There’s a lot of subjectivity when it comes to a word. Three people standing on the subway might have three very different interpretations to what the word success means. In a way that’s the beauty of words – their inherent difference in each person’s mind makes them fodder for art and debate. With this said, I’ve wanted to consider what exactly is a traveler? What does that word mean to me?
Now technically anybody who has ventured outside of their home city is by definition of having traveled, a traveler. However, this doesn’t encapsulate the spirit of the word. Traveling is an attitude more than an action. Not only stepping away from the life one knows, but choosing to do it again and again is what characterizes a traveler. Fear of the unknown is replaced by allure of the unknown. The excitement of that which is yet undefined – that which must be defined by them - is what the traveler seeks. To a traveler, the question becomes equal to the answer – what is behind that next corner?
At least once in their lives, probably more, a traveler has relocated to another country. People take trips to new places and skim the surface, the traveler immerses themselves. A new identity is born from this interaction – one that they cannot go back from. This will forever define them and mark them as slightly different to their country men. To the traveler this distinction is something they quietly relish.
Fluidity and freedom of movement is what the traveler wants. Cars, houses, and furniture enter the fold slowly.... if at all. Possessions and serious responsibility lock a person to a place. This goes contrary to the traveler’s pathos and propensity to dream of escaping into the unknown again. Foreign lands always beckon... and the promise of a return to that feeling they once had of freedom and transcendence echoes in their ears. Age may silence it slightly, but this is a melody that they cannot escape; a melody that they wouldn’t want to escape from - even if they could...
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