travel there, 'what do Americans eat?' In Liberia, people eat rice every single day. It is their staple food, and they cannot go without it. (They also ask me if there is rice in America.) Sometimes I answer by going into descriptive detail when explaining that Americans don't necessarily have a “staple” or traditional food and that our food culture tends to reflect our varied melting pot society and geographically diverse environments. The ones who have visited the State...
Read more

Where the hell am I?

Reverse culture shock. You don’t think it will actually happen. But then it creeps up on you. Going from Malawi, even the capital in Malawi, to Cape Town, South Africa has been like going from zero to 10,000. There are so many choices at the grocery store, so many expensive cars and pothole-less roads, so many smartphones, and so many women wearing trousers and leggings all around. The skyscrapers are enormously tall and construction of new ones is happening with massive mechanical machines. People rush around with headphones in, completely tuned out of the world and their surroundings. Shops are chock-full of material goods, all set up enticingly, and restaurants have so many food options. People are a beautiful blend of mixed races and cultures. There are wide sidewalks, pedestrian crosswalks, and stoplights. The produce and meats at the grocery store are all wrapped up in plastic. I feel so lost and over stimulated. What happened to my simple, village life? ...
Read more

Moving to the Big City

April is coming to a close, and I need to do another update on my life. A whooooole lot changed this month, but the biggest changes were my location, my job, and my health. Last month in March, a bunch of emotional things happened. Two of my closest friends left Liberia, dry season heat was at its peak and making me miserable, and the lack of work at my site was reaching a tipping point. I thought long and hard about my options. My favorite little 9 month old is almost walking I felt torn. I didn’t really want to leave Liberia, but I also wasn’t sure how much more of my situation I could emotionally handle. I felt like I’d lost control over every aspect of my life; my well-being, privacy, daily routine, and happiness all felt dependent on my environment and the people around me. I tried not to stress about this realization, but I also felt like I’d reached an inescapable and unhealthy place. Thankfully, things sort of fell into place all at once. As I was...
Read more